Swirl: The Complete Collection (BWWM Interracial Romance) (Books 1-3)

by Lexi Lewis

  “Hello, Eve,” Carla said, stepping back to let her in. “How was work?”

  “Hey, Carla. Not too bad. We’ve got an interesting patient in right now, so that provided some entertainment.”

  “Oh, yes. Reese Abbot, right? I heard about it on the news. Terrible what happened. Is he hurt badly?”

  Eve shrugged. “Can’t say, really. Because I don’t know and because I’m not supposed to talk about it.”

  “Doctor patient confidentiality, right, right,” Carla replied with a grin. “Well, Devin’s just finishing up dinner with the boys. He was perfectly behaved as always.”

  That was one thing about this that always made Eve smile. Devin was so well behaved that people never minded watching him. It made everything a lot easier, and she wondered how he could be so good even after all that he had been through in his short life so far.

  She tried not to think about it too much in case she ended up jinxing it.

  Instead, she followed Carla through to the kitchen where Devin was sitting at the table with Carla’s husband and their two sons. Devin was older than Adam and Sam, but the three of them were pretty much inseparable when they spent time together. Eve entered the kitchen in time to see Adam, the older of the two boys, slip Devin and extra piece of chicken from Sam’s plate, and she shook her head with a smile.

  “Eve!” all three boys chorused at once.

  “Hello, gentlemen,” she said, giving a little bow. “Hey, Ricky.” She smiled at Carla’s husband, who grinned and waved at her while chewing.

  Eve never worried about Devin when he was being watched by Carla and Ricky Santiago. They were obviously good parents themselves, and their apartment was always cozy. Raising two boys, rambunctious and all over the place at the ages of nine and six, meant that sometimes their apartment was messy and strewn with toys and dishes, but it always felt like a home when Eve came in.

  Something was always cooking, and someone was usually singing. There was laughter and the sound of family, and it never failed to make Eve feel good.

  …And a little bad at the same time.

  Carla worked from home as an editor, so she had time to be there for her sons and Devin, to pick them up from school and bring them back and make snacks and dinner. When Eve took Devin next door to their place it always seemed cold and empty by comparison.

  There were just as many toys and dishes and clothes strewn around, but that warmth and laughter was missing during the week when Eve had to work. Things weren’t the same quality at their place, either, and it was clear that having two people to work and help pay for things went a long way.

  But she wasn’t thinking about that. She wasn’t going to be down on herself. They didn’t have a lot, but they had a good life, and that was enough. They were working towards building good things, and that was something.

  Eve waited until Devin was finished eating and then smiled and held her hand out to him once he had grabbed his backpack.

  He stuck his tongue out at her and ran into the hall ahead of her.

  “Fine, be that way,” she teased, following him out. “Thanks, you guys.”

  “You know it’s never a problem, Eve,” Ricky said, pressing a covered plate into her hands. “I think the boys would have a fit if they didn’t get to see Devin every day anyway. So it’s no trouble.”

  Eve smiled at him and took the plate, which she knew contained the chicken and potatoes that they had been having for dinner. Honestly, the Santiagos were always so nice to her, and she wasn’t too proud to accept their help when she needed it. “Thank you,” she said, voice softer. They both nodded, and Eve went to unlock the door to her apartment, letting herself and Devin in.

  She checked over his homework while she ate and he took a bath, and then she collapsed onto the couch, exhausted from the long day. Over twelve hours had passed from the time she had woken up, and she could feel every one of them.

  By the time she had Devin put to bed with a story (not about Reese’s stunts because she was just too tired), she was ready to drop herself, so she took a quick shower and got into bed, letting sleep claim her easily.

  CHAPTER 5: RELATING

  Casts were the little gifts from the devil, Reese was sure of it. He’d been in more of them than he cared to remember, and they were always awful. Itchy, hot, constricting. He was used to being able to move his legs as he pleased, but now the left one was wrapped in plaster. His right arm was still in a sling, and he’d been advised not to move it around too much. Add that to the fact that his whole right side was a mess of bruising and pain, and he was uncomfortable, even with the morphine coursing through him.

  He was coming to hate painkillers.

  And hospital oatmeal.

  The hospital had been so swamped with patients that it had taken nearly all night before anyone had come to put his leg in the cast or check up on him at all, and the nurse that had been assigned to him once Eve had gone was even worse than the silent one he’d had at first. Mostly because she’d spent all the time when she wasn’t actively assisting the doctor making eyes at him.

  Considering the fact that she looked like she was old enough to be his mother, Reese thought that his discomfort had been completely valid.

  It was morning now, early if the soft light coming in from the window was to be believed, and he hadn’t slept at all. Between the pain and the constant visits from the nurse and Dr. Smith, reassuring him that they hadn’t forgotten about him and that they’d be with him soon, he’d been up all night. When they’d finally come in around three in the morning to start the process of dealing with his leg, Reese had given up on sleep all together.

