33. Christian
CHRISTIAN
LA, November, 9 Months Ago
S ir, you can’t go in there.”
I don’t stop, pushing through the double doors to the emergency room and shoving right past the nurse that tries to stop me.
She’s chasing after me when I round the corner and see Mason Carpenter at the end of the hall, looking grim where he sits in a chair.
“I’m going to have to call security—”
“Call them,” I snap over my shoulder and whatever she sees in my eyes must scare her, because she falls back.
“He’s with us,” Mason says, though he looks like he’d much prefer they throw my ass out, instead.
“You’re sure?” the nurse asks and Mason just nods. She turns back to me, eyeing me reproachfully. “If you cause a disturbance, I’ll have to have you removed.”
“Good luck,” I murmur and she saunters away.
Immediately, I move to step past Mason, but he puts a hand out to stop me.
“Mason, if you don’t let me in through that door, I’ll rip it off the fucking hinges.
Mason is huge, but I don’t give a damn. I’m almost as tall as him and with the rage coursing through my veins, I know I could take him.
I also don’t want to hurt him, but if he doesn’t give me a choice, I’ll do what I have to do.
“Mom told me what you did,” he grits, his eyes narrowed and the vein in the center of his forehead bulging. “You know how fucking illegal that is?”
“She also tell you, she’s the one who asked me to?”
He falls silent, staring at me.
“Why the fuck would she do that?”
I shrug. “Ask her yourself. Let me by.”
Again, he stops me, a hand on my chest.
I have half a mind to break his fingers.
“She’s not in good shape, Cross,” Mason grunts, and I can see how tired he is. Fuck, we all are. As soon as I got the news, I left and flew straight to LA. I haven’t slept in God only knows how long.
Not that I slept much before.
Lead fills my chest. The uncertainty of what I’m going to find when I walk through the door has been playing Russian Roulette with my mind all fucking day. “What happened?”
“They don’t know who did it,” he murmurs, shaking his head. “Fuck,” he grits, scrubbing a hand over his face. “She’s in a medically induced coma. They thought it would help because she’s got broken ribs and a collar bone. A head injury.”
I take a step toward the door and his voice rings out, stopping me in my tracks.
“There’s something else.”
I pause, not liking the tone of his voice.
Prickling, icy fear slips over me. I know the worst. Surely, there can’t be more.
“She was pregnant,” he says finally, his eyes darkening past recognition. “Eight weeks.”
I’m thankful for the numbness that slips over me when he says those words. I’m afraid if it hadn’t, I would have destroyed this entire fucking hospital.
He shakes his head, his lip curling up in a sneer.
“You couldn’t just let her go, could you? It was over.”
“It wasn’t over for me.”
His eyes flash dangerously, and he steps in front of the door.
“When she wakes, she can decide if she wants to see you.”
“Get out of the way, Carpenter.”
“Fuck off, Cross. You left her. You said you’d keep her safe.” He shoves at my chest, and I take a step back, anger bubbling just underneath the surface. “That’s my little fucking sister.”
“And she’s my fucking wife .” I shove him back, and he stumbles back into the wall. I’m too pissed off to care. The rage rushing through me all consuming.
Silence falls over the halls and both of us stand on opposite sides, glaring at each other.
I step toward the door and this time, he doesn’t stop me.
“She’s going to hate you,” he murmurs from behind me and I pause, hand on the doorknob.
“She already does.”
“She won’t eat.”
I nod once, staring at the bedroom door down the hall that may as well lead to a tomb.
The whole fucking house is a tomb. The curtains are drawn and the lights dimmed. The only time that fucking door opens is when Monica steps inside to bring in a new plate of food and to remove the old, untouched one.
I fucking hate it. This . . . barrier separating me from her. I want to rip the door to shreds. At least then, I’d be able to see her. Know she’s alive and not just another ghost haunting these walls.
The last time I saw her, she was in a coma and I haven’t been allowed around her since. That was three. Fucking. Weeks ago, and I’m losing my goddamned mind.
“I’m not sure if I should take her back to the hospital. She’ll hate me, but I fear I won’t have a choice. It’s been four days since she’s eaten anything. I can’t even get her to drink.”
“Let me talk to her.”
Monica shakes her head.
“It’s not a good idea, Christian. She’s already been through so much where you’re concerned.”
“Maybe that’s exactly why he should see her,” Bob, Monica’s therapist boyfriend chimes.
Don’t get me wrong. Bob’s great. He’s the nicest guy I’ve ever met.
He’s just way too fucking chipper for my dark moods these days.
Everyone’s been on edge the last few weeks. Since Mila came home, Monica expects everyone to walk on eggshells. As if her daughter is seconds away from a nuclear meltdown.
I wouldn’t know. Again, I haven’t been allowed to see her.
“Bob,” Monica warns, and Bob holds up his hands to placate her.
“I’m just saying, it might give her something else to focus on other than what happened.”
I scrub a hand over my face, pushing back at the tiredness that threatens to take over. I barely sleep now. Not because I don’t have time—I’m just waiting around to see her—but because I can’t get it out of my head. The way she looked in that fucking hospital bed. Beaten and bruised black and blue. How fucking small she looked covered in all those fucking bandages.
“Let me see her,” I murmur, my voice rough with the need for sleep I won’t be getting. Not anytime soon. Every time I close my eyes, all I see is her, and I’m filled with fucking rage all over again.
I want to gut him. I want to skin him alive and hang him out in a field for birds to pick at until he’s nothing more than decay fertilizing the earth. Until there’s not a single ounce of him left on this godforsaken plant anymore.
Monica eyes me, her gaze worrisome.
I know what she’s thinking, and I get it. I also don’t care.
A door won’t stop me from seeing her.
