“Damn.” Brock exchanged looks with the other men. “If I tell her there’s a John Doe in a coma who might be her brother, she’s gonna want to go and ID him, and if it’s him, she won't want to leave. This is gonna ruin her chances. But I can’t hide it from her, either.” He rubbed his hands over his face.
Wolf clapped a hand on his shoulder. “Some advice? Tell her and then take her to see him this morning. If you’re planning a future with this woman, you don’t want to start by hiding anything from her. Be there with her and for her. It’ll have to be up to Brianna what she decides to do if that’s her brother, and you’ll have to support any decision she makes.”
“I second that advice,” Jake said. “And don’t let her out of your sight after that. Voice of experience here.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Brock said, dreading the next few hours. He didn’t need a hunch to know this was going to be a long, hard day for his woman, which meant it was going to tear him apart too.
* * *
Brock jogged with Brianna’s hand in his as they hurried down the hospital corridor. He felt his ring on her finger and hoped that it reassured her that he was there for her one-hundred percent. It damn near broke his heart to take her aside this morning and tell her the news. She’d been jamming with the rest of the finalists, a look of pure bliss on her face, and he’d been the one to take that away from her.
“We’re just ahead of the rest of the family,” she said half to him and half to herself.
When they got to the room, Brock stopped Brianna from going in. From the hall, he could hear multiple machines pinging and humming inside and wondered why he wasn’t in the ICU. Was Brian stable, or was there just no hope?
“Do you want to wait for them and go in together? This is going to be hard, babe. Shocking, even.” He rubbed his fingers over hers, their hands still joined.
“You’ve done this before, haven’t you?” She looked up at him with compassion on her face that slayed him. “You must have, being military.”
“Yes, I have. And it’s always hard to see someone you care about looking so vulnerable when you can’t do anything about it. So many times I would have traded places because it seemed easier to be the one in the bed than the one beside it, helpless.” He stroked her cheek. “But I don’t want you thinking about me. I want you thinking about you, okay?”
“We still aren’t even sure it’s him.” She looked at the door pensively, then took in a deep breath and let it out. “I have to go in. He’s my twin. I have to be the one who sees him first.”
“I’m right here with you, baby.” Brock folded her into his arms and kissed the top of her head. She pulled away, stood on her tiptoes, and kissed his cheek. Then she opened the door.
The man in the bed looked deflated. His face was mottled—bruise-colored camouflage. His right arm was in a cast, his fingers splinted together. Not all of his fingernails were there. He was on oxygen and the IV in his other arm led to a pole with several bags dripping saline and medications into the line.
Brock threw his arm around Brianna as she approached the bed. She looked into her brother’s face—even under the bruising there was no mistaking their similar features—and bit her trembling lip. Brock felt a horrible cold fear trickle down the back of his neck looking at Brian. The twins’ resemblance was enough to give him the momentary illusion that it was Brianna lying in that bed busted and broken and hurting.
“Did he get into a fight?” Her voice was so quiet and small, almost childlike, and Brock’s heart grieved for the frightened little girl she’d been, now looking at her one-time compatriot in that fear. The one person who ran away with her to find what safety they could, had run to the wrong people.
“Baby, I…I think it was more than a fight. His nails are gone.” He couldn’t bring himself to say the wordtortured. Now his fury grew. He wasn’t Brian’s biggest fan, but the man didn’t deserve this. Brock tamped down his emotions—fury would do him no good here—and thought. If Brian had been tortured, this was either about revenge or he had something someone wanted, pure and simple. Information probably, but about what? He cursed himself again for not taking the man aside when he had the chance.
Brianna shivered and he pulled her closer. “What did he do to make someone…dothat?”
“I’m gonna find out, don’t you worry. Whoever did this will pay.”
Voices at the door made them turn around. Sonny came in first, April and Hannah on his heels. Claire came in behind them. She was the first to gasp when she saw Brian. She ran up to the bed and stopped just shy of touching him. “My poor lost boy,” she said quietly. Her daughters flanked their mom.
Sonny caught Brock’s gaze. The man looked nearly broken for a moment before his defenses went back up. He nodded at Brock who nodded back, then turned his attention to the bed.
“Papa, what can we do?” Hannah slipped her hand into Sonny’s. She was a little older than Brianna, but her voice had taken on that same little-girl quality.
“We just have to pray and hope that he comes back to us,” Sonny said. He put his other arm around his wife, who had her arms around April. Sonny looked over at Brianna in Brock’s arms. “Baby B, I’m so sorry you had to walk in on this.”
“I had Brock,” she said simply and definitively. “I was first, but I wasn’t alone.”
“Speaking of,” April said as she crossed the room, “I need something happy right now. Let me see it. Photos in texts never do anything justice,” she added, grabbing Brianna’s hand. “Oh. My. God. It’s stunning.” She held up Brianna’s hand to show the others. “Stunning.” Claire and Hannah oohed and ahhed.
“Son, can I have a word with you in the hall?” Sonny asked Brock.
“Oh, Papa, don’t,” Hannah said, hanging onto his hand.
“You don’t know what I’m gonna say, and even if you did, it’s none of your business,” Sonny told his daughter.
Brock gave Brianna a squeeze. “I’ll be just outside.”
When he and Sonny had walked a little way down the hall toward a small waiting room, Brock started. “I apologize for not coming to you before proposing to Brianna.”
