“I’ll take it,” I said on a strangled breath when none of the numbers had changed.
I’d take it and be so dang grateful.
My stare shifted to the door when it shoved open, already knowing Thatch would be next.
“Waiting in the hall?” I assumed, and watched as a smirk stole across his face.
“Obviously,” he muttered as he grabbed the chair I’d ignored and carried it over to the same place Briggs had stood. “Your nurse threw a fit when I followed her and Briggs down here, but they made us wait long enough to start coming back here. I wasn’t going to let her change her mind once Briggs had his turn.”
An understanding rumble built in my chest, but I didn’t respond otherwise as his amusement was replaced with grief when he did the same thing Briggs had done: taken her still form in. Studied her. Mumbled, “She’d be mad that they have her sleeping like this—it’s vulnerable.”
A breath left me that might’ve been laced with amusement. “Thought something similar. She doesn’t sleep like this.”
He swallowed thickly as his head bobbed. Without taking his stare from her bandaged neck, he asked, “Can I see?”
Didn’t take long to figure out what he was referring to, because I knew it wasn’t the wounds on her neck. “Briggs tell you?”
“Never seen him cry, even when his brother died. Of course he told me.”
That same possessive feeling coursed through me, but I lifted the photos for Thatch to take. “Probably because this could’ve been him,” I explained roughly. “It could’ve been Lai—” I choked over the name and the rest of what I’d been saying and locked my trembling jaw.
It could’ve been Lainey.
It could’ve been Kaia.
It could’ve been their unborn baby.
There’d been near-constant threats on Briggs’ family because it was Briggs’ company. He felt the weight of this too well, and now he was seeing it play out with people who were as good as his family.
Handing the photos back to me, Thatch leaned over the bed to grip my shoulder and waited until I met his stare. “I’m sorry,” he said, letting me hear all the worry and fear he’d been masking just seconds before. “What do you need?”
“For her to wake up.”
His head bobbed slowly. “From us,” he amended.
“There’s nothing,” I said immediately, knowing it was true. “Y’all are here, but you don’t have to be. I don’t know how?—”
“That’s funny,” he said over me. “Almost sounded like you were saying we didn’t need to be here.” With a squeeze to my shoulder, he released me and shifted slightly away. “We’re family. We don’t go through things alone. You know that. And I know if it were me and Chloe right there, no one would be able to get you farther than the waiting room until she was cleared to go home.”
When I eventually nodded, Thatch’s focus shifted to Mallory as he bent closer to her. His voice was low when he said, “Monroe, this guy’s insufferable on a good day, and that’s with you smacking him every five seconds. Need you to wake up so you can keep him in his place. Yeah?” Placing his hand on top of her head, he whispered, “Come on, little sister.”
With a slow exhale, he straightened away from her, only to sit in the chair he’d brought over. “I don’t understand, the surgeon didn’t say she was in a coma.”
I was sure my jaw would shatter at some point before this new day was over. “They haven’t officially said that to me. When I was brought back here, the nurse said they were waiting for Mallory to wake up from surgery. She didn’t. The nurse just told me the pain meds could also be making her tired, but to focus on the positive that she’s breathing on her own. So, I don’t know.”
Thatch grunted.
“Thatch, I don’t know how long she’s been like this. I don’t even know what time it is,” I said on a humorless laugh. “I don’t know where my phone is. That clock’s broken.” I gestured in the direction of the analog clock on the wall without looking away from him. “And Briggs was talking about everything fromyesterday, so all I know is it’s at least a new day.”
Pulling his phone from his pocket, he said, “It’s just after eight in the morning.”
We’d gotten back to her condo close to six last night. Which meant we’d beenherefor around fourteen hours.
“Go home,” I told Thatch. “Tell everyone to go home.”
“No,” he said as if the idea alone was insane. “Not only does no one want to, it probably isn’t safe right now. We’re still waiting to hear from Rush anyway.”
My brows drew tight, but my stare drifted over Mallory like a magnet drawn before snapping back to Thatch. “What do you mean? Where’s Rush?”
