Trust (Temptation #3)

by Ella Frank

  “Rach? Hey, how are you?” He paused and then said quite reverently, “I love you so much. Please take care of yourself.”

  Yes, if ever there were a time to tell someone, it’s now, Logan thought as he made his way to the shower—alone.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Beep… Beep… Beep…

  What is that noise? Tate thought as he tried to force his eyes open. They felt heavy as lead, and after several attempts, they finally decided to obey and everything around him came into view. A white, blurry view.

  He blinked a couple of times, figuring he must’ve been in one hell of a deep sleep, then tried again. He heard the incessant beeping sound around him, and as the fog started to dissipate and the room came into sharper focus, Tate realized that something was definitely not right. In fact, it was very wrong.

  There was a throbbing ache down his right side, and one of his arms was wrapped with a bandage, trapped across his chest, holding his shoulder immobile. In the other hand, he had an IV.

  An IV… The hospital… The excruciating ache in my shoulder… What the hell happened? Where is Logan?

  His eyes searched the room until they skidded to a stop on the back of a short, dark-haired woman—Rachel. He opened his mouth and said her name, but was shocked at the raspy sound that emerged. It didn’t sound anything like him, and “Rachel” had come out sounding more like “Ray.”

  The woman standing over by the glass door turned anyway, and as Diana’s face came into view, Tate’s heart stuttered.

  What the hell is she doing here? was his first thought, but he quickly pushed that aside as his eyes frantically shifted to the other side of the room.

  Nobody else was in there with them. Just him and Diana—in a hospital room.

  Jesus, did I fall asleep and wake up in the fucking Twilight Zone? And where is Logan?

  “Oh, God. Thank God. You’re awake.” Diana sounded so stunned that it occurred to him that maybe she’d…what? Never expected him to be?

  Tate swallowed, about to try to speak again, but his throat felt as though it were on fire—not to mention scratched to shit.

  “No, don’t try to talk,” she rushed to say as she walked over to him.

  Tate tracked her suspiciously as his pulse started to race and his anxiety level rose. What happened to me? He tried to remember how he’d ended up in the hospital, but he was coming up with nothing, and still…no Logan. Where the fuck is he?

  “Your parents just stepped outside. They’re going to want to see you. Oh, and the doctors,” she rambled on.

  But when she leaned down to kiss his forehead, Tate managed to grab the wrist she had resting by his hand on the bed. He took it between his fingers, and as she stilled, their eyes connected. It was the first time he’d gotten a clear look at her, and she looked like hell—as if she hadn’t slept for months.

  Tate opened his mouth, and as his dry lips parted, he tried to speak. He didn’t care where his parents were. He didn’t even care about seeing the doctors. What he wanted—no. What he needed was to know where Logan was.

  Why isn’t he here with me? Did something happen to him?

  When nothing came out, he shut his eyes, frustrated at his inability to voice his thoughts. And that was when Diana placed her mouth by his ear.

  “Don’t worry. He’s here.” When she raised her head, Tate barely recognized the soft expression in her eyes as she stroked her fingers across his forehead. “He’s been here every day since you arrived.”

  Tate frowned, now wondering how long that had been—

  “I have to get the doctors. You stay right there,” she told him as she backed away to the door.

  Her smile was so genuine that it reminded him of the girl he’d known a long time ago, and it left him thinking that maybe he really had woken up in the Twilight Zone.

  * * *

  A day. A week. Three had passed by in a haze, and every night, Logan had been ushered back to Tate’s room to sit by his bed while his family left to go home.

  It wasn’t until a couple of days ago, somewhere in the fourth week, that Tate had finally started to show signs of improvement. The doctors had removed the drain on his right side and extubated him from the vents. Now, a full forty-eight hours later, he was breathing on his own.

  Each day, Logan had been shuffled between the two rooms, refusing to leave except when Cole demanded it. He would sit and wait for any kind of information indicating improvement, but as the month had passed by, he’d started to believe that it wasn’t going to happen—until this week.

