46. forty-four
forty-four
. . .
ASPEN
Screaming his name had accomplished absolutely nothing as Crew raced from the cabin before the explosion.
The blast still tossed him through the air like a rag doll. As soon as the air rushed past where I stood, ripping at my hair and clothes, hot and dry, I rushed for him. He wasn’t moving, his pulse was weak and thready, and his entire face was covered in blood from a wide gash across his forehead.
But he was alive—for the time being.
I refused to leave his side as paramedics rolled in. Lane must’ve called them ahead of time, and they arrived not a moment too soon. Sutton Rausch’s partner, some twit whose name I didn’t bother to learn, tried to shove me out of the way, and I nearly decked him. Sutton calmed everyone down and allowed me to stay with Crew while she worked on him in the back as we headed to the hospital. I was far from next of kin, but none of the brothers protested when I climbed up into the ambulance.
As Sutton checked his vitals, she spoke with me, keeping me updated on what exactly she was doing and why.
“Due to the fact that he hasn’t regained consciousness with prodding, we’re taking him to Boise,” she said, almost conversationally. “That cut in his head is pretty nasty, and palpating the rest of his skull revealed a pretty gnarly bump on the back. Though his pupils are responsive, I made the call to take him to the city where there’s a legitimate trauma center. We’re going to get him the best care possible, okay?”
I could only nod, words eluding me as she continued to work on him. First, she bandaged his head, though the white gauze was soaked with a red splotch in minutes. She slipped an oxygen mask over his face and hooked him up to an IV.
Still, Crew remained unconscious, and I continued to silently cry.
I couldn’t lose him. I simply wouldn’t survive it.
As we pulled up to the emergency entrance, Sutton’s partner—Thomas, I heard someone say—came around back to help unload Crew. Doctors and nurses swarmed the gurney, and before she got out, Sutton paused to squeeze my hand.
“He’s going to be okay.”
I nodded, giving her a wobbly smile, but I wasn’t sure I believed her.
Numbly, I shuffled inside behind them, not paying any attention to where I was going, and a woman in scrubs stopped me as I tried to follow past the doors to the trauma bays.
“I’m sorry, miss. We can’t let you back there.”
“But that’s my?—”
My what ? Fresh tears fell. Crew and I had never taken a second to define what exactly we were. All I knew was that he was the love of my life, and that had to give me some privileges where his medical care was concerned, right?
The woman gave me a sad smile and directed me to the glass walled waiting room, settling me in a chair and kneeling in front of me.
“The doctor will be out to give you an update when he has one,” she assured me. “I’m going to bring you some water. Is there anyone you want me to call for you?”
“I—”
Didn’t get to finish that sentence as the cavalry appeared, the brothers filing into the room in order of age: Trey, Lane, Finn, West. Additionally, a teenage boy was with them, tall and gangly-limbed with a mop of curly, dirty blond hair. The twins sat on either side of me, simultaneously reaching for my hands. Trey and Lane took seats in the row across from us, the boy between them.
“Who’s the kid?” I asked.
“Oh, this is Parker,” Lane said, placing a hand on his shoulder. “He’s the one responsible for the dumpster fire.”
Parker groaned. “I thought we let that go.”
“Never.”
“Broooooooo,” Parker said, dragging out the word dramatically. “I almost got burned alive. Cut me some slack.”
“Fair enough,” Lane murmured, then to me said, “Any news?”
“They just arrived,” the nurse answered for me. “The team is examining him now. As I was telling Miss…”
“Aspen,” I croaked. “His girlfriend.”
To hell with it. The man was mine in every sense of the word, the least I could do was call myself his girlfriend.
“Aspen,” she nodded. “I was telling Aspen that the doctor will be out with updates when the care team has more info.”
“So…we wait,” Finn said.
She shot him an apologetic smile, turning and pointing to a hall that branched off the intake area in the opposite direction of the ER. “Feel free to use the cafeteria for drinks and snacks while you’re here.”
The guys murmured their thank-yous, and the nurse left us alone.
“Did someone call Mom?” West asked .
“I did on the way here,” Trey supplied. “She and Ari probably aren’t too far behind us.”
As though the words had conjured them, Birdie and Aria rushed into the lobby, and I watched as Birdie approached the desk, her voice carrying to us as she asked for news on her son.
“I’ve got it,” Lane said, rising to his feet to greet his mother.
I could hear Aria’s sobs from here, though they muffled as Lane folded her and their mom into a hug, murmuring to them.
All I could do was put my hands in my face and weep.
“Crew Lawless’s family?”
My head snapped up. I must’ve fallen asleep because my neck ached from resting at an uncomfortable angle for too long, and a scratchy hospital blanket someone had thrown over me drifted to the ground when I shot to my feet.
“That’s us.”
“He’s stable,” the doctor began, and a collective sigh of relief echoed from us all. “He suffered trauma to his skull, both some sort of blow to the back and the gash on his forehead, which I closed with stitches. There wasn’t a brain bleed that we could find, and there’s only minor swelling. He’s also got a few broken ribs, a dislocated right shoulder, which we have reset, and deep bone bruising to his right hip. He’s going to be in significant pain and completely immobile for some time. We’ll be keeping him for observation for a few days, but I don’t see any reason why he won’t make a full recovery.”
“Is he awake?” Birdie asked. “Can we see him?”
“He’s not awake yet. We’ve got him pretty heavily sedated. But a few of you can go back and sit with him if you’d like.”
“Mom and Aspen,” Trey said automatically. “Then we can rotate after that.”
I shot Trey a grateful smile, then grabbed Birdie’s proffered hand, following the doctor out and into the emergency department.
“It’s not up to me to tell a doctor how to do his job,” Birdie whispered, “but I don’t like the words ‘heavily sedated’ very much. Not with his history.”
