by C. M. Marin
All I want is to break down the damn doors behind which my girl disappeared and get to her. Instead, I have to settle on pacing and trying to temper my erratic breathing. But it’s not of any fucking help. The roar that flows out of me is as unexpected as my fist crashing into a wall. Both brimming with the rage, anguish and despair that collide inside of me in a powerful battle. I’m like a caged animal, unable to stay in control. I control nothing right now.
“Jayce.”
Tentative and quiet, Cam’s voice barely gets through the sound of my even more ragged breathing.
“Babe.”
Nate’s endearment is just as low even though it comes from right behind me, but I don’t miss the concern and warning in it. He knows how volatile my temper is right now, so I get his worry. But I don’t even tense when my sister places a hand on my forearm, and Nate doesn’t even flinch when I turn to her and pull her into my arms.
“I can’t lose her,” I rasp out in a murmur.
“I know,” she whispers back. She doesn’t say that I won’t. She doesn’t promise me that Alex is going to be fine, because she doesn’t know that. “I know you can’t. But you have to keep hope. Just keep hope.”
She does her best to stray strong, but her body is trembling slightly against me. This is close to home for her. Only a few months ago, she was the same wreck I am now as she spent days inside this very same building waiting to know whether or not Nate was going to make it. Though it was fear that was solely springing off her. There wasn’t an unstable fury ruling her. But fury is easier for me to handle than fear. Fury has been my closest friend for over a year. I’m used to it.
I cling to her for a brief moment, then I resume pacing like the caged animal that is clawing at my gut, not wanting to let me breathe. The few times my eyes flick to Liam, it’s to see him standing in the same position, leaning against the wall with his head bowed between his taut shoulders and his palms opened on the hard surface as though he’s bracing himself for what could happen.
It takes too much time. We’ve been waiting for too long. I have no idea how long exactly, but I can’t wait any longer. Someone should have already come to talk to us. But at the same time, I like to think that if the doctors are still with her, it means she’s still alive.
God, she has to be. She has to fight. I wish I could be by her side to tell her just that and to hold her hand. Thinking about her in a cold room surrounded by strangers… Fuck, it fucking breaks my heart.
When some of my brothers shoot up from their seat while those still standing take a few steps toward the door I’m facing away from, I whirl around.
And I’m now wishing that the doctor that just walked in hadn’t come see us. My heart could as well have been pierced right through by a knife the moment my gaze finds him. His head is bowed low, and he briefly rubs his short hair before his eyes come up to meet ours.
She’s gone. There’s no doubt. Defeat is too thick rolling off him. He hasn’t been able to save her.
God, no.
Air doesn’t meet my lungs anymore. The pain is so… No, agonizing is too weak of a word. This pain will kill me. It will, I can feel it. And I wish it’ll do it fast. There’s nothing I want more than to fucking die with her.
“Alexia Morens’ family?” he asks no one in particular.
“I’m her brother,” Liam says from somewhere near me.
The doctor doesn’t ask any of us to give them some privacy before he starts talking. “She’s lost a lot of blood because the bullet injured her aorta. I repaired the damages, but she’s still unconscious and there’s nothing more I can medically do. It now will all depend on whether or not her body is strong enough to overcome the blood loss.”
Liam puffs out a harsh exhale as I blurt out, “She’s alive? She’s still…”
“She’s alive,” the doctor confirms. “Honestly, if the bullet had hit her even half an inch on the left, she probably wouldn’t be. But she’s not out of the woods yet. We’ll keep a very close eye on her for the next forty-eight hours.”
“I want to see her,” I demand.
I need to see her now. I need to see her breathing with my own eyes.
He nods. “Only two people at a time until we can get her out of ICU and move her into a room. Then I understand that there will be people in her room as well as outside, but you have to remember that she needs quiet to rest. It’s very important to her recovery.”
“We’ll be very careful,” Nate assures.
“Show us where she is,” Liam demands, clearly as sick of uselessly standing here as I am.
