And weeps.
For once my deafness is a gift, because if I heard it, those broken sobs torn from his throat, it would break me too, clean in half.
He clutches me as his massive shoulders roll and bunch, shudder and vibrate under his leather jacket. All I can do is set my other hand on his hair, damp with sweat, and hold him to me while he breaks up on me like a wayward vessel of old on the rocky coast of a storm swollen sea.
Because I was born deaf, I can often sense things that others don’t. The prickle of unease climbs up my spine, vertebra by vertebra. I don’t have time to look at my father or at Leah, because my attention is snatched by two men dressed in black. They’re wearing matching jackets with yellow writing on the front.Security.
They approach my bed like they have a right to be there. I look pleadingly at my father, but his jaw settles into a hard, determined line and he makes no move to stop them.
Their arms close around Edge’s, one at each side, catching him off-guard. He didn’t hear them or see them coming, so it takes him a second to fight back as they drag him away from me. He jerks hard and the average built men on either side of him are no match for the unholy rage of my man. I catch the look in his eye, dangerous, cold, wild, like a spooked animal about to go completely wild to defend and protect what he loves. It’s instinct for him, ingrained into the very essence of his being.
I don’t have time to be thrilled by that awesome display of power, the latent curl and flex of his muscles bunching below his jacket, the way his face hardens and his hands ball into deadly fists. He could tear the world apart with those hands, hands thathave known and are unafraid of even the most brutal violence. I have to stop him before he does damage that he can’t take back.
“Stop it!” I struggle upright in the bed, even though it takes all of my strength and my arm protests the movement with a brutal burning throb that makes my eyes tear up all over again. Every protective instinct in me roars to life and it’s not just Edge who turns into an animal. “Don’t do that to him!”
I watch Edge freeze at my command, the muscles in his legs bunching and straining against his jeans as he plants his black biker boots firmly on the tiled floor, but I know it won’t be long before he lands a savage blow into one of those men. He’s one step away from being a wild animal with its paw in a trap, yowling and clawing and fighting like an unhinged demon. I don’t want him to hit one of those men and end up getting charged for it, or even worse, going to prison.
“Stop it, I said!”
That time, my scream, torn from the black fissures of pain shredding me wide open, stops the men in their tracks. They raise their heads and stare at me. One is younger, probably in his early twenties. He looks at me with a mix of pity and uncertainty. The other, a more seasoned, middle aged man with dark hair that’s rapidly receding from his forehead, shakes his head, but his hold on Edge’s arm doesn’t loosen.
“Why are you taking him away?” I wail. “He can stay. Please let him stay.”
“Sorry, family only,” the older man says as he shakes his head at me like I’m a wayward child and he’s tired of explaining the rules. His eyes shutter off and I can tell he’s used to doing this job without feeling, because there’s no place for emotion.
“Heismy family!” I protest, with every ounce of strength I have left.
“He’s not on the approved list and he created one hell of a disturbance, busting past the front desk and throwing doors open left and right. He’s gone, lucky if he’s not banned from here for life.”
Edge turns his face and snarls, silently telling them he doesn’t give a fuck about being banned in the future, but his head whips back to me when I move, his gaze cutting through me.
I can’t let him face this alone. Edge is mine now, just like I’m his. I know that they’re going to force him to leave, and I’m not staying by myself. I’m not letting him leave me behind.
I shove myself upright on the bed, youth and strength on my side, even after my ordeal. I swing my legs over the edge, but when I turn, my hand hitches up, tugging me back with a violent burn that singes its way up my arm and into my chest. I nearly gag on the jolt of pain, while everyone around the room watches me, astounded, frozen with their shock.
My dad recovers first, just as my fingers fly to my left hand, the hand holding me back like there are chains wrapped around it.
“What are you doing? Harley, stop! You have to stay here, at least overnight.”
“Honey, you’ve been through a lot,” Leah pleads, her dainty hands landing on my arms.
I shrug them away and grasp the stupid IV planted into my vein. “I have to get out of here,” I mutter, “before Edge uses all his strength to bring the entire place down around all of us.”
I pull hard on the taped up end of the IV, suddenly frantic to have it out of me no matter how much it hurts. It gives way with a sickening burst of white hot pain and a streaking trail of blood that makes my stomach lurch. Bile claws at my throat, but I swallow convulsively, pushing it down. I unhook the little clip from my finger and the flashing of the machine in the room tells me that it’s alerting someone else, the nursing station probably.
Before anyone can burst into the room to see what the hell is going on, I rush to Edge. I wrap my arms tight around his waist, not caring that it hurts like the hounds of hell have been unleashed and are gnashing their teeth against my flesh. The cool air of the room rushes up the stupid hospital gown that is no doubt gaping open in the back.
Because I guess they have something of a heart after all, or maybe they’ve just been shocked so thoroughly that they can’t help themselves, the security guards release Edge’s arms and they close around me, carefully pulling that gown together, holding me like I’m made of glass, but I don’t mistake the strength in it, the raw territorial possessiveness radiating off of him in hot waves, the sorrow and terror, relief, and love in him. I know he feels it, because I feel it too. He draws it out of me like a magnet, my polar opposite, stuck so hard that we’ll never be pulled apart.
And that’s how the frantic nurses find us, locked together, an embrace of life and near death, an embrace that time and distance, that age and circumstance can’t hope to break.
Neither of us cares that it’s against everyone’s wishes—my doctor’s, the nurses, and my father’s. Edge sweeps me up in his big, brutally strong arms, my hands wrapped around his neck, my face pressed tight into his leather clad chest, and we walk out of there together.
Chapter Twelve
Edge
Ilove my brothers. I’d fight and die for them any day of the goddamn week, but there’s two in particular who are testing the vows I made to the club I love. One I left at the hospital when I walked out with his daughter. The other…