“That makes two of us. Let’s check on him, then we can make the team aware of his previous addiction issues.”
Birdie nodded, and we proceeded forward, locked arm in arm.
That cloying, antiseptic smell hung in the air, and I had to force myself to keep my feet moving. Being back here—even if it wasn’t the same hospital from either of my previous ordeals—brought up all kinds of bad memories. In that moment, I vowed to find a therapist at the first opportunity to work through my lingering issues, but this wasn’t about me. This was about being there for Crew. Hand still gripping Birdie’s tightly—honestly, I couldn’t tell which of us was keeping which upright and moving—we entered Crew’s room.
The first thing I noticed was how small he appeared. This larger than life man, the one who’d stolen my heart and saved me in more ways than even he knew, had his arm wrapped in a sling, heavy white gauze wrapped around his head, an IV line snaking from the hand of his bad arm.
And it was all my fault.
Birdie let me go and moved to his bedside, gently brushing his hair off his forehead, leaning in to press a kiss there.
“My baby boy,” she murmured. “You got yourself into a real mess this time.”
“I—” I started, unsure what I’d been about to say. Fuck, this was harder than I thought it’d be. I hadn’t balked at getting into the ambulance with him, so why was this tripping me up?
Birdie’s gaze snapped to where I stood, suspended in the doorway, unable to cross the threshold. As if sensing that, she walked back over to me, guiding me to Crew’s side .
“It’s okay,” she whispered. “He’s going to be okay, honey. You’re going to get that time together. Right now, he needs you here with him. Even if he’s not awake, I believe he can sense us. Talk to him. Give him your strength.”
She pressed a kiss to my temple, holding me for a beat and allowing me to soak up all that motherly warmth. Then she gave Crew’s hand a squeeze and left me alone with him.
No one else appeared to take her place, so I had to assume she was giving me and Crew the space I needed for me to get some things off my chest. To share with him what was in my heart.
So I did what she suggested, I pulled up a chair, cradled Crew’s hand in mine, and talked.
I told him anything and everything I could think of, from stories of my childhood and how much I’d idolized my sister, how much I missed her, to dreams of what I thought our future should look like. An hour passed in a blink, and my throat was raw from endless talking.
“I never planned on you, you know,” I said, smiling through my tears, eyelids fluttering closed against my blurred vision. “This was only supposed to be another stop, another map dot and a pat on the back for a job well done. But this case was the best thing that ever happened to me, because it brought me to you .”
“Despite almost dying?”
My eyes flew open, landing on the gorgeous blue depths of Crew’s.
I choked on a sob. “Despite almost dying,” I agreed. Rising to my feet, I bent over him and dropped a gentle kiss to his forehead, murmuring against his skin, “God, you scared me.”
“How long have I been out?” he asked, his voice rough and pained.
“About twelve hours. ”
The sun beyond the hospital had long since risen, though Crew’s curtains remained closed.
He tried to shift on the bed, instantly hissing in pain. “Fuck. Everything hurts.”
“That’s to be expected,” a new voice intoned, and I jerked my head around to face the doctor.
“Let’s hear it then.”
The doctor’s voice remained flat as he detailed all of Crew’s injuries, and another curse slipped past my man’s lips when he finished.
Honestly, I was right there with him.
“If Kelly wasn’t already dead…” I muttered.
Ignoring the doctor for the moment, Crew glanced at me. “She didn’t make it out?”
I pursed my lips as if to say, get real . “ You barely made it out.” Gesturing to his body, I said, “Did you think you were here for fun?”
“What even happened? The last thing I remember was telling my brothers to bail and take Parker with them. Oh my god,” he started, jerking upright before ultimately falling back with a groan of pain, eyes squeezed shut. “Is Parker okay?”
“Parker is fine, you fool,” I assured him. “But you were thrown probably fifty feet through the air.”
He grimaced, using the arm not in a sling to try to shift himself into a more comfortable position. “Explains why my entire body feels like a giant bruise.”
“We can up your morphine dosage—” the doctor began. Honestly, I’d forgotten he was there.
Crew quickly cut him off with a shouted “No!”
The doctor blinked in surprise. “Mr. Lawless, you’ve suffered a lot of trauma. Recovery will be incredibly painful regardless, but at least let us make you more comfortable.”
“I’m a recovering drug addict,” Crew gritted out. “I can’t…I don’t even like taking Tylenol. ”
“But you will take it?” Crew nodded. “Okay, I’ll prescribe you the highest dosage we’ve got and advise my support staff that you don’t get anything harder than that. And I appreciate your candor. In the interest of full disclosure, you should know that drip”—he indicated to the line in Crew’s hand—“is definitely not Tylenol.”
Crew moved like he was going to rip the IV out, but I clasped his hand, holding it at his side.
“Can you get a nurse in here to take replace it, please?”
The doctor sighed like he didn’t appreciate being ordered around by a patient’s family, but wisely left the room without a word.
A half hour later, his line was changed out, the drip replaced with the promised Tylenol, and Crew’s entire family had crowded into the room. I reclined in my chair, never more than a foot from him. Hell, I barely even let go of his hand. His mom, brothers, and sister chattered around us, tossing stories and insults around like we were crowded around the family dinner table instead of a hospital bed.
Honestly, though, I didn’t mind.
The sense of normalcy was exactly what we needed after three months of everything but .
Crew’s grip tightened around my fingers, and I glanced at him, melting when he smiled at me. His discomfort was obvious on every line of his gorgeous face, but that smile was like the sun shining after an endless winter. Blinding and beautiful.
“I love you, little phoenix,” he murmured, only loud enough for me to hear.
“I love you more, hotshot.”