I relax into the couch, hoping his initial grumpiness is over. I give him the CliffsNotes version of my life in the past two years, purposely steering clear of mentioning Beck. Which causes the guilt on my shoulders to extend, but there is no sense in riling Garrick up. I need to ease him into the discussion about my boyfriend.
“Wow. I have missed so much. I’m happy you found your dad’s family but sad to hear about Nana.”
“Thanks. I’m still struggling to accept it. Sometimes I think I hear her voice in my head, and I get a sharp pain in my chest when I realize I’m only imagining it.”
He places his hand on mine. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you.”
I squirm on my seat, stuffing the last of my cupcake into my mouth so I don’t have to answer.
“Want more coffee?” Garrick asks.
“I’m good.”
“It’s no trouble. One of the nurses will make us some,” he says, pulling a cell phone out of the pocket attached to the side of his chair. “Mom has a top-of-the-line coffee machine in the kitchen. It won’t be a macchiato, but it’s decent. Only the best for Ivy.” He rolls his eyes, and I force a fake smile. His brow puckers as he deliberates over the keypad on his phone.
“Want me to do that?”
He shakes his head. “My medical team want me to use it as much as possible so I regain dexterity in my hands, but it’s hard. Sometimes I don’t remember how to spell a word, or I get a pain in my fingers when typing.”
“I imagine it would be worse if Helena hadn’t been working on you while you were, ugh…in a coma.”
His head picks up. “You can say it.Coma.” He drags out the word. “It won’t change the fact it happened by not saying it.” His tone is a little snippy, but I ignore it. “Yeah, Helena’s been great. She pushes me hard, but it’s what I want. I need to regain muscle and strength.”
“It looks like it’s working.” I cast another glance at his broader arms.
“Liking what you see, baby?” He waggles his brows.
Thankfully, the door opens, so I get out of having to answer.
The nurse comes in carrying a tray with two coffees. Garrick makes her take a cupcake for her and one for Hudson before she leaves.
“So, I’m guessing you know what day today is?” I tentatively ask as I sip my fresh coffee.
Garrick snorts. “Yeah. It’s not like I’m ever going to forget the day my life turned to shit.”
He says it with such venom, in a way that is not characteristic of the guy I knew, that I almost choke on my coffee.
Garrick pats my back until I’ve regained composure, but his hand lingers, making me uncomfortable. “This hair,” he murmurs, threading his fingers through the soft strands, and I regret not putting it up. It wasn’t a conscious decision to leave it down. It’s how I normally wear it these days, but I forgot how much Garrick loves my hair. His eyes flare with heat when he lifts his gaze from my hair to my face. “Remember how I used to wrap it around my hand when I was fucking you from behind?”
Two red dots sprout on my cheeks, and he grins, reaching out to touch me. “And this blush. So pretty. It still gets me every time.”
I jerk away from his touch and remove his hand from my hair. “This isn’t appropriate anymore,” I quietly say, hating the pain I see flashing in his eyes.
“Oh, that’s right,” he says, snatching his coffee from the holder and drinking from it. “I forgot that while I was in a coma, fighting for my life, you were out fucking some other guy.” His hand shakes, and I can only watch in horror as the cup falls from his fingers, spilling hot coffee all over his legs.
“Oh fuck.” I hop up, frantically looking around the large room for a towel or a cloth or something to mop up the hot liquid. “Let me call someone.”
“Why?” He looks at his sodden jeans and the coffee spilling down his legs and onto the floor before lifting sad eyes to me. “There’s no panic. It’s not like I can feel anything.”
Tears threaten as my chest tightens, and I’m speechless for a moment until I get a grip. “Your skin can still burn even through jeans. You need to call the nurse.”
I step outside, while the nurse attends to Garrick, sitting on the bench in the hall with Hudson with a heavy heart and pain rattling around my skull.
“How bad is it?” he asks, a few minutes later, and I know he’s not talking about the hot coffee debacle.
“Bad.” I swallow thickly. “He seems normal, happy one minute, and then it’s like a switch flips, and he’s angry.”
“Yeah. He’s experiencing the full gamut of emotions.”
