“We’re only half a mile to Highway One.” Officer Needle’s voice disrupted my panic.
I only had to think through her meaning for a couple of seconds to discover a new rush of terror. Things got a lot more complicated if Neal reached the highway. The entire state spread out before him from that point.
“What do you think? Will he go north or south?”
I didn’t even have to consider. “South. Toward San Francisco.”
She nodded. “Agreed.” Even as she increased her speed, she reached for her CB and began to report our status. She paused midsentence.
I didn’t need to ask why. Ahead on the left, nearly zooming our way at our rocketing speed was a car wreck. As we closed in on it, skid marks arched over the road, crossing into the oncoming lane, and giving way to a haphazard path into the forested edge of the road, where small trees were snapped, broken, and bent.
My heart sank. And I reach for the dash, gripping it for support.
Officer Needle pulled to the side of the road and reported our new status.
Her words were nothing more than a blurred background as the cruiser slowed. I was out of the cruiser before it came to a stop and rushing toward the car. The Subaru was smashed against a tree, partially upside down, looking like it had stopped midroll.
I was halfway to it when I saw a body at the foot of another tree several yards away.
“Jasper!” I slid as I changed direction abruptly, fell to my knees, but shoved myself back up without missing a beat.
Behind me, I heard Officer Needle’s pounding footfalls.
I was nearly to him when I realized it wasn’t Jasper. Wheeling again, I turned and rushed toward the car. “It’s Neal. Get your weapon ready.” From the way his huge body was lying, I didn’t think he was about to jump up and take off or put up a fight, but we couldn’t take chances.
Even in the dark, the damage to the Subaru was horrifyingly clear. The thing looked like it had gone a couple rounds in a giant’s pinball machine.
There was no way someone could survive that. None. They’d be crushed.
I kept going, doing my best to shove every thought and fear away.
He’s all right. He has to be. Jasper is okay. There was no other choice.
The undercarriage and wheels faced me, and I tried to call his name as I hurried around to the other side. Tried to yell it so he would hear, so he would answer. So he could walk out from wherever he was hiding in the trees, completely safe and unblemished. I wasn’t sure if I even made a noise.
The roof of the Subaru was completely caved in, and the driver’s side door, barely recognizable as such, pointed partially skyward as it rested against the tree. The windshield was gone, and the gaping hole looked more like a jagged mouth open in a twisted scream than anything resembling a car.
I got on my hands and knees and crawled over the ground, the crushed hood of the car brushing my back as I made my way toward that terrifying opening. “Jasper?”
Glass, rocks, or something cut into my palms and knees as I moved forward, but I barely felt it. “Jasper?” His name was little more than a croak, and I realized I was crying.
He wouldn’t be in there. He would’ve been thrown from the car. He’d be lying, crumpled and broken… dead… somewhere around, and I just hadn’t seen him yet. But still I crawled forward, ducking lower to fit my head and shoulder into the jagged opening of the windshield.
“Jas—” And then I saw him.
Naked and bleeding, his pale skin glowing even in the dark and shadows of the crushed Subaru. He lay at an angle, his feet invisible in the shadows of the upside-down dash, his back cradled over the inside of the passenger door, and his head rested on a mound of grass that bulged through the space where the passenger side window had been.
His face and what I could see of his body was covered in blood. Bruises were already forming, his left eye swollen shut and nearly the size of a baseball.
“Oh… baby….” I was sobbing. Sobbing so hard the tears threatened to erase him from view. I managed to get halfway into the car, enough that I was able to stretch out my hand and touch the side of his face that still looked like him. He was gone.
He was gone.
“Jasper.” I prayed the car would close its jagged mouth, devour me. Consume us both.
He groaned, and his one unswollen eye winced, then cracked open just a sliver. “Russell?” Jasper’s voice was nothing more than a raspy, pain-filled whisper, but it was the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard.
Something sliced through my jeans and deep into my thigh as I pulled myself into the car. “Yeah, baby. I’m here. I’m here.”
