That seems to get through to him because he finally does, stalling long enough for me to see the shine of tears in his eyes. His voice comes out choked. “Oak.”
“Yeah, I’m right here. You’re okay. Everything’s okay.”
His stubble is rough on my palms as I take his face in my hands, letting loose a slow, measured breath in the hopes Lawson will follow. He does, inhaling shakily before easing out his own breath. I can hear the medics approaching from behind us, but their voices don’t register.
“I think I lost it,” Lawson says, sounding gutted.
“Lost what?”
“My acorn. The acorn you gave me.”
My brain stutters and restarts, my pulse joining the fray. “It’s okay. It’s just an acorn.”
“It’s not,” he says vehemently, his hands coming up to hold my wrists. They feel damp, and I’m fairly sure it’s not sweat. “It was your promise, Oak. And I lost it. I can’t find it.”
Ah, God.
“Law…”
The paramedic’s voice is closer now. “Are we okay down here?”
Lawson’s eyes hold mine, the whiskey-brown imploring me. I pull him into my arms, my lips pressed to the side of his head, Lawson shaking as he hugs me back tight. The man smells like earth and iron, the latter having me squeeze him tighter, as if I could somehow call back his wounds.
“It’s okay,” I promise him. “I’ll find you another, Law. It’s okay.”
My heart breaks right down the middle when I hear Lawson start to cry. I’m pretty sure the man is in shock, but he doesn’t let go of me as the paramedic starts to look him over. It takes a long minute before I can persuade Lawson to unlatch his arms, not wanting him to go but knowing he needs medical attention. I pray his only injuries are the small cuts on his hands, but there’s every chance he got banged up when the truck tumbled over. The airbags clearly deployed, andalthough there’s no blood on his head or body that I can see, bruising or whiplash or, hell, even a concussion could be a concern.
I stick right by Lawson, my hand in his vise grip as the paramedic finishes examining him. My parents are waiting up on the road, the police here now, talking to the other woman who has her own paramedic nearby. Everything passes so quickly, and, before I know it, Lawson is being loaded into the ambulance.
“You can ride with him,” the paramedic tells me, nodding down to my hand still wrapped firmly in his.
“Thanks,” I say, belatedly recognizing the man as someone Lawson and I graduated high school with. “Appreciate it, Duke.”
Duke gives me a nod and a smile before stepping back to grab his supplies, his partner getting into the front of the vehicle to drive. The police remain with the woman, although it’s clear there wasn’t a collision. Her car isn’t damaged in any way, and I catch her telling the cops that Lawson managed not to hit her when she swerved to avoid a deer. He drove off the road instead, risking himself in the process, the damn fool.
I make a mental note to chew him out later, even though, realistically, I know it’s no one’s fault. Only an accident born from split-second reactions on both the woman’s and Lawson’s part. No one’s to blame, not really.
But fuck if he didn’t terrify me all the same.
I brush Lawson’s hair back as we wait, the dark brown messy atop his head, threaded through with a few silver strands these days. He’s staring up at me from his position on the gurney, tiredness starting to show on his face and in his eyes. A good bit of pain, too, although the paramedic found nothing butcuts on his palms and a few on his knees from the glass that tore through his jeans. The neck brace is only a precaution.
The man escaped so many worse fates.
“You scared the shit out of me,” I tell him, my voice wobbling.
Lawson’s hand tightens in mine. “Didn’t mean to.”
That has a rough laugh jumping out of my throat. “Jesus, you think? I need to call your family.”
He looks as if he tries to nod, but the neck brace doesn’t let him.
Duke hops up next to us, grabbing hold of the door to shut us in. “Ready?”
I catch my dad’s eye. He waves me on, pointing to my mom and then our vehicles. Understanding they have it in hand, I give Duke a nod. “Ready.”
He shuts the door, and the ambulance sets off.
There are so many things to take care of. Getting my phone from my dad once they join us at the hospital. Letting Lawson’s family know what happened if they haven’t already heard. Making sure Lawson himself is given a pristine bill of health after rolling his damn truck while trying to findme. Apologizing for leaving the way I did in the first place, when all I could see was Lawson telling me he wasn’t interested in a romantic attachment with me, even though that wasn’t the case at all.