A fucking nuke won’t stop me from seeing her.
“Fine,” Monica agrees softly, wiping a stray tear that slips down her cheek. Bob rubs her back. “But don’t do anything to upset her. No lights. No asking how she’s feeling. None of that.”
The weight on my chest suddenly feels a thousand pounds heavier. I don’t stick around, instead, striding straight for that fucking door.
I hate that fucking door.
I knock once, receiving no answer, and slip inside.
It’s exactly as I thought it would be.
A fucking tomb.
The curtains are drawn tight, blocking out most of the LA sun outside. The room smells of old food and dirty sheets, and the silence is thick.
I step inside, shut the door behind me, and take in the small form nestled amongst the thick blankets in the center of the bed.
Mila doesn’t move when I enter, her back to me and her gaze trained on the wall in front of her. Monica said this is all she does, since she came home. Sleep or lay here.
I don’t bother with small talk; instead, I cross the room to where Monica just brought up the cup of broth, steaming on the nightstand, untouched.
I grab it, pulling up a chair in front of her, and finally, her soft grey eyes focus on me.
Fuck.
I’ve fucking missed her.
“You’re dying.”
She doesn’t say anything at first, simply blinking up at me as if she’s trying to decide if I’m real or fake and if she really cares about the answer.
“Good,” she whispers, closing her eyes.
She’s weak. Four days without food or water will do that to you.
“Is that it, then?”
Her eyes spring open, and she glowers at me.
“Leave me alone, Christian.”
“I asked you a question, Mila.”
“Why are you here? I don’t want you here.”
Because there’s nowhere else I’d rather be than by your side.
“Answer the question. Do you want to die?”
I know I’m being harsh with her, but I know Mila. Maybe better than she knows herself. Monica tip-toeing around the elephant in the room isn’t helping. Mila needs someone to challenge her. She always has.
“And if I do?” she snaps, her voice scratchy from a lack of water.
Sitting forward, I slip my hand into the holster at my back, holding the pistol out to her. She stares at it for a moment, then at me, her gaze ping-ponging back and forth like she can’t fucking believe I’d actually give her a loaded gun.
I didn’t, of course. But this gives her the illusion of choice, even if it’s a false one.
“I don’t want that,” she whispers, a single tear slipping down her cheek and onto the pillow below.
“Then eat.”
She tries to glare at me, but it’s weak just like the rest of her.
“Your mother is this close to taking you back to the hospital.”
She doesn’t want to. I can see it in her eyes.
But . . . there’s also a desperation there. A desperation to stay as far away from the hospital as possible after nearly three weeks there.
I hold both the broth and the gun out to her.
She takes the broth.
I don’t help her sit up in bed, even though every one of my instincts is telling me to. She doesn’t want to be touched, and I can understand it. So, when she manages to rest against the headboard, breathing deeply through her nose as the room spins around her, I hand her the mug without even so much as a brush of my fingers.
“When was the last time you took a shower?”
“You’re welcome to leave if you think I smell,” she grumbles, swallowing some of the broth. I can’t explain the strange sense of relief that washes over me.
“I don’t really give a shit if you smell,” I murmur, shrugging my shoulders.
She says nothing, but her hands shake, holding the mug.
“It’s pretty dark in here,” I murmur. “There’s a world outside these walls, you know.”
“The world’s a fucked-up place. I’m a testament to that.”
“World’s not fucked up. There’s just fucked up people in it.”
She stares at me, studying my face for a long moment.
“Did my mother send you in here to con me into leaving my room?”
“No.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Would you prefer I leave you to wallow in your self-pity?”
Her jaw ticks, her eyes narrowing to slits.
All the while, I can’t help but wonder how hot that broth is and how bad it’s going to sting if she throws it in my face.
“I’m not wallowing. I’m working through it.”
“By wallowing.”
She huffs, shaking her head.
“You don’t understand.”
“I understand what happened perfectly. I also know you’re stronger than it. Letting it defeat you proves nothing.”
“It’s . . . not . . .” her voice trails off, and she shakes her head because she knows it’s a lie. “I just . . . every time I close my eyes, he’s there.”
Fuck, I wish I could take her pain. I’d do it in a fucking heartbeat if it meant the light in her eyes was still there.
“And he’ll continue to be there for the rest of your life. Some part of you is always going to know what happened. You’re going to have moments where you feel it like it was just yesterday and moments where it couldn’t be further from your mind. He didn’t kill you three weeks ago. Don’t let him do it now.”
She stares at me a beat, tears burning in her gaze, but they don’t fall. They don’t slip past the threshold, glistening in the glow around the edges of the curtains.
“I . . . finished it.”
She sits the mug back on the nightstand, and I’m glad to see some color in her cheeks, even if it’s only a small step. She may look alive. She may be breathing.
—She’s still a ghost.
I nod, rising from the seat by the bed and taking the mug.
“I’m not going to tell you it’s going to be okay,” I murmur. I can’t look at her because if I do, I’ll reach for her, and that’s the last fucking thing she needs right now. My touch. A man’s touch. “That depends on you. I can tell you, your mother’s worried about you. Your siblings . . . I’m worried about you.”
Finally, I glance in her direction and the tears finally give way. I have to clench my fist to keep myself from wiping them from her cheeks.
“The rest is up to you.”
Forcing myself to leave the room, I find Monica and Bob hovering in the hall. Monica’s so elated that she’d eaten something that she starts to cry. Of course, she cries all the time, these days.
It’s not until that night when I’m lying awake in my room across the hall that I hear the shower kick on. Getting up, I go and change her sheets. I don’t know why. It’s just something that I need to do.
I failed her as a man. As a husband.
I won’t make that same mistake twice.