  With his head resting back on the wall, Logan sat in the far corner of the now familiar room and waited for the head nurse to let him know that it was time for him to go back. He wasn’t exactly sure what Tate’s father had told the staff of the ICU, but every time he entered the area, they all looked at him with curiosity.

  “Mr. Mitchell?”

  Logan sat up and got to his feet, making his way over to where the nurse was standing by the doors. As he started to wander down the hall with her, she turned in his direction and smiled.

  “I don’t know if anyone has told you yet, but Mr. Morrison woke up tonight.”

  Logan faltered and then stopped in the middle of the hall. When the nurse realized he was no longer walking beside him, she came back over to where he was standing.

  “What did you say?”

  “I’m assuming no one did tell you.” She placed a hand on his arm. “He’s awake.”

  “Since when?” Logan asked, hardly recognizing his voice.

  He’d barely functioned these last few weeks, other than to sit and talk to the silent man lying in the ICU. So this news—this news gave him hope. And it was the sound of that that he didn’t recognize—because until right then, he hadn’t realized he’d lost it.

  “Around thirty minutes ago. His family was in there, but they just left.”

  Logan reached for the wall beside him. He’s awake… He woke up?

  “This is a good thing,” the nurse encouraged, and finally he managed a nod. “Would you like to come and see him?”

  More than my next breath, Logan thought and stood up straight. “Yes. God, yes.”

  He followed her down the hall, and when he stepped into the ICU area, three of the other nurses behind the station were smiling at him. Two of them he recognized, but the third was a tall blonde he’d never seen before, and as she made her way around the desk toward him, Logan looked behind himself to make sure she was heading in his direction.

  “You’re Logan, right?”

  Logan shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans and nodded.

  She gave a cute little smirk and said, “Mr. Morrison has been quite adamant that he doesn’t want to see any other person’s face, including the doctor’s, until he sees Logan.”

  A full-on smile stretched across his lips. That stubborn shit…“Is that right?”

  “Yes. I was the first person to speak to him after Diana came to tell us he’d woken. He’s having a hard time vocalizing right now due to the tubes that were down his throat. But he wrote this and gave it to me when I was in there getting his vitals with his parents.”

  Logan took the piece of paper from her, and when he opened it, he saw: I want to see Logan. NOW.

  Logan clenched it in his fist as he brought it to his mouth and sucked in a gulp of air.

  “Are you okay?” she asked, concerned as she touched his arm.

  “Yeah,” he let out on a relieved sigh. “Yeah. I’ve never been better. Can I see him?”

  She walked over to Tate’s door. “I think he’d like that very much.”

  When she opened it, Logan moved toward it, wondering if he’d ever felt such anticipation. The answer to that was easy—no, he fucking hadn’t.

  He couldn’t wait to see Tate.

  As he stepped inside and his eyes finally collided with the gorgeous, brown ones he’d so desperately missed, Logan shook his head.

  “You, Mr. Morrison, are in so much t
rouble.”

  * * *

  Tate had been waiting for what seemed like hours for this very second. He’d been going out of his mind while the nurse had been checking his temperature, blood pressure, and every other fucking vital she’d needed to check. And then his damn parents had been fawning all over him, and he…he couldn’t have cared less.

  This was the person he wanted to see. The person he needed to see. And as Logan got closer to him, Tate found himself trying to sit up in the bed.

  “No, no,” Logan told him, wagging his finger back and forth as though he were scolding him. “You stay just as you are.”

  Tate watched him stop and take the seat by his side, and when Logan reached for his hand and entwined their fingers, he finally felt things start to fall back into place.

  Damn, Tate thought. Logan was clearly trying to put up a strong front, but… He looks a breath away from shattering. As Logan’s eyes roved over him and his fingers tightened around his, Tate’s fluttered shut.

