“Leave us alone,” Sebastian says airlessly. He kicks at Ryder’s knee, the one on the injured leg, as he thrashes and tears at Ryder’s shirt. “She’s my wife.”
Still holding him with one hand, Ryder clocks him in the jaw, and I hear a cracking sound from Sebastian’s mouth as his head spins to the side.
“Don’t ever call her that again,” Ryder says, punching Sebastian in the temple. Sebastian’s body crumples and slides to the floor. His eyes are open, unblinking, though his chest still moves up and down with breath. Alive, but unconscious.
But it’s over. Forever this time. The police sirens getting nearer make me sure of it.
I glance at us in the mirror: me, in my jeans and bra, one strap hanging over my shoulder, and Ryder with his shirt ripped open by Sebastian, his firm, gorgeous chest smeared in blood.
We’re together. We’re alive.
“Let’s get out of here,” Ryder says. “Before he comes to again.” He turns toward me, dragging his hurt leg behind him.
I stand and walk to him, careful not to put pressure on my cut foot. I lay his arm around my shoulder and mine around his waist, holding him against me. Since our injuries are on opposite sides of our bodies, we balance each other.
“You’re reading my mind,” I say.
“Start thinking dirty thoughts then,” he says. “Because I could really use a bright side right now.”
He kisses the top of my head and we hobble outside into the warm night.
CASSIE
CH. 29
Atlanta Medical Center is pandemonium when we arrive. “Everyone thinks the lines at the clubs are long,” says the nurse who checks us in. “But this is the hardest place to get in on a Friday night.”
After I get my foot sewn up and the crutches that the doctor assures me I’ll probably only need for a week, I find Ryder in his examination area, a makeshift room partitioned only by curtains. He’s naked except for his underwear, lying on his stomach as a woman in a white coat stitches the lower part of his calf.
“Hi,” I say, shuffling to him. I comb my fingers through his hair. “How are you feeling?”
“Better now that you’re here,” he says. “But ask me again when the anesthesia wears off.”
“Ryder Cole got anesthesia for stitches?” I say. “And here I thought you were a tough guy.”
“Let’s just keep it out of the statement for the cops,” he says, grinning. “I’ve got a rep to maintain.”
But the police statement we give later starts like this: It turns out that Ryder had noticed I wasn’t at the fight yet and was starting to worry. He asked Gunner to track Sebastian’s cell phones and credit cards, check rental car places, airlines, hotels. Gunner found a charge at the Night Light Inn, which maybe no one would have thought much about until Jamie called Ryder not long after, about a break-in at our house. When Jamie saw that I wasn’t there but that a downstairs window was broken and the upstairs closet door was ajar with my clothes all over the floor, he knew something was wrong.
“If there’s one thing I know, it’s trouble,” Jamie said when I called him from Ryder’s cell phone as we waited in the ER lobby. “And you were in pretty deep.”
“Thanks, Jamie,” I said
“You help me, I help you,” he said. “I’m just glad you’re alright. That you both are.”
“Okay, Mr. Cole, you’re all done,” the doctor says. “The bandage may need changing later in the week, but it should heal well and quickly. A benefit of your being in good shape.” She stands. “Hope the rest of your weekend is more relaxing.”
I’m pretty sure every night for the rest of our lives will be more relaxing than tonight.
After the doctor leaves, Ryder scoots over on the examination table, and taking me by the hand, pulls me onto it, right next to him. He folds himself around me and kisses the back of my neck, and though I’m still shaken from everything that’s gone on tonight, I don’t care that we’re hurt, I don’t care that we’re at a hospital, I don’t care about crutches or stitches or police statements. I only care about his warm skin pressed against mine, his big hand clutching my small one, squeezing away the bad memories of the night and replacing them with the one thing that counts: being with him. “I can’t believe I nearly lost you,” he says.
And for the first time since we got here, I start to cry. But they’re not tears of sadness or even happiness. They’re tears of relief.
I turn over, facing Ryder, taking his face in my hands. “I am so sorry, Ryder,” I say. “I am so sorry.”
He smoothes my hair back. “What are you sorry about?”
I exhale. “You’re hurt. You could be dead. And it’s because you had to get me out of trouble that I should have done more to avoid.”