The conversation flows around the room. My girls—my family—sitting around me on the sides of the bed. All except for Izzy—a very pregnant Izzy—who is sitting in the chair next to us.
They leave an hour later. Exhausted from all the activity plus having my last dose of pain medication before they release me, I crash hard. I get a good nap in before Maddox wakes me up asking if I’m ready to get out of here.
When we finally make it down to the front of the hospital, where Maddox’s black Charger is waiting for us, my eyes widen when I see the crunched-up front end. Noticing the question before it’s even out, he snaps, “Don’t ask,” before lifting me out of the wheelchair and carefully placing me in the passenger’s seat.
“You ready to go home?” he asks after starting the car.
“I am home,” I reply with a smile, and then I lay my head back and close my eyes with a smile on my face.
CHAPTER 25
Maddox
“I’m going to take a shower. You good?”
Emmy looks up at me from where she’s resting in the middle of my bed. The bed I carried her to after I refused to bring her to the guest room when she pitched a mammoth fit. Her argument is that we shouldn’t rush things. Mine is that we’ve wasted enough time.
She’s also lost her fucking mind if she thinks I’m letting her out of my sight for a good, long while.
“I’m freaking fine,” she huffs.
My lips twitch when she tries to throw her attitude around by crossing her chest with her good arm. “It loses a little of its intimidation factor that way.”
Her jaw drops and she throws her book at me. I watch it sail across the room and slap me in the chest before tumbling carelessly to the ground.
I keep my feet planted and let my arms hang relaxed at my sides, but there is no mistaking that she sees my impatience written all over my face. It shouldn’t be like this—us arguing. She’s frustrated with her inability to care for herself and I’m unwilling to bend on anything. Fuck moving too fast. If I hadn’t had my head so far up my ass that I could taste the bullshit I was spewing everywhere, then this whole ‘moving too fast’ bullshit wouldn’t be happening.
Last night, while she slept, I let my mind wander to where we would be had I given in to the drug that is Emmy’s love. I let myself picture a future I never thought I would see. Blessings. That’s all I saw. A wife, maybe some kids, and more happiness than I imagined possible.
Those are the things I’m fighting for now, and Jesus, I’m not exactly the one to beat around the bush when there is something I want. No, something I need.
“You really want to toss that sass around? It’s adding up, baby, and I can’t fucking wait.”
Her eyes widen and her mouth moves silently.
“Nothing to say?” I ask as I step toward the bed. “I get it, Em. I’ve given you every single reason to doubt me. I’ve driven that into you and I’m sorry.” I sit on the bed, shift so that I have one hand planted next to her hip, and bring the other up to cup her face, leaning in close enough that our noses touch and our breath mixes together. “I’m here. I’m not going anywhere and I’m fighting—for you, for me, for us. Don’t give up on me because I took too long.”
Her breathing accelerates. I study her face, noticing with great satisfaction that her pulse is going insane. The vein in her neck is pulsing faster with each passing second.
“It’s not that I’m giving up on you—or us—Maddox. I just think that we need to talk about things before we jump into bed with each other.”
“I’m not going to fuck you,” I say. Her eyes narrow at that, and I could kick my own ass for blurting that out. “Yeah, clearly I’m not good at this shit, Em. Cut me some slack. Bottom line, I don’t want you away from me. I need you near me. I need to feel your warm skin, smell your intoxicating scent, and hear your sass even when you’re silent. I get that we need to hash shit out, but right now, I need to feel that you’re still here more than I need to waste time with some pleasantries of separate bedrooms. I need you, Em. Maybe even more than you need me at the moment, and that’s a whole fucking lot.” I kiss her lightly, breathing her scent in deeply, before taking off to the bathroom to shower.
Emmy
“Okay, okay. Get your wits about you, girlfriend,” I mumble to myself.
I can hear him moving around in the bathroom, the door cracked I’m sure so he can hear me if I need him. He’s humming to himself, the almost upbeat tune so unlike him. I’ve witnessed the closed-off, hard-around-the-edges, vibrating-with-anger Maddox slowly start to fade away since our time at the cabin. It’s hard to pinpoint when I noticed it happen first. But I do remember the exact moment he flipped a switch and the old Maddox came back.