Chapter 4
CHAPTER FOUR
FOREST
There were three things I was an expert in besides my field of academia: procrastinating, putting my head in the sand to ignore what was right in front of me, and getting shit done when I had to.
One of those things contradicted the other two, but in my head, it made sense because the other thing that defined me as a person was my intense aversion to confrontation.
I could tell that Nash wasn’t going to let the whole seizure thing go, so the first thing I did when I got home was call my GP for a referral.
“We’re emailing you a list,” the receptionist told me after speaking with the physician’s assistant. “Give any one of them a call, and we’ll fax the referral over.”
So the next thing I did was that. Forty-five minutes of call after call until I found one willing to take a new patient.
The woman on the phone had been kind and told me there was a six-month wait for an appointment, so I took it because what choice did I have? I could go back to my GP for standard tests, but those had never turned up anything, so what was the point?
Luckily, she asked what was going on, so I explained, and half an hour later, she called me back and said the doctor could see me in three days.
I’d been kind of hoping for the six-month wait so I could pretend like nothing was wrong, but I wasn’t ignorant. I knew damn well that their finding availability to see me so soon meant the very real possibility that something was seriously wrong.
And that left me plagued with insomnia, sick to my stomach more than I had been since all my weird symptoms had begun, and stressed beyond measure.
It was somewhere past midnight, and I had finally gotten my legs to cooperate enough to get out of bed.
My eyes were a little blurry from squinting at my phone without my glasses on, and my stomach was in knots from everything the internet told me was wrong with me.
A brain tumor, cholera, malaria, five chronic illnesses, and one terminal case of mad cow disease, if all the medical websites were accurate.
I wasn’t normally the kind of person who went down those rabbit holes, but this situation wasn’t like any I’d ever been in. I didn’t know what to do with myself except research until I found something that made sense.
Unfortunately, my list of symptoms didn’t make sense. So I did the only other thing I knew to do, which was get up for a glass of water, hoping it would help shake me out of this paranoia.
Going down the stairs was treacherous, but I was dizzy and thirsty and tired of staring up at the ceiling, contemplating all the what-ifs.
I might’ve been more relaxed, but Nash had been a little weird and quiet when he came home after his shift, so I hadn’t gotten my usual conversation with him.
And I sure as hell wasn’t going to be calling Creek because if I did, he’d know.
He had a weird sixth sense when it came to me and things going wrong in my life.
He always knew when my heart had been broken. He always knew when I was hurt. And he always knew when I was sick.
I hated icing him out, but I had no idea what else I was supposed to do.
I couldn’t handle his typical smothering care right now.
I couldn’t spend my time reassuring him that everything was fine when I didn’t know if that was the truth.
It killed me to shut him out, but I knew—at least for now—that was for the best.
Coming around the corner to the kitchen, my legs started doing a strange thing where I couldn’t stop them from propelling me forward. It felt a bit like nightmares I used to have when I was younger. I’d be in a car, slamming on the brakes, but nothing would stop it from rolling forward.
That was my legs now. Getting them going was hard. Making them stop was harder. My muscles felt tense but strangely weak, and I was going to crash into the wall.
And then I hit a roadblock.
A tall, gorgeous, broad-chested roadblock in soft flannel pajama pants and a threadbare black T-shirt. Nash looked down at me as he caught me by the hips, his eyes half-lidded and sleepy, hair mussed like he’d been running his hands through it.
I lost every single bit of my breath as I stared into his face.
“You good?” he asked. His voice shattered the silence around me.
My legs still felt weird, weak and restless, but I was steady again. My hands were starting to tremble, so instead of getting water and spilling it all over myself, I moved past him and dropped into a chair.
“Forest,” he said.
Right. I should probably answer him with words and stuff. “I’m okay.”
He scoffed and walked over, dropping into the seat across from me. “Wanna try that again?”
“No.” He lifted a brow, and I rolled my eyes. “You’re not my commander, Top.”
His lips twitched. “You’re cute when you’re being sassy. Now, one more time. Want to try that again?”
With a groan, I lifted my hands to cover my face, but the tremors were too strong, and I dropped them back down again. I wasn’t brave enough to look at him, but I could feel the weight of his stare.
“I made an appointment with a neurologist.”
He let out a loud rush of breath. “Yeah?”
