by Kylie Parker
“You know what would really make me feel better?” I ask.
“What?”
“If you got in here with me,” I say.
She laughs and strips down. I smile. This makes the bubble bath seem a lot more masculine now. The bathroom is really fancy for an apartment; it sort of reminds me of Éclair’s home with all the pink and silver décor, but it’s not like I’m going to make that a topic of conversation with Sylvia. She dips down into the tub, leaning her back on the opposing side. I feel her little toes go up in the water, and one of her feet lands between my legs and starts to toy with me.
I am still leaning back and relaxing, letting my sore limbs and chest soak in the warm water, but it’s not like I won’t try to sleep with her if she’s in the mood. After a few minutes, she makes a move. She comes towards me and sits right in my lap; I’m still leaned back with a towel wrapped under my head; she had rolled it up for me earlier. I start to sit up, but she stops me. “Relax.” She says with that cute smile of hers. “You just let me handle this.”
Sylvia slides up and down on my cock and wraps her arms around me. Apparently having sex anywhere but a bed is our thing, and I’m okay with that. I reach up and touch her breasts, and she giggles slightly. I’m not going to lie; I don’t hold out for too long. Something about the water, her soaking wet breasts in my face, and her willingness to take charge is really turning me on. After our amazing night at the theater, I’m almost embarrassed at how quickly I finished. “Um…” I can’t look her in the eye, “Sorry.”
She just laughs at me and kisses my lips, “Don’t apologize. It’s all about you today, hon.”
Holy hell –where has this woman been all my life? She gets out of the tub and tells me to stay put; she says she is going to fix me something to eat. Sex, a bath, a massage, and now food? I think I struck gold. After a few minutes, she enters into the bathroom, “Hey, James, your lawyer is on the phone.” She holds up my cell and gives it to me.
I frown, “Hello?” I say, and Lillian starts spouting out a long list of paperwork she wants me to get to her as soon as possible, “All right, all right, easy.” I say, “Half of that has already been gathered up by the police, but I can get the rest to you. I have to go back to the factory, though.” I hang up and sigh.
“Do we need to go?” Sylvia asks, sounding disappointed.
I look at her and sigh, “Yeah. The sooner I take care of this the better.” I then smile, “How about you go with me, and I treat you to a nice date tonight?”
She smiles, “That sounds like a plan.”
The two of us dry off and get dressed, and I have my driver take us back to the factory. It looks like the media and the police have cleared out for the night. Sylvia looks around curiously, “I have never been to your factory before.” She says.
“You want a tour?” I ask.
She laughs, “Just get the paperwork you need. I’d rather go on our date.”
I smile, “Awe, come one; this is my baby here. Let me give you a tour.” I say, and she shrugs. We grab the necessary paperwork from my office first before heading down to the factory. She is doing her best to pretend to be interested, I can tell. It’s really nothing special, but the factory itself has some interested quirks.
On one side of the factory, there is a line of offices you can see into through glass walls; I can see one, Eddie’s office has not been cleared out. Good; he knows I was not serious about him being fired. We walk along the walkway by the offices when I suddenly notice something. “Is that blood?” I point to a few drops of a red substance.
Sylvia frowns, “Geeze.” Suddenly a bit of blood drips down, and we both look up. Sylvia screams, and it’s ear-splitting. She backs away and almost collapses, grabbing onto a nearby railing to keep herself up.
“Damn!” I cry out and abandon her to soak up the scene by herself. I don’t have time to make sure she is not too upset; this is beyond serious.
Up above our heads, I spot a man lying on the catwalk, so I don’t have time to stop and think. I hurry up the metal stairs and run down the metal bridge that overlooks the heavy machinery, and I make a frightening discovery. “Eddie!” I scream when I see my brother lying before me, his head and arms covered in blood. I look down at Sylvia, “Call an ambulance!”
She nods, still a bit shaky, and she whips out her cellphone, “There’s no service!” she shouts.