  No doubt Paul was in their hotel room, sleeping (and probably not alone knowing him), and Reese stifled a sigh. Breathing in too hard made his ribs ache.

  They were still running scans on his body, and they had to make sure that his ribs weren’t broken enough to warrant worry about whether or not his lungs or something were going to be punctured. But apparently they were going to be releasing him sometime that day.

  Reese didn’t know what he was going to do when he was released, and he sort of wished they wouldn’t.

  All he had to look forward to was seeing his parents and staying with them until he was healed enough to travel, and honestly he was not actually looking forward to that at all. If this had to happen, he would much rather it have happened closer to where he called home, a few states south of here. At least then he would have been able to be in his own apartment with his own things.

  There wasn’t much else to do, and he really didn’t want to think about how long he was going to have to be bored and unable to do the things he wanted to, so he flipped channels on the television while time passed, watching infomercials and terrible morning talk shows as the sun started to come up in earnest and the hospital got busier outside of his door.

  Someone with a history of injury like his couldn’t not appreciate hospitals for all that they did, but he was bored and achy and displeased.

  He finally gave in and heaved a sigh, wincing when it hurt just as much as he had been expecting it to. Great.

  “Are you being melancholy in here?”

  Reese looked up and into the dark eyes of Eve. From what he had seen yesterday, Reese was pretty sure that she was one of the nurses that Paul had been perving on the day before. She was very pretty and looked to be around the same age as him, or maybe a little younger. Eve was short, but curvy, and her skin looked soft. There was just something about the way she carried herself that made him take notice of her, and when she stepped into the room, dressed in pink scrubs, he couldn’t help but smile.

  “Who me?” he asked innocently. “I’m sure I don’t know what you mean.”

  “Uh-huh.” She picked up his chart and looked it over, frowning at something she saw. “Did it really take them until three-thirteen in the morning to come and get your cast on?”

  “Yep. Apparently they were swamped with patients or something. Dr. Smith and Nurse Ca
n’t Keep Her Eyes to Herself kept coming in to tell me it wouldn’t be much longer, but it took forever.”

  Eve made an amused noise. “Nurse who now?”

  “Older lady, curly graying hair. Would not stop staring at me while she was hooking me up to stuff."

  “Ah. You must be talking about Patty,” Eve replied with a smile. “She thinks you’re really hot. When she first found out you were here, she ran to tell me all about it.”

  “Did she now?” Reese teased. “And what was your response?”

  It was amusing to see her cheeks flush, and he found that the flood of color on her darker skin was really nice to look at.

  “I told her that I was going to treat you like any other patient. And I am.”

  He pouted. “So you don’t think I’m really hot?”

  “Stop fishing for compliments. How was the oatmeal this morning?”

  That was enough to have him dropping the flirty eyes he had been giving her as his stomach rolled with the memory of the gray-ish lumpy mess of breakfast he had been presented with that morning.

  “Please don’t remind me of that,” he groaned, and she laughed softly.

  “Sorry. Yeah, oatmeal day is never very popular around here.”

  She snapped his chart closed and replaced it at the end of his bed before going about checking the machines he was hooked up to and his IV. “How is the pain?” Eve asked, eyeing the levels of fluid in the bag.

  “Scale of one to ten? About a five. Six if someone makes me laugh.”

  She flashed him a smile, and he couldn’t help but notice how pretty it was and how it lit up her eyes. “Well, I’ll keep my jokes to myself, then, so I don’t agitate your ribs. How do you feel otherwise?”

  Reese shrugged. “A little lightheaded, and my stomach’s been acting up, but I’m blaming the oatmeal for that. Not too bad, considering.”

  “It could be worse. The oatmeal might be the cause, or you might be having a reaction to the morphine. Hit the button if it gets worse, okay? I’ve gotta go make the rounds, but I’ll be back to check on you in a couple of hours.”

  He nodded and gave her a little wave. “Hurry back. You’re just about the most entertaining thing in this hospital.”

  To his great pleasure, the color flooded her cheeks again, and he smiled. It was nice to know that even laid up in bed like this, his charms were not completely gone. Reese watched her go, and he couldn’t help but get a look at her butt as she went. Even the shapeless scrub pants she was wearing couldn’t hide the fact that she had a great ass, and he smiled to himself before shaking his head. He wasn’t trying to get like Paul.

  The TV was proving to be just as uninteresting as more time passed, and it was almost a relief when someone knocked on his door.

  “Come in,” he called, using one arm to push himself up out of the slumped position he’d been in. With any luck it would be the doctor coming to tell him some good news. Not that there was much to ne had here, but still.

  Unfortunately, it seemed like luck was just not going to be on his side because when the door opened, his mother stuck her head in, his father close behind.

  Somebody just come and put me out of my misery now, he thought to himself and then pasted on a smile. “Hey, guys.”

  “Reese,” his mother said evenly. For once she wasn’t on her phone, and Reese didn’t know if that made him feel better or worse. His mother was always busy with her job, always taking calls and conducting business, and he couldn’t even remember the last time her focus had been completely on him.