I nodded, biting my lip as I finally glanced at him. He still looked tired. No, it was more than that. Something was wrong. “They were able to fit me in after I told them about the whole…maybe seizure thing. And the tremors. And…and some other stuff I haven’t really talked to you about.”
“Other stuff,” he echoed. He hummed low in the back of his throat and nodded. His gaze was a little far off, but it didn’t last long. He was back to looking at me with laser focus. “I’m going to drive you. Let me know what day so I can make sure I have the time off.”
“Nash, that’s not—”
He held up a hand. “You gonna tell your brother? Ask him to take you? Because your ass ain’t drivin’ again after what happened.”
I felt sick to my stomach even though I knew he was right. I wasn’t going to take the risk of hurting myself, let alone someone else. “I can take a Lyft or something.”
“Waste of money. If you’re not going to tell Creek, then I’m taking the time. Heard?”
“Yes, Drill Sergeant,” I said stiffly.
He pinned me with his stare. “Again, cute and sassy, but I’m being serious, Forest. I’m not trying to be a dick, okay? I’m trying to help, and I need to know that you understand that.”
I grimaced but gave a stiff nod. It wasn’t worth fighting with him over. He was more stubborn than I was. With his former and current careers, I suppose he had to be.
It was hard to be mad at Nash about it though. I knew he was just looking out for me.
“So,” he said, the tension between us easing, “why are you up?”
I shrugged, fighting back a yawn. “Stress insomnia. I made the mistake of asking Dr. Google what was wrong with me, and it turns out I have nine rare diseases, a brain tumor, and four minutes to live.”
He chuckled and shook his head. “You kids and your goddamn internet. You’re rotting your brain.”
“Isn’t that what your parents said about TV?” I challenged.
He grinned and shrugged. “And what their parents said about rock ’n’ roll, and what their parents said about books.” He slapped his hands down on the table, then pushed to stand before offering me a hand up. “Come on. Let’s go sit on the couch if we’re gonna be up all night.”
“We?” I pressed.
He rolled his eyes and shook his hand at me until I grabbed it. “Good job.”
I shivered for a second. His praise was casual and unthinking, but it hit me in all the right ways. Or maybe all the wrong ones. I took a deep breath as I stepped away from the table and tested my strength.
My feet didn’t want to get started, and once they were going again, they didn’t seem to want to stop, but it was easier with my hand in Nash’s, and I used his firm grip on me to keep from crashing into the couch.
He let me take the corner section, but he didn’t stray far. His shoulder pressed against mine as he stretched his legs one way into the right side of the L and I set mine along the left.
The comfort of simply being with him was overwhelmingly nice. Too nice.
Dangerously nice.
“So,” I said, trying to kill the mood just a little, “why are you up? Was it me?”
“Nah, honey,” he said, using that word again, totally unthinking and unaware of how it affected me. “It wasn’t you.” He tapped his temple. “Just the usual shit, you know?”
I hated it, but I did know. I knew what Nash and the other guys dealt with. “Should I not ask? I know Creek gets pretty pissed off if I try to make him talk about his PTSD.”
“Nah. It’s not all that…well…” He stopped and shrugged. “Actually, yeah. I had a bit of a triggering afternoon.” He let out a trembling breath, and I could tell something was actually wrong. “There was a call to a car accident that went sideways when we got there.”
Twisting around, I reached for him, unable to stop myself. I took his hand in mine and stroked soft lines over his palm. He immediately relaxed against me and let out a groan I was most definitely going to file away for later.
“Do you want to talk about it?” I chanced.
“No.” That answer was too quick, and having known my brother his whole life, I knew what I needed to do, so I did it.
I waited, letting the silence give him the space and freedom to talk when he was ready.
“There was a woman,” he finally said. “A girl, really. Not even eighteen yet. Nasty car accident—drunk driver. We managed to get her out, but she likely has a pretty severe spinal injury, and there’s a good chance she’ll lose a leg.”
“Oh,” I whispered.
Nash nodded his head against my shoulder and nestled just a little closer.
His hand closed around my wrist, and he squeezed it in an absent, almost melodic pattern.
“The swelling was pretty bad and I…well, hell. I wanted to be able to help her and tell her it was all gonna be okay, but I couldn’t. I felt helpless.”
I turned my head and pressed my nose to the side of his temple. “That’s the worst feeling.”