In silence, Liam and I follow him. And after several more unending seconds, he enters a room at the very end of a hallway. Even before I set foot in, I can hear the beeping sound coming from inside. And when I cross the threshold, she’s all that seems to be left in the white, sterile room. If it wasn’t for how pale her skin still is, you wouldn’t believe she’d been hurt at all. Her stomach is hidden by the sheets, concealing the wound I know is there from view. I rush to her without wasting any more time and fill the space on one side of her bed while Liam goes to stand on the other side.
And then we wait. I don’t care if it takes a day, a week or a month. I won’t move from this spot until she’s back here with me. I won’t take my eyes off her until hers open on me.
Chapter 5
Alexia
“Hey… Hey, baby sis.”
Liam leaves his chair with the same urgency his voice gives away. Somehow, it’s also full of softness, and I watch him take a couple of steps toward me just as Jayce’s body tenses noticeably against mine. Closely pressed against me, his entire body becomes a stock of stiff, solid muscles, and his hand stops caressing my hair in that gentle, appeasing motion. I can’t see his face, but I know it’s him lying next to me. I’ve never forgotten what being in his arms feels like.
“Alex?” Jayce says tentatively.
When I try to answer, my throat doesn’t allow any sound to be formed. My voice somehow gets stuck in the back of it, and I just keep staring at my brother who is now standing right beside me.
“Are you back with us, sweetheart?” Liam prompts softly even though his tired, concerned eye scan my face hurriedly.
I focus on the simple task of speaking, which seems to have become a challenge, and even then, a raspy whisper is all I can get to leave my mouth. “Yeah.”
But Liam looks even less reassured after I’ve spoken.
“How are you feeling, baby?” Jayce asks me as he crawls out of bed gingerly.
The loss of him brings a whimper to the tip of my tongue. It felt so amazing to have him back against me that I didn’t want him to pull away even slightly. But then he takes my hand in his, and I get to squeeze it. It’s like completing another challenge, but I don’t care. His warmth feels wonderful, and I need the contact more than I ever have.
“Tired,” I admit, barely able to look around me at the hospital room I’m in.
I can’t find it in me to give him more words, but tired is a huge understatement. Exhausted wouldn’t even begin to cover how I feel.
As soon as the single word leaves my mouth, Liam whirls around and strides to the door.
“Where… Where is he going?” I ask Jayce.
I’m glad to have been able to get out more than one word, but my voice is still unable to raise even slightly.
Liam opens the door and voices his command before Jayce has time to answer me. “Someone find the doc. She’s awake.”
“He’s not going anywhere, babe,” Jayce finally says with a reassuring tone, and I wonder if my question came out with worry. “Are you in pain?” he asks me then, and my head shifts to look at him for the first time.
The bags under his eyes are as pronounced as Liam’s. He looks awful.
“Alex? Are you in pain, baby?”
I don’t know why it’s taking me so much time to answer him. Maybe because I know what brought me to lie in this hospital bed, and I feel compelled to at least t
hink about it. Logically, I should be in pain. At least a little. But I don’t feel much. Definitely not pain.
“No,” I say. “Bit cold…” I go on quietly, but my mind quickly goes to how heavy my eyes feel already.
Maybe I’m cold because Jayce’s body felt so warm against me before he got up.
“Alexia? Baby, you hear me?” Jayce urges.
“What’s going on?” Liam asks as urgently, telling me that he didn’t leave the room.
I can’t see either of them anymore, and I realize I’ve closed my eyes. I’m just so tired, so I only hum to tell Jayce I heard him.
“She’s falling asleep again,” Jayce tells Liam, though I guess he noticed that.
But it’s a man I don’t recognize the voice of who answers with a perfected collected tone. “It’s normal. She’ll most likely be drifting in and out of sleep for several hours.”
That must be the doctor. My first thought is that I’d like to ask him what damage the bullet has done, but I can’t open my eyes. I can’t find enough strength in me to accomplish something so trivial. I feel very weak but unbelievably comfortable at the same time. The sensation is weird.