  No, wait, scratch that.

  It was when he told her he was dropping out of school to pursue his dream. Then nothing had distracted her from her yelling lecture about how he was going to either end up a failure or laying on the concrete with his head cracked open.

  Funny how he had landed somewhere squarely in the middle of those two things.

  “How are you feeling, son?” his father asked, looking concerned. Being his focus was nothing new.

  “I’m fine, I guess. Pain’s not too bad, and they finally got around to taking care of my leg last night.” He wiggled his leg in its massive plaster cast. “They said if everything stays the same, I should be out of here sometime today.”

  His mother made a face, but his dad was grinning. “Good, good. We’ve got your room and the guest room all made up for you and Paul, and we’re staying in town until you’re ready to go.”

  “You don’t have to do that,” Reese said quickly, really hoping they wouldn’t. “Paul rented a car, and we can just drive there ourselves. I know how much Mom hates missing work.” He glanced over at her, and from the twist of her mouth, he could tell that it was killing her to be here instead of in her office yelling at her underlings.

  “It’s fine,” his dad assured him. “Isn’t it, Carolyn?”

  “It’s what has to be done,” his mother answered, and that was probably as close as she was going to get to agreeing with her husband.

  Reese rubbed at his face with his hand. “Look, it’s…I appreciate it, I do, but I don’t need you guys to treat me like an invalid or a little kid. I can handle getting there on my own. I don’t want to put you guys out.”

  His mom snorted. “You’re acting like a child now. You are in no condition to be trying to get anywhere on your own. Your father and I have taken time off to help you, and you will accept that help and not throw it back in our faces.”

  It was a struggle not to snap at her, but the look on his dad’s face made him hold his tongue and keep quiet. He knew how much his dad hated it when he and his mom fought, and they would probably be doing plenty of that while Reese was staying with them. No need to start it early.

  He dragged in a deep breath, ignoring the sharp stab of pain from his ribs. “Yeah, okay. Thanks. I’ll…give you a call when they release me, I guess. Unless you guys are going to be around here all day?” Please say no. Please say no.

  “No,” his father said, and Reese barely held back the sigh of relief. “Your mom wants to go to that coffee place down the street so she can plug in her laptop and use the Wi-Fi. You know how she is.”

  “I am right here, Anthony,” she said, voice dry. “But yes, that’s where we’ll be. I assume your agent will take care of getting your luggage and things from your hotel?”

  Ugh. Paul would groan and complain about that, but there was no way Reese was going to tell her that that wouldn’t be happening. He’d just have to deal with Paul. “Yeah, he’ll handle it. I’ll tell him bring it and meet us here with the car.”

  “Why do you still need the car?”

  “Because he’s going to want to go places while we’re here, Mom,” Reese said. “He might not even want to stay the whole time. It’s not like I need him glued to my side through this whole thing.”

  She made an annoyed noise. “He sounds so very loyal.”

  “Mom.”

  “Alright, alright,” Anthony broke in. “It’s fine if he wants to leave, Carolyn. We can’t make him stay, and if there’s no reason for him to be there, then it’s fine. I’m sure he’s a busy man anyway. It’ll just be nice to have Reese home for a while, won’t it?”

  “Yes. So nice,” his mom replied, but her smile was strained and barely even real. “Well. Since you’re clearly alright for the moment, we’re going to head out. Remember to call us when you hear something.”

  “Right. I’ll remember. See you later.”

  He practically held his breath while the two of them were leaving, and didn’t let it out until they were gone and he could hear the sound of his mother’s heels clacking on the polished floors getting fainter. Then he let it out with a whoosh and flopped back against his pillows, making a pained sound when he jostled his arm and his ribs.

  How in the world was he going to survive staying with them for so long? He and his mother could barely be in the same room for seven minutes without arguing, let alone seven months, and the more he and his mom fought, the more overbearing and smotherin
g his father got. There was no way this was going to go well, and by the end of it, Reese would be lucky if he and his parents even wanted to see each other at Christmas anymore.

  “Goddammit,” he groaned.

  His stomach was still in knots from the oatmeal and the visit from his parents wasn’t making it feel any better. In fact, the rolling nausea was starting to take on a pained edge, and Reese made a face.

  None of this would even be happening if he had just done better in his run. He should have triple checked his equipment or practiced his runs more. Something. Anything to keep that accident from happening and landing him in this position. It was hard to say what was worse at this point, being grounded for so long or having to deal with his parents for so long.

  He picked his phone up from the side table and sent Paul a quick text, letting him know what was going on and that he needed to pack and bring their luggage to the hospital.

  As predicted, the only response was: You owe me.

  Yeah, well. He would deal with that later. Like when he didn’t feel like he was going to throw up all over the place.

  It was getting warm in the room, and Reese looked around for something that would turn the air on or something. In his experience, hospitals were always too cold, and it was rare for him to feel like he was overheating in one.

  But it was so hot.