“He’s a lot tougher than anyone suspected, huh?” Pride filled Harrison’s voice as he stood beside the hospital bed and smoothed his fingers through Jasper’s glistening auburn hair.
The doctor had just left the room for what felt like the billionth time over the past ten days. “He sure is.” I held on to Jasper’s hand. I had every millimeter of it memorized by that point. Though it had twitched every so often, I was ready to feel Jasper’s grasp, the awareness that he was really there. Some part of him indicating life other than the beeping of the machines.
“He’ll be fine, right?” Harrison’s voice broke, and his bloodshot eyes met mine over the bed. “He’ll still be Jasper.”
“Yeah. He will be.” I forced myself to meet Harrison’s brown gaze, so different from his brother’s blue. “He will.”
Harrison simply nodded, looked like he was taking strength from my resolve, and then refocused on Jasper.
The change in Jasper over the past week and a half seemed miraculous, though the doctor said it was normal. The swelling had gone down, the cuts and scrapes already scabbing and beginning to heal. Even the worst of the bruises were starting to fade, the smallest, already gone. There would be a few scars, some on his face, more on his body, but the doctors thought that after a few months, even those would be nearly invisible. The broken bones would heal. We would have Jasper back.
While I’d been treated for a concussion, and I had a slight brain bleed they would have to keep a watch on for a while, my injuries were nothing compared to what Jasper had endured. The doctor said it looked like his poor brain had been a football during the Super Bowl.
The best team of experts in San Francisco finally agreed that the swelling and the bleeding had receded enough that they could take Jasper out of his induced coma, now that he was past the critical stage. And while that was all miraculous enough, the real test was upon us. The only way to truly know the fallout of Jasper’s brain injuries would be to see how he responded when he woke. If he would still be Jasper.
The following afternoon, Harrison was asleep on the couch by the window that looked over downtown San Fran, his large football-star body making it look like a piece of doll furniture.
Jasper’s hand twitched in mine. Although it caused me to flinch at every occurrence, it was so commonplace, I didn’t bother to lift my head from where I had it rested on my arm propped up on the bed rail.
His hand twitched again. And again. And then fingers closed over mine.
Thinking I was imagining things, I lifted my head and glanced down. Sure enough, Jasper’s fingers were interlocked with mine and curled over the top of my hand.
Barely daring to hope, I looked over and met Jasper’s beautiful blue eyes. He blinked, probably trying to bring things into focus.
I was tempted to get his glasses that we’d set beside the table, but I didn’t want to let go of his hand. I leaned in. “Hey.”
Jasper blinked again.
I couldn’t tell if he was there. Couldn’t tell if he knew I was there. “Hey, Jasper. You’re awake.”
Another blinking.
My heart lurched, he wasn’t focusing. He didn’t see me.
It was okay. We wouldn’t know instantly. The doctor said it could take days, even weeks, before we knew the extent of the damage.
He was awake. That was enough.
Repositioning slightly so I didn’t have to let go of him, I stroked his cheek with my other hand. “Hi, my love. I’m glad you’re awake. So glad you’re here. You were so strong. So strong.”
He blinked again, and then his gaze latched on to mine and seemed to click into place. “Russell?”
God, he sounded like death, like pain. But he was there. He was there. And he knew me. He was there.
Tears began to fall as I nodded. “Yeah, baby. It’s me. I’m right here. Your brother’s here too. You’re not alone.”
I thought he attempted a smile but couldn’t be sure. A few more blinks, and though he didn’t say anything, he didn’t look away, his gaze clearly searching mine.
I could see Jasper in the depths of that blue gaze.
He attempted to speak, his mouth moved, he croaked. Before I could think to get him a drink, he tried again. “Neal?” The word had been a whisper, but as if hearing the name brought it back, fear filled his eyes. “Neal!” Panic that time, still ragged, but louder and panicked. The beeping in the background began to race.
I cupped his face and gripped his hand. “He’s gone, baby. He’s gone. Neal’s dead.”