But when Jayce’s hand starts to slip out of mine, I’m surprised that I manage to gather enough strength to keep it right where it is by squeezing it as much as I can. I don’t want him or my brother to leave me alone, even if it’s with a doctor.
“Babe, the doctor needs to make sure you’re doing okay.”
“It’s alright, you can hold her hand,” he tells Jayce, and I’m relieved. “I’ll just check your blood pressure and breathing, Alexia. If it’s all good, I’ll be back when you’re more alert, okay?” He pauses, and even though I heard him, I can’t even hum to answer him. “Can you squeeze your boyfriend’s hand if you heard and understood me?”
My boyfriend. He must mean Jayce, but I’m too out of it to care about that sort of detail. I just do my best to squeeze his hand once more.
“That’s very good,” the doctor says, and I internally smile at the way he almost congratulates me for succeeding in doing such a simple thing.
I let him fumble with my arm, then he places his cold stethoscope on different spots of my upper chest, but I quickly forget what he’s doing as I revel in Jayce’s presence and scent. I’ve always loved the way he smells. Besides the leather scent they obviously all wear at the club, he smells like sandalwood because of his shower gel. I’ve missed it. His smell is comforting as it surrounds me.
“How is she?” Liam asks after several seconds of silence passed―my brother has never been the patient type of guy. “You sure it’s normal she’s already fallen back asleep?”
I want to tell him that even if my eyes are closed, I’m still awake, but the words don’t leave my head, not even attempting to reach my mouth.
“It is,” the doctor affirms. “She woke up, which was the hardest part.”
Very happy to hear that. Unless I’m mistaken, it sounds like I have good chances of surviving that bullet.
“I will keep a close eye on her for the next forty-eight hours,” he goes on. “But it seems like she’s going to pull through this. She still needs her rest, though. It’s very important. Don’t try to wake her. The machine will tell you if there’s something wrong. If her heartbeat is steady, it means she’s simply resting. Her body needs that now,” he explains.
“Whatever she needs, Doc,” Liam promises.
“Perfect. Then I’ll leave you two with her, and I’ll be back in a little while.”
Light footsteps that fade away let me know the doctor is walking out of the room. And quickly, his presence is replaced by another one. But this time I recognize the voice when the guy speaks.
“What did he say? How is she doing?”
That’s Ben. The serious Ben. The one we only get to see when the club is going through some troubled times―and who most likely bribed some nurse to get into my room, because he shouldn’t be in here.
“He said that she’s doing alright. She’ll be mostly out for a while, and he will do some tests after she’s fully woken up, but he says she should be out of the woods,” Liam explains.
“Thank fuck,” Ben sighs. “I’ll let the guys know,” he adds before I can hear the door click shut, but my thoughts then drift back to the shooting.
Jayce, Liam and Ben are obviously okay, but was anyone else hurt? Everything happened so fast, and my surroundings got so blurry from the moment I fell to the ground, that I have no idea what all happened around me.
“What are you saying, Alex? It’s okay, you’re safe here,” Jayce soothes even though I know I’m safe.
His alarmed tone makes me realize that my worry for the guys and my incapacity to form proper words brought me to bristle as I’ve tried to speak.
“What’s going on?” Liam urges again, and I hear his footsteps approaching my bed.
I wish so badly I could open my eyes, but there’s no use in trying. And when my bed jostles slightly, I know that Jayce is cautiously climbing on it again to lie next to me.
My body relaxes instantly, and I even get to pronounce with a barely audible voice, “Anyone… hurt?”
“No, baby. Everyone’s good. But now you need to think about yourself and get better, alright?”
I think I say okay, but I’m not sure. Relieved to know that they’re all unharmed, I lean into Jayce’s side, humming peacefully as I let myself drift back to a deep sleep.
