This was air.
“Now rest,” Declan said. He kissed me. Soft and careful and achingly gentle. “You're still recovering. The doctors will have my ass if I tire you out.”
“Stay?”
“I'm not going anywhere.” He settled back into the chair and kept hold of my hand. “Sleep, Troy. I'll be here when you wake up.”
I believed him.
For the first time in my life, I believed someone would stay.
TWENTY-EIGHT
NEON SNOW
TROY
Iwas still sore as hell three days after getting out of the hospital, and Declan was making it his personal mission to ensure I didn't lift a finger for anything that might qualify as physical activity.
“I can get my own water,” I said from the couch where he'd basically installed me like a piece of furniture.
“I'm already up.” He brought me the glass anyway and set it on the table beside me. “You need anything else?”
“I need you to stop hovering like I'm made of glass.”
“You just got out of the hospital two days ago after nearly dying. I'll hover if I want to.”
“Two days is plenty of time to recover from nearly dying.”
“That's not how recovery works and you know it.” He sat down beside me and checked the pill bottles on the table likehe'd been doing every three hours since we got home. “You're due for pain meds in twenty minutes.”
“I don't need them.”
“Your ribs are still cracked. You need them.”
“I've had worse.”
“That doesn't make me feel better about this situation.” He picked up the bottle anyway and set it where I could reach it. “Humor me.”
I looked at him and saw the exhaustion still living in the lines around his eyes, the way his shoulders hadn't fully relaxed since Rafael. The man had barely slept. Had spent most of the past few days making sure I was breathing, eating, taking my meds on schedule like my continued existence depended on his vigilance.
Which it probably did, but I wasn't about to tell him that.
“Fine. I'll take the damn pills. But only because you asked so nicely.”
“I didn't ask nicely. I told you to take them.”
“Potato, potato.”
He smiled at that, small and tired but real. “You're a pain in the ass.”
“And yet you're still here.”
“Yeah, well. I've invested too much time keeping you alive to quit now.”
I grabbed his shirt and pulled him down for a kiss that lasted longer than it probably should have given that I was supposed to be resting. When we broke apart, his expression had softened into something that made my chest tight.
“You keep kissing me like that and I'm going to think you actually like having me around,” he said.