  Yes, that feels familiar. It felt right. And when Logan brought their fingers to his mouth to kiss them, Tate opened his eyes and turned his hand so he could stroke his fingers over the dark stubble covering Logan’s jaw. He traced them up and over his ear and then pushed them through his silky, black hair. The sound that left Logan was somewhere between pleasure and anguish as he leaned over and pressed his cheek to his thigh.

  “Tate…God. Oh, God. These last few weeks…”

  Logan’s eyes were shut, but he kept talking, trying to explain what he was feeling. Tate stroked the hair away from his face and saw tears falling down his cheek. It was clear by the tormented words and trembling in Logan’s body—he’d been through hell.

  As Tate tried to soothe him, he opened his mouth and made himself speak. “Logan.”

  His voice was barely audible, but Logan’s eyes opened. And when he told him, “Shh,” Tate shook his head and forced his lips to move and get his words out.

  “Love you.”

  Logan got to his feet then and pressed their lips together in a kiss filled with all the overwhelming emotions neither of them could put into words. Tate closed his eyes, taking in the scent of him, and when he finally pulled away and offered a shaky smile, Tate noticed that it didn’t quite reach his blue eyes.

  “I love you too.”

  Tate grimaced. “I’m sorry—”

  “Don’t,” Logan said, cutting him off and brushing one of his curls aside as he bent back down over him. “Don’t you dare apologize. You did nothing wrong. You did everything right.” Logan brought his lips by his ear, and their cheeks were touching as he whispered, “You woke up.”

  When Logan straightened, Tate felt a keen sense of déjà vu, and he noticed that Logan was wearing his leather jacket. His lips curved as he nodded up at him and said, “You dared me to.”

  * * *

  How does he know that? Logan stared down at Tate’s upturned face and couldn’t resist the urge to touch him again. He ran his fingers across one of his eyebrows and down the side of his cheek to his chin. Does that mean he heard me talking every night?

  “And how would you know that?”

  Tate seemed almost as confused as he felt, and then he shrugged his non-bandaged shoulder. “Dunno. Will…” he started but coughed.

  Logan looked around and spotted a pad of paper and a pen. He brought it back and gave it to Tate. “Don’t try to talk right now. Write it.”

  Tate took the pen and scrawled on the pad: Tell me what happened?

  Logan read the request and sat back in the chair. “No one has told you?”

  Haven’t asked. Wanted to see you.

  “So badly you didn’t ask why you were in the hospital? Have to say, you’re doing wonders for my ego right now.”

  Tate wrote something else, and Logan peered over at it and chuckled.

  “You don’t look so great yourself, FYI. But I suppose that’s acceptable after being hit by a car.”

  When Tate winced, Logan nodded. “Yeah. If you think for one fucking minute I’m letting you ride that damn bike of yours again, forget it.”

  Tate sighed and then wrote: How long have I been here?

  “It’s the third of September, so nearly a month,” Logan answered as he crossed his arms over his chest.

  Tate’s eyes became so wide that, if it weren’t so tragic, it would’ve been comical. Logan couldn’t begin to imagine how he was feeling. He’d had a hard enough time waiting for Tate to recover. How must it have felt to be the one waking from pretty much a month of his life gone?

  Trying to lighten the mood a little, Logan shrugged. “Yeah. And I never thought I’d say this, but you need a haircut.”

  Tate glanced down his body to the tabs stuck to his chest and his bandaged arm then brought his eyes back to his.

  “Yep, you went all out. Broken ribs, broken clavicle, couldn’t breathe on your own. I mean…” Logan stopped as he remembered Tate lying there with tubes taped to his mouth and ribs and the machines surrounding his head, and he lost his ability to keep it cool. “Fuck, Tate, I thought you were going to die… It was…”

  “Hey,” Tate’s voice rasped, and Logan looked into his solemn eyes before Tate lowered them to write on the paper.

  Sorry you went through that.

  Logan sat forward to rest his elbows on the bed and pressed his lips to his steepled hands. “It was worth every hellish hour just to see you awake and looking at me again.”

