Chapter 9 #2
It was the first time I’d openly acknowledged what had transpired between us since the night it happened. The look of excitement and hope that lit up Ellis’s face made my stomach churn with even more guilt.
I really had fucked this up. No one should look that happy while sitting injured in a hospital bed.
“No, there’s no one,” he quickly assured me. “No husband or boyfriend. Not even any friends, really.”
He tried to laugh as if that last statement were a joke, but he couldn’t hide the obvious hurt in his voice or the way his words wobbled like they would fall apart at any minute.
“I mean, I did have friends. Once. But, when my brother got sick, taking care of him took all my time, and I found out that the people I thought were my friends were…”
Although he couldn’t seem to find the right explanation, I understood what he was trying to say.
“Fairweather friends?”
“Yes, exactly. Once I got busy and wasn’t “fun to be around” anymore, well, they stopped being around me.
Honestly, I’m jealous of the relationship you have with Magnus.
You guys are real friends. I don’t think I’ve ever known anything genuine like that, except maybe my brother, but he left me in the end as well.
I think… maybe, I’m just not cut out for real relationships. ”
“Hey, that’s not true.”
I tightened my grip on him. It probably hurt, but he didn’t try to pull away, and even leaned closer to me.
“Then, why don’t you…”
There were so many ways he could have finished that question, and none of them would be pleasant, but he never got the chance. At that moment, a nurse stepped through the door and our conversation ended.
“I see someone’s finally awake,” the nurse said as she closed the door to the private room behind her. “We’ve all been very worried about you. Your partner here has barely left your side.”
Ellis and I both opened our mouths like we were about to correct her, then simultaneously chose to remain silent.
The nurse finally switched off the wailing machine and reattached the monitor that had come loose from Ellis when he woke up. Blessed silence reigned for a moment, but it was quickly interrupted as the nurse started asking Ellis a series of rapid-fire questions to determine how he was doing.
After his earlier breakdown, he was still very dazed, and mostly gave the nurse halfhearted or vague answers.
This didn’t seem to bother her, as she marked everything down on the chart, and assured him that some confusion was normal after being unconscious for over a day, but to let someone know if the symptom persisted.
I suspected his disorientation was a result of the emotional roller coaster he’d been on in the last twenty-four hours rather than a result of his concussion, but I didn’t correct the nurse. This was her job, and I wasn’t going to tell her what to do.
It was, however, good to hear that Ellis didn’t seem to be suffering from any negative effects of the accident.
He’d been incredibly lucky that he’d been secured to such a sturdy chair when the van overturned.
It had kept him mostly safe and allowed him to avoid any serious injuries.
As much as I hated feeling grateful to his kidnappers, I was very glad that they’d chosen to restrain him so thoroughly.
Eventually, after nearly an hour of poking and prodding, the nurse finally left. Ellis and I were left staring awkwardly at each other, unsure how to pick up the threads of our interrupted conversation.
“Listen…” Ellis sighed as he chose to break the silence first. “I’m not expecting anything. I don’t want you to feel obligated?—”
“Stop,” I cut him off, reaching out to grab his hand. I’d moved off the bed to give the nurse space to work, and I was already hating the extra distance between us. “This isn’t about expectations or obligations.”
Ellis pulled his hand away from me. “Isn’t it?
You took me in because you felt responsible for me after I lost my memories.
You protected me because you thought that those cult members were after you and that I was just caught in the crossfire.
Everything between us has been out of obligation.
And, you know, I get it. I don’t bring anything to the table.
No money. No friends or family. No job. I got my memories back, but it makes no difference.
I have no life worth remembering. So, I’m not surprised that you’re here out of obligation.
There’s no other reason for you to get involved with me. ”
He obviously had even more to say, but I’d already heard enough. Before he could utter another word, I leaned over and pressed my mouth to his.
At first, I expected him to fight me. He’d been so determined to pull away from me, and a kiss definitely crossed more lines than just holding his hand.
Yet, the moment our lips touched, he melted against me like he was a block of ice that had been shoved directly into a bonfire.