I nod off towards the offices, “There are phones in there. Hurry!” I watch her run off towards the offices, and then I turn my attention back towards Eddie. I’m afraid to move him. He is so perfectly still. “Eddie, can you hear me?” I ask, and I hear a slight mumble. Blood pours out of his mouth. “Damn it, Eddie!”
What happened? Did he fall and hit his head? I frown, knowing that is not true. His face is bruised, and his clothes seemed tattered as though he had suffered some sort of beating. I gently tap his cheek, “Eddie, can you hear me?”
His eyes open slowly, “James!” his voice is hoarse, but I can hear the relief in his tone.
“Helps on the way,” I say, my heart racing. He coughs, and more blood pours out of his mouth. He closes his eyes, and I gently shake him, “No, man, you need to wake up. Eddie, wake up!”
I hear Sylvia shout, “They’re sending an ambulance!”
I nod, but my attention is on Eddie, “Eddie, can you tell me who did this?” He does not speak. He is perfectly still. Who would do something like this? If I find out who did this, I’m going to fucking kill him. There is so much blood that the smell of it is making me sick to my stomach; the weird mixture of coconut off me and Eddie’s blood and sweat are making me light headed. “Eddie, I’m so sorry.” I say, “If you can hear me, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
It takes way too long before I start to hear sirens in the distance. Every passing second grows more and more unbearable. “Just hang on, Eddie,” I say, “You’re going to be all right.”
I’ve never felt such a horrid mix of emotions. Sylvia is looking up at me from down below; her hands shaky, “I’m going to go out front and wait for the ambulance so I can bring them straight here.” She says and then adds, “He’s going to be okay, James.” She hurries off to meet the paramedics.
I don’t know if he is going to be okay, and nothing has ever terrified me more in my life than this moment.
Chapter Thirty-One
This feeling in the pit of my stomach is almost impossible to describe. I’m scared and worried and angry and so many other things right now. I’ve never smoked before, but I could probably go for a cigarette. My hands are shaking, and I wish that Sylvia was still here. She had stayed with me for hours, but we both had grown tired and hungry. She offered to go grab us both some lunch, and I agreed that that would be a good idea. Now, I wish I had just called my assistant or something because sitting here alone staring at my older brother in a medically induced comma is making me antsy.
The doctors said he had probably been lying there in the factory for hours based off of the blood loss before Sylvia and I had found him. Whoever did this is going to pay big time. He got out of surgery about an hour ago, and the surgeon did not really offer me any words of encouragement –just a simplistic, “We’ll see.” That had been enough to put me on edge.
Eddie really looks like shit. His face is bruised and covered in stitches. A large bandage is wrapped around his head, and a neck brace is strapped around his neck. He has a breathing tube in his mouth, and his wrists are strapped to the hospital bed to keep him perfectly still. He has a fractured skull, broken neck, two broken arms, one broken leg, and even a collapsed lung. Who could have possibly have done this? Eddie is not a big guy, but he is not exactly a little guy either. Someone either got the jump on him or was easily able to overpower him. Either way, he’s hurt –bad.
I’m sitting in a chair beside his bed; I have not been able to leave his side ever since he got out of surgery. We had just gotten into this crazy fight just hours before I had found him. It was so stupid. I had actua
lly accused him of sabotaging my company! What’s wrong with me? And then I had gotten pissed off because he got mad about it! Of course, he got mad about it! He’s given so much of himself to my company; he would never try to sabotage me. I’d give anything for him to wake up just so I can tell him how sorry I am.
I keep looking at the tiny window on the door of the hospital room whenever someone passes by. I want Sylvia to hurry back. I can’t stand sitting here by myself anymore listening to the slow, steady beeping of the heart monitor. I look at the tiny computer screen at the two ECG lines: one if for his heart and the other is apparently monitoring his brain waves or something like that.
Anxiously, I scoot my chair closer and touch his right hand. His right hand has a line of stitches across the back of his palm and over some knuckles. The doctor said he thinks Eddie took a swing at his attacker and busted his own knuckles, but we can’t be sure. The attacked could have knocked Eddie’s hand with a blunt object; the rest of his injuries seem to suggest that the attacker had some sort of weapons like a pole or bat.