  When Tate reached out a hand to touch his, Logan took it. “My parents?”

  Logan grimaced at that question and shook his head. “Have been here every day.”

  The scowl on Tate’s face had Logan rubbing a hand over his own. He understood that reaction. It had been his at first too. But after having a month to comprehend the anguish they must’ve been feeling, he had—

  Did you call them?

  Logan rebuffed that with a shake of his head. “No. But that brings up a very important discussion you and I need to have. Your emergency contact is still listed as Diana.”

  “Shit.”

  Logan gave him a tight smile. “Yes. Getting in to see you was a fucking nightmare. I was going out of my mind. But…” He let his next words loop in his head before he said them out loud. He wasn’t quite sure how Tate would react to them. “Your father gave permission for me to be back here in the evenings, but only after they would leave. Your mother still doesn’t know.”

  A flush of annoyance colored Tate’s cheeks and his jaw tightened.

  Logan tried to calm him by saying, “He was pretty decent, all things considered.”

  Tate grabbed the paper out of his hand and furiously wrote. When he thrust it back at him, his eyes were alight with anger.

  Permission? I’m not fucking ten. Where have you been this whole time?

  Logan ran a hand through his hair then said softly, “Out in the general waiting room.”

  “For a fucking month?” Tate’s voice cracked around the words.

  “Hey,” Logan said, and trapped Tate’s hands between his palms. “I got to see you every night. That got me through.”

  Logan kept his eyes on Tate’s, making sure he knew he was telling him the truth, but when Tate’s eyes started to fill and a lone tear slipped free, Logan wiped it away.

  “Don’t you cry for me. It’s time for you to get better. I now have your permission to be in here whenever the hell I want, and you know what? There will be no slacking, Mr. Morrison. It’s time for you to come home.”

  Tate blinked away the tears and mouthed, “Yes.”

  Logan winked back at him and said, “Just so you know, that doesn’t count. And it won’t until you’re back on your feet, giving me hell, and then telling me yes.”

  And with that, nothing more needed to be said. The challenge had been issued, and the prize was now within reach.

  Chapter Eighteen

  “Come on. It’s all ready.” Logan’s voice echoed down the hall to where Tate was seated on the couc
h.

  “You’re really going to make me do this?” he asked as Logan walked into the living room and crossed his arms. He’d rolled the sleeves up on his black, knit pullover and was barefoot in his jeans as he stood there with his brow raised, tapping his foot.

  “Yes, I am. So come on. Time to get up,” Logan said, holding his hand out.

  Tate took it and got to his feet with a wince.

  “This will do you good.”

  It had been a couple of hours since he’d been released from the hospital and gotten a haircut, and ever since then, Logan hadn’t stopped—until now.

  “I don’t remember the doctor saying anything about this,” Tate pointed out.

  “Everyone knows that a soak in a bathtub is good for sore muscles.”

  “Really? And how many times have you used this bath of yours after a long, hard workout?”

  Logan wrapped an arm around his waist and smiled at him. “Never. But we aren’t discussing me.”

  As Tate leaned against Logan’s side, he rolled his eyes. “Of course not. You do remember the doctor saying I can walk on my own now, right? I’m also allowed to bathe myself.”

  Logan stopped them at the bathroom door and scrunched his face up. “Yeah, but where’s the fun in that for me?”

  Tate chuckled. Logan had been amazing since he’d woken up two weeks ago. Hell, from what he’d been told by the hospital staff, he had been pretty damn wonderful the entire time he’d been unconscious. Not only had he spent each night by his bed, they’d told him that he would play music, read to him, and even, at times, yell at him.

  He studied Logan’s side profile and smiled. Tate had no trouble believing that Logan would get frustrated at him while he was lying out cold, and every now and then, when he closed his eyes and really thought back, he almost remembered parts of it.

  “Okay. I’ll get in the bath if you—” His words came to an abrupt stop when he spotted the tub filled with… “Bubbles? You ran me a bubble bath?”