Confusion clouded Jasper’s eyes, and his brows knit.
The fucker had died instantly, and while I was glad Neal was gone, if I’d had my way, he wouldn’t have gone quite so quickly. His spine had shattered on a tree. Though I knew it showed an ugly part of my soul, I wished that had been it. That he would’ve lived. Lived and been confined to a bed for the rest of his life. But that hadn’t been it. Somewhere, in the collision, his nose had been shoved into his brain. That had been the killing blow. Seemed like such a small thing, considering the severity of the crash.
“Dead?” Jasper wheezed. “Neal’s dead?” The beeping began to slow.
“Yeah, baby. Neal is dead. Gone.” At the relief in his eyes, I changed my mind. This was better. So much better. “You never have to worry about him again.”
His brow smoothed, and his lips curved into a smile. “Russell.”
“Yeah, baby. I’m here.” I leaned forward and kissed him. “I’m not going anywhere. You sleep. I’ll be here when you wake.”
His smile faded as his eyes closed, and he drifted off once more.
I lowered my head again and wept. In relief and gratefulness, in the release of the constant terror the past ten days had gifted.
Jasper was asleep, but he was there. He was going to be fine. I knew it as surely as I’d ever known anything in my life.
Twenty-Five
Jasper
My first couple of days of consciousness were nothing more than a drug-induced haze of pain and dreams. Thanks to the drugs, the pain was nothing more than a dull ache, but one that was all-over, constant, and in a way intensified by the confusion and blurriness caused by the drugs themselves. And the dreams… a worse sort of blur. The events of the past jumbled into one long, nonsensical parody of my life. My mother, father, Harrison, Neal, and Russell. All tumbling and jumbling together. I wasn’t sure what was happening, what was past, and what was nothing more than delusion.
After I began refusing the pain medicine, things began to improve. The pain was more acute, but I preferred having a clear mind over numbed nerves.
By the time I’d been in the hospital a little over two weeks, it felt like half of Lavender Shores had come to San Francisco to visit me. If I hadn’t already been certain I’d found my home, that clarified it.
“You did it.” It was the second time Xander had come to visit, though the first had been during the drug haze, so I didn’t remember much. As he beamed at me from his spot on the couch, between Heather and Alex, hero-worship fairly glowed from his eyes. “After everything, you saved yourself. You didn’t even need your bodyguard.” Those green eyes widened as his gaze darted to Russell at my side. “No offense, Mr. Wallace.”
Russell laughed and patted my hand. “None taken. And you’re right. Jasper saved himself.”
I moved my right arm about an inch before the pain caused me to lower it. With the cast from wrist to shoulder, it looked more like a chicken wing than an arm. “I have two broken bones in my forearm, and a fracture near my shoulder. Not to mention my clavicle, two ribs, and my right fibula. I’d hardly call that saving myself.” I started to give a self-conscious laugh, but it caused a spike in my head. “Oh yeah, and nearly getting my brain bashed in. Let’s not forget about that.”
Heather shook her head, strawberry-blonde hair glistening in the afternoon sun shining through the hospital window. “Xander and Russell are right. Those are just war wounds, Jasper. You did save yourself.” She moved her hand from her lap and placed it on top of Xander’s as she turned to face him. “Just like you did. You fought for emancipation, you demanded freedom. You both saved yourselves.”
“Just like I’m going to do.” Alex smiled nervously.
It took a second for her meaning to slip in. “You’re going to go for emancipation?”
“Yeah. Mom’s already talking about taking Dad back.” She beamed at Heather. “Ms. Kelly says I can live with her and Xander. She’s saving me.”
“You can’t live with me if you keep calling me Ms. Kelly.” Heather winked. “And, I’m not saving you. You’re saving yourself, just like you said.”
Russell had said something similar to me many times over the days, as had Harrison. Each time I’d blown them off. But having Heather compare me to Xander and Alex… I couldn’t steal that away from them, couldn’t steal it away from myself.
