67. Emmett
CHAPTER SIXTY-SEVEN
EMMETT
“ W ill you quit pacing? It’s making me nauseous,” I snap at my brother, but truthfully if I were able, I’d be pacing right alongside him.
Being stuck in this bed is fucking torture when all I want to do is be able to take my girl’s hand and coax her back to us.
Waverly’s unconscious in the bed beside mine. We both went into surgery at the same time, but only one of us has woken up, and every second that ticks by without her waking up is making me more murderous than the last.
Kade cuts me a glare, and I can’t help but chuckle at my big, bad twin, who never lets his emotions overwhelm him. The darkness beneath his eyes is all the evidence you need to know he hasn’t slept in days, and his wrinkled clothes and hair sticking up in every direction are confirmation that he hasn’t left the hospital since he and Wyatt carried us in two nights ago.
“If you had to watch the only two people on this earth you gave a fuck about almost die, you’d be going out of your mind as well,” he growls.
I would. Hell, just seeing Waverly like this makes my skin itch.
She looks tiny in the middle of the hospital bed, wires and tubes covering her too-pale frame. But her body needs to rest. The doctors said it might be the trauma that’s keeping her unconscious for longer than they would normally expect, or maybe her body just needs a little more time. Given her history, the last ten years of looking over her shoulder, of working herself to the bone, I don’t blame her for taking the time, even if it’s driving Kade and me to the brink of insanity.
“She’ll wake up soon,” I remind him. I turn my head to look at Waverly, her chest rising and falling gently, the beep of the heart monitor. I’ve spent more time than I care to admit obsessing over both those things, but he doesn’t need to know that.
The fact we’re even sharing a room is nothing short of a miracle, but Elias and Wyatt organized it for us, and if I had to hazard a guess, I’d imagine they called in a favor from the Syndicate of the Legion.
Kade nods and crosses to the chair beside her bed. “I know. I just miss her.” His words are so gentle I almost miss them, but they bring a smile to my face.
My brother has never missed anyone in his life. He’s never given a fuck about anyone. But what he feels for Waverly surpasses everything. For both of us.
“You love her?” I ask.
His eyes flick up to meet mine, a stricken look crossing his face for a moment before the cool indifference returns. “Yeah. I do.”
I smirk. “I never thought I’d see the day.”
“Shut up. It’s not like you’re not head over heels for her.”
“Oh, I am, but I realized that years ago. It’s not a revelation for me.” I chuckle.
Kade sighs and slips his hand into hers, careful of the IV as he settles beside her. “Your apartment or mine?”
I raise a brow. “To move into?”
“Yeah. I don’t want to waste another minute. We’ve fucked around for a decade. After almost losing her, I’m done with it. I want everything, and I don’t want to wait for it.”
I shake my head, but the smile that tugs at my lips widens. “Yours,” I say. “Mine is small because I was never there.”
“And which one of us is legally marrying her?”
“Me,” I say, expecting him to argue, but he just gives me a nod and presses a kiss to the back of Waverly’s hand.
“Okay, but I get to knock her up first.”
I raise a brow. “And how exactly do you intend to enforce that?”
“No coming inside her when she’s ovulating.”
A chuckle tumbles from my throat, but an image of our future fills my mind. A little girl that looks like her mother and twin boys that look like us. A ring on our girl’s finger. A house in the suburbs where the kids can grow up. It’s perfect.
“You need to quit,” I tell him.
“I know. I’m done with that life. I thought I might try my hand at being a stay-at-home dad.”
“I think you need kids for that,” I remind him.
“Like I said, no more wasting time.” He shrugs.
I chuckle and shake my head. I don’t know how this became my life, but I won’t take it for granted. Not even for a second.