I hear someone walk by the room, and I look up hoping the door will open and Sylvia will pop in, but she doesn’t. Is she still not back yet? I feel weird touching Eddie’s Frankenstein-esc fingers, but I feel like I have to reach out to him somehow. “Eddie, I’m sorry,” I say for the millionth time since finding myself alone in the room with him.
I should probably see if I can get in touch with his other half-siblings. I’ve never actually met any of them, but they should probably be informed of what is going on. Honestly, I have no idea how to even get in touch with them. I’m not even sure if I know their names or how many there are exactly. I’ve been so stubborn about all of them always asking Eddie for money that I never wanted to meet them. I shake it off, deciding that I’m not going to waste my time trying to figure that shit out –not with the way they have all treated him ever since he found out about them. Screw them. Eddie and I may have our problems, but I have never taken advantage of him the way they have. They will come looking for him as soon as they need another handout, I’m sure.
The hospital room door opens, but it’s not Sylvia. It’s Éclair, my business rival, and occasional fuck buddy. I frown. I had really been expecting Sylvia, but I have to admit seeing Éclair’s face is a little bit reassuring. She puts on a sad smile when she sees me. She’s holding a vase full of flowers. She’s awkward when she speaks, “Hello, James.” She says in a tone shier than what is normally Éclair’s typical demeanor. “I heard what happened. It’s on the news.”
I nod, “I’m sure it is.” I have been in the news a lot lately. My latest line of supplements has been poisoning people, evidently. Turns out someone has been putting rat poison in the vitamins, and I’m the dumbass who actually accused my own brother of doing the deed. I know it wasn’t him, though. He would never do that to me.
She puts the flowers down and awkwardly stands at the foot of the bed, staring at Eddie. She and Eddie have never gotten along. Eddie has always acted like an asshole towards her; it always bothered him that she and I had a thing going on the side –she is our business rival, after all. Éclair forces herself to look away from Eddie; she walks around the bed over to me and drapes her forearms on my shoulders from behind me. “I’m so sorry, James.” She says and leans down and gives me a reassuring peck on the cheek. “Listen, if you need anything, anything at all-”
She is not able to finish her sentences. The monitors suddenly go berserk, and Eddie starts jolting around like a fish out of the water. I jump up, and Éclair darts for the door shouting, “Nurse! Nurse!”
“Eddie!” I shout, “Damn it, Eddie!” The room is suddenly swarming with doctors and nurses. My eyes scan the small crowd until I am sure of who is in charge of the situation; I look at the doctor, “What’s wrong with him? What’s happening?”
The doctor ignores me and looks at his staff, “He’s gone into cardiac arrest.” He says and begins barking out demands from his team of nurses.
“Oh my God! Oh my God!” I cry out, and suddenly the doctor points a finger at me.
“Someone get those two out of here.” He says.
I feel a few nurses grab hold of me, “We need the space.” One of them says as I am being drug out of the room.
The next thing I know I’m standing out in the hall and the nurses are gone and shutting the door behind them. I feel Éclair grab onto my arm, “He’s going to be fine. He’s going to be fine.” She says over and over again, but it does very little to reassure me.
I’m shaking as I locate a bench out in the hall. I probably would have fallen over if it was not for locating that bench so quickly. Éclair sits next to me. I just stare at the floor, unable to speak. How could this be happening? Surely this is just all a bad dream?
Chapter Thirty-Two
I feel Éclair grip my hand. It’s somewhat reassuring as she sits next to me on the bench. I’ve been waiting for word from Eddie’s doctor for what feels like an eternity. Eddie had looked so pathetic on that hospital bed seizing up the way he did, and I can’t shake the image of it from my mind. It keeps replaying over and over again like a monster horror scene in a movie that spooks you so bad that you feel like the creature is lurking over your shoulder because it’s permanently imprinted on your brain. I’m afraid to close my eyes –afraid the memory of it will pop back into my head.