Chapter 6
Jayce
She woke up. What I felt the moment she opened her beautiful baby blues and looked at me… It’s useless to even try to find the right words to describe the feeling. All I can say is that I fought the tears that wanted to spill in relief. Though relief is too weak of a word. It’s like the world started turning again, and I had to battle every instinct that begged me to grasp her fragile body and engulf it in mine.
Then I couldn’t tear my eyes off her for hours. I still can’t. And even though all I wanted was for her to rest and get stronger, I had a hard time following the doctor’s order to not wake her up. I needed to hear her voice now more than I ever have.
Now, it’s been two full days since she first woke up, and she’s out again. But that might only have to do with the fact that it’s barely six in the morning. I should be sleeping, too, but I can’t get my thoughts to settle down enough to let my brain get some rest. She woke up, but the fear of losing her is still clinging to my stomach. I want to hear every breath she draws, and I want to feel every movement of her body that nestles further into mine regularly, as though she knows I’m right here with her. Having her back in my arms is something I’ve dreamed of every single night since the day I sent her away.
Fuck, I wish so damn badly I could go back in time and change things. Change what I’ve done. I’d go back in time and keep my girl next to me when I needed her most. I wish I could go back in time even before that. As my gaze relentlessly scans her face that has regained some of its natural tan, I wish I could go back to five years ago. To the day she became mine. The day she fully became mine at least. Because in some way, she always was. She was meant to be mine.
“You shouldn’t be the one sounding like an insecure girl right now, you know that?”
A smile pulls on my lips hearing the witty tone that my firecracker uses to make her annoyance clear. It’s not a surprise that I earn a murderous glare, but I take my chances and move forward, closing the step of distance she put between us until I can enclose her face between my hands.
“I just don’t want you to regret anything,” I tell her.
Softness kills the irritation in her gorgeous baby blues. “I’ve been wanting this since you first kissed me. That day I understood fully what being attracted to someone meant,” she confesses. “I waited six months because you wanted us to wait until my eighteenth birthday. You’ve been acting like you are forty years old instead of twenty-two all this time, and it’d be really awesome if you would stop now,” she teases. “I’ve waited
long enough.”
She sure tried to get me to change my mind about taking things further more than once during those six months.
That first kiss happened two months after I discovered the feelings I had toward her. It crashed on me like a fucking bomb, and I spent those couple of months wanting to kick my own ass while fighting those feelings tooth and nail. She was only seventeen and a half years old, and my twenty-second birthday was just around the corner. I fought hard, but I didn’t know there was no use fighting.
I’m still not sure how it all happened. From the day Liam joined the club five years ago, Alex tagging along because he was all she had left, I’ve had a soft spot for her. Until about eight months ago, I’d been close to her, in a purely platonic way, obviously. For some reason, she’s always been this girl I had to protect no matter what the cost was. I couldn’t explain why I felt so protective of her, but it was the way it was. She was four and a half years younger than me, but she became a friend. A confidant. She became the person I could tell anything to. With her, I could share the feelings I couldn’t share with my brothers. My fears and my dreams. I knew she would never mock me, and I knew she would keep every word I said a secret.
And one day, she grew up. At least one day I realized that she had grown up. She had become this gorgeous seventeen-year-old young woman with killer curves, totally comfortable in her own skin. The girl I still wanted to protect had become a temptation as well. And there was no missing the way she had started to look at me. She felt something, too. Once I had realized my own feelings, hers were easy to see, too. But that didn’t change the fact that she wasn’t eighteen and that I was about to turn twenty-two. Even if I wasn’t that much older than her and knew that she was mature and perfectly capable of making her own decisions, it didn’t matter. Not only was she too young, but Liam would have slit my throat for even thinking of putting my lips on hers. So, I pushed everything away from my mind and stayed away for endless weeks. Two entire months. Two months from hell. Because even if I knew I was doing what was right, I also knew that what I was feeling for Alex wasn’t some temporary insane thing. I knew it in my gut. It wasn’t a coincidence that she and I had been close since she had shown up at the club. It wasn’t only attraction I felt for her. We’ve always been meant to be. I just had to wait until she became the woman meant for me.