Try as I might, I couldn’t stop guilt from breaking in every so often. Theoretically, I knew the car crash had killed Neal. A car accident. An accident. Which meant, if I accepted that I had saved myself, then I also had to accept that I’d caused the accident; I’d killed Neal.
Moments of that car ride came back in flashes, not just in dreams. My fear and terror. The horror at thinking Russell had been killed. My desperation. My fury.
I hadn’t known I could be so angry. Would never have guessed that I had it in me.
I almost wondered who that Jasper was in the car that night. Screaming, attacking. Punching. I could still feel Neal’s nose shatter beneath the heel of my foot. Could still hear it.
I’d caused the accident. I’d saved myself. And in so doing, Neal had been killed. When it came down to it, since I’d caused the wreck, I’d killed him.
As I studied Xander and Heather, though I wouldn’t say it to the kid, I knew that part of the shame I felt, probably all of it, wasn’t so much for the fact that Neal was dead, but that I was glad of it.
The conversation had moved on as I’d been lost in thought. But I was pulled back to the moment when Xander said my name. “Sorry, what?”
Heather spoke before Xander could repeat whatever he’d said. “You look tired. Do you need us to go?”
“No.” I started to shake my head, then remembered that it didn’t feel so great. “Just zoned out for a bit. Glad you’re here.” I focused on Xander. “What’d you say?”
“I was just asking when you thought we’d open the bookshop again. Russell said they’re hoping to send you home in a couple of days.” He looked hopeful. “You think, maybe, we can open it the day after you get home?”
Heather sighed and shook her head in Russell’s and my direction. “If I didn’t know how much Xander loved you and the bookshop, I’d almost be offended, thinking he was desperate to get away from me.”
“No, books are just a powerful draw, that’s all.” I couldn’t blame him. I was rather desperate to be back in the bookshop myself. “Tell you what, let’s plan on that. Even if I don’t feel one hundred percent, you can be in charge. I’m sure I’ll just be hanging out in bed or on the sofa upstairs anyway for another few weeks.” That’s what the doctors were telling me; the only way they’d agree to send me home. I didn’t plan on following that if I could help it. Although, with Russell watching over me, I probably wouldn’t get away with much.
At that thought,
I looked at him, but glanced away again quickly. Now that Neal was gone, there was no official reason for him to stay. I knew he loved me. The very fact he hadn’t left my side since I’d been in the hospital left no room for doubt about that.
I knew he was battling his own guilt, feeling responsible that I’d been taken at all. He blamed himself for me being battered, bruised, and broken in a hospital bed. But we’d said the entire time that we were just going to live in the moment. Just because he loved me didn’t mean that had changed. And the moment was drawing to a close.
As much as I was desperate to get back to my life, to Lavender Shores, and my bookshop, a part of me didn’t want to leave the hospital. When I did, we’d have to cross that bridge.
Xander, Alex, and Heather stayed for a while longer. I continued to battle to stay focused, which I blamed on being tired instead of being worried about Russell. When the nurse came back to check my vitals and do another series of tests, which seemed never-ending, Xander, Alex, and Heather headed back to Lavender Shores.
Later the next evening, after another round of tests, Russell knocked on the door and stepped cautiously into my room. “Everyone decent?”
Chuckling, I rolled my eyes at him. “As I tell you every time, sorry to disappoint, but yes.”
“Dammit.” He grinned, brown eyes twinkling, and he shut the door behind him, then drew the curtain that blocked the narrow entrance and the window in the door from the rest of the room. He’d never done that before.
“What are you up to?” I leaned slightly to get a better view, noticing that he had something in his hands.
“I talked the nurses into giving us a couple of hours for a date.” He held up a couple of large white paper bags with the scrolling logo printed in green on the sides. “The curtain will give us some privacy, and serve as a reminder in case they try to come in. They don’t need to do any more tests for four hours, and I assured them that if we require anything, I’ll let them know.”
The Alcove (Lavender Shores Book 7) Page 27