Without breaking the kiss, I moved back onto the bed until I was pressed up right next to him. Logically, I knew it wasn’t the best kiss. His breath was stale from his long sleep, I hadn’t shaved in several days, and Ellis’s cheeks were still red and his eyes rimmed from his earlier tears.
It was also the sweetest kiss I’d ever experienced. I would have happily stayed there, squished onto the little hospital bed as I wrapped myself around him, and kissed him for the rest of my natural life.
Unfortunately, biology wasn’t so kind, and we soon had to part in order to catch our breaths.
“It was never about obligation,” I said as I leaned my forehead against his.
“I took care of you because I wanted to. I protected you because I wanted to. And… I slept with you because I wanted to. I only pushed you away afterward because I thought I was protecting you. I thought I was doing the right thing and that taking care of you was more important than my own desires, but all I did was hurt you. That was my mistake, but I’m not going to make the same mistake again. I want you. Plain and simple.”
Ellis grabbed onto the front of my shirt and brought us back together for another kiss, just as sweet as the first, although shorter.
“Me too. But I still don’t know what I can actually bring to a relationship, or what I’m even looking for. It’s been so long since I focused on what I wanted that I don’t even know what my own wants even look like anymore.”
Bracing my back against the head of the bed, I positioned Ellis so he sat between my legs and could lean back against my chest. It was the only way we could both fit on the small hospital bed, and even then, it was barely comfortable.
Especially, since we had to be careful of the multiple wires still connected to him for fear of setting off the machines again.
“I don’t know what I’m looking for in a relationship, either. Especially, not right now, with everything going on. How about we take it slow and figure it out one step at a time?”
Ellis settled in easily against my chest, letting his head rest directly over my heart. “Slow sounds good. Although…” He twisted around to look at me with a frown on his face. “Does that mean sex is off the table?”
Instead of immediately replying with words, I first answered him with a kiss. “Oh no. Sex is still on the table. Or the bed. Or the shower. Or wherever you want. I don’t think I could keep my hands off you if I tried.”
With a smile, he snuggled in closer to me, turning me into his personal pillow. “Good. I could abstain if I had to, but I think that might actually count as torture.”
The word torture bounced around inside my head like a tennis ball made of barbed wire, pricking everything it touched.
For a moment, my thoughts turned to Creed and what he might be going through right now, but I pushed the image away.
There was no reason to catastrophize before we even knew what the situation actually was, and it certainly wouldn’t help my fragile new relationship with Ellis.
I held him closer. “Yeah. We wouldn’t want that. Nothing but pleasure between us from here on out.”
For a moment, it looked like Ellis was about to say something else, but at the last moment he changed his mind and stayed quiet as he returned to his place nestled against me.
I found it odd, but didn’t give it much more thought as the stress of the last few days finally caught up with me and I dozed off surrounded by the warmth of his body against mine.
The hospital staff insisted on keeping Ellis overnight for observation, and then most of the next day was spent going over the results of his final tests—he was surprisingly healthy, considering everything he’d gone through—and then convincing the doctor to finally discharge him.
It was so late when he was finally able to leave the hospital that we probably would have been better off just renting a hotel room for the night and driving back to Emberwood in the morning, but we were too impatient to wait.
I hated leaving Magnus alone longer than necessary while there were still people out to get us.
Plus, Ellis was eager to sleep somewhere more comfortable than a hospital bed, and I could attest from personal experience that the beds at Rynkirk’s only hotel weren’t much better.
At least, that was the excuse he gave for why he didn’t want to stay in Rynkirk, but from the way he kept looking back through the rearview mirror as we drove away, I knew there was more to it.
This was the city where his brother had died.
Somewhere on the outskirts of this town, Aaron Beckham lay in an unmarked grave, completely unknown to the rest of the world.
The guilt around his brother’s death must be driving Ellis insane, and I didn’t blame him for wanting to get some distance from it.
I instinctively moved my hand to rest on his knee, and I squeezed in what I hoped was a comforting gesture. “We’ll come back. When this is all over, we’ll give your brother a proper burial. I promise.”