Éclair keeps checking her phone, and after the fourth or fifth time, I realize her phone is going off but she had put it on silent. I sigh and pull my hand away. “If you have to go somewhere, go,” I say.
She frowns, “James, I’m not going anywhere.”
I shake my head, “No. I know how it is, Éclair. Your company can’t go a day without you, am I right?” I force a smile on my face, “I appreciate you coming and sitting here with me for as long as you have. Sylvia will be here soon. I’ll be okay.”
Éclair looks anxious. She does not want to leave me, and it feels good to know she cares. She puts her hands on mine and squeezes them both tight, “James, you call me, and I mean it. Call me if you need anything. If anything happens, please, don’t let me find out on the news. I will be here.”
I nod, “I promise I will.”
She leans towards me and gently presses her lips against mine. It’s so light and gentle –not at all like what I am used to receiving from her. She stands and nervously stares at the hospital door that has kept us closed off from Eddie for a considerable amount of time now. Éclair bites at her fingernails for a moment before turning to look down at me, “I am just a phone call away.” She reminds me before leaving.
I have to admit I am somewhat surprised. I did not expect her to be so concerned for me. I mean, I have always considered her to be a friend, but not this close of a friend. Not one who would show up unannounced at a hospital, bring flowers, and be just as concerned as I was for my brother. She leaves, and I feel annoyed with myself for granting her permission to leave. I now realize how I definitely do not want to be alone in this damn hallway. Finally, a doctor exits out into the hallway. I jump up, almost tripping over my feet when I do so.
The doctor acts almost as a distraction for me as nurses quickly wheel Eddie out on a bed and down the hall; my stare goes from the moving bed to the doctor, back to the bed, and then finally stop to look the doctor in the eye. “He’s all right for now.” The doctor says, “We’re going to attempt a second operation, this time in his heart to prevent it from failing. I will be able to give you a full description of what we are going to do.”
I nod, and I walk with the doctor down the hall back into the waiting room. He walks alongside me, explaining in detail why they need to go back into surgery. He explains the risks, and none of them sound good, but it does not sound like he has much of a chance if they don’t cut him back open again. It makes me feel half dead to sign the paperwork granting him permission to operate on him again after just having operated on him once already not but a few hours ago. I sign, and the doctor assures me that
I will get regular updates on the progress from a nurse during this second surgery.
I sink down into a seat in the waiting room, and I try not to completely lose my mind. I’m only there for about thirty minutes before Sylvia comes walking in, looking flustered. She had been trying to find me, apparently, but they had moved me back into the waiting room. She has a to-go bag and two sodas in her hands; I had almost forgotten that she had gone to get us some lunch.
She sits down beside me and puts the bag and drinks down on a small table in the waiting room. “What’s happening?” she asks, looking quite concerned.
“He-” I pause to clear my throat, realizing a lump had formed, “He went into cardiac arrest, and they have him back in surgery again.”
“James, I’m so sorry.” Sylvia says and puts a hand on my knee, “He’s going to be okay.” She says and firmly squeezed my knee. “Listen, you need to eat. I know you probably don’t feel like it, but you’re going to make yourself sick if you don’t.”
My stomach growls. She’s right. I willingly take the sandwich and drink she had run out and gotten for me and start eating. She does the same. “So…” she says somewhat awkwardly, “I ran into Éclair in the hall.”
I almost choke. “Oh?”
“Yeah.” Sylvia says, “I mean; I did do that modeling gig for her. I asked her what she was doing here, and she said she was coming to visit your brother. I know you said you knew her, but I didn’t think you two were close like that.”
“Well…” I struggle to speak. I like Sylvia. I don’t really want to lie to her, but I don’t want her to freak out either.
She makes it easy for me, “You two are screwing around, right?”
“Um…” I don’t know what to say.
She just laughs, “Relax, James. It’s not like you and I are exclusive. I just wanted to know exactly what was going on between you two. So I’m asking.”