Chapter 7
Present Day
One moment, Caleb was taping Angie’s sprained ankle; the next, he was sprinting from the training facility and speeding to the hospital.
The rest was a blur. Hospital personnel yelling at him not to park there. Frantically asking nurses and whoever would listen where the fuck the Level Two Trauma Care unit was.
“Who are you?”
“Are you family?”
“Sir, I’m going to need you to calm down and take a seat.”
It wasn’t until he spotted Benji, Jamie’s older brother, that Caleb was able to get some answers.
“How bad is it, Benji?” Caleb asked desperately, heart pounding out of his chest. He looked around, wondering why the fuck no one would tell him where his fiancé was.
Every person who seemed to work at this hospital kept disappearing behind two swinging doors with an obnoxious red stripe running through them.
“I don’t know,” Benji muttered grimly. “He got hit by a car or… or a bus? They think it’s a head injury, but didn’t say much else. I saw him—”
“You saw him?” Caleb spun on the man. He was built like Jamie, but with an intensity that Jamie didn’t have. “When? How did he look? Where—?”
“Caleb,” Benji said, setting his hands on Caleb’s shoulders and guiding him into a chair. “I don’t know anything, okay? I saw them wheel him in for a… scan? Some kind of scan?”
“CT scan?”
Before Benji could reply, a doctor threw the double doors open and approached them—a blonde woman who looked way too calm for a Trauma Care Unit.
“James Collins’s family?”
“Yes, that’s us.” Caleb quickly stood. Benji stepped forward and said, “I’m his brother,” at the same time that Caleb said, “I’m his fiancé.”
“Thank you for waiting. I’m Doctor Wilson.” Her voice was calm and practiced, like she’d said that exact line a hundred times. “James is stable. His vitals are good, and there is no life-threatening bleeding.”
Caleb felt his knees practically give out. He shoved down the urge to ask if he could go in there right now to let her finish.
“Is he going to be okay?” Benji asked.
Doctor Wilson looked down at the paper in her hands, and Caleb wanted to scream. Couldn’t she fucking speak faster? “He sustained a traumatic brain injury when he was struck by the bus. Because of that, his brain needs time to rest. At the moment, he’s not awake or responsive in a meaningful way.”
Caleb clenched his fists. “What does that mean?”
“It means that he’s in a coma,” the doctor said.
The lights lining the hospital ceiling started to blur.
Caleb blinked rapidly. The doctor quickly added, “Based on what we’re seeing, we expect the coma to be temporary.
He is breathing on his own, his reflexes are intact, and there are signs that his brain is protecting itself rather than shutting down. ”
Shutting down.
“Can I see him?” Caleb croaked, wishing there was a wall to hold himself up on. “Please.”
“You can come in and sit with him,” she replied. Caleb rushed toward the doors, and Benji fell into step beside him. “You may talk to him. In fact, familiar voices can be comforting. Even if he doesn’t respond, he may still hear you.”
Despite the warnings about being calm and quiet, Caleb rushed into the room that Doctor Wilson indicated, but the moment he threw the door open, he froze mid-step.
Nothing could prepare a man for this moment.
Jamie’s body lay motionless beneath thin white sheets, his eyes closed, dark lashes resting against pale skin. A faint bruise marked his temple, and the sight of it made Caleb want to vomit.
Machines hummed softly as Caleb moved quickly to the bedside.
“Jamie.” Caleb’s voice cracked. “Sweetheart.”
Jamie didn’t stir at the sound of his name, nor when Caleb brushed the back of his knuckles against his bruised temple.
Doctor Wilson approached the machine beside the bed and pressed a few buttons. “Like I said, he’s not responsive right now. But that doesn’t mean he can’t hear you.”
“Oh, Jamie.” Caleb’s fingers shook as they traced the freckles on his pale face. “Baby.”
This couldn’t be real. Surely, this was just a cruel dream that Caleb was having, and soon, he’d wake up with Jamie in his arms, and it would all be okay…
“So, now we just wait?” Benji asked from behind Caleb. He hadn’t moved from where he was on the far wall, eyes locked on his brother. His green eyes—a shade darker than Jamie’s—were wide and unblinking. He looked like he’d seen a ghost.
“Yes. Now we just wait,” the doctor answered. Caleb couldn’t think of a worse form of torture than sitting here, waiting, praying that he’d wake up.
Jamie. His Jamie. The love of his life. The man that he was going to marry.
“Here, sweetheart,” Caleb said, turning and brushing the curls from Jamie’s forehead. He hated it when his hair got in his face. Just last week, Caleb had convinced him not to cut it. It was too gorgeous, long like this.
“I’m right here, okay? I’m not going anywhere. I’m right here.”
Caleb sat down in the chair beside the bed and settled in for the longest forty-eight hours of his life.
Ellie is going to be so angry.
Jamie was late getting home, and he hadn’t texted her when he’d gotten in. The woman hated when he didn’t text her—she always worried like a mother hen—and he was such a prick for forgetting.
Again.
“Jamie? Can you hear me?”
What was Benji doing in his flat? That was odd. They weren’t home in Buck, sharing a room, right? It wasn’t the Christmas holiday.
“Benji?”
“Oh my God, he’s awake. Jamie, can you hear me?” The sound of a chair scraping the floor. “Caleb! Someone get Caleb.”
Blinking his eyes open, Jamie winced at the harsh, fluorescent lights, buzzing machines, and the commotion of people yelling that he was awake.
A stern-looking doctor came into his line of vision. She placed a cold hand on his shoulder. “James, I need you to stay calm, okay?”
“Oh my God, he’s awake.” He could hear a variety of voices in the room—the one sobbing was definitely Ellie—but his neck wouldn’t move enough to look.
“What… what happened?” he asked, realizing that his throat was dry as paper. Panic crawled up his chest and into his throat.
The doctor turned to the crowd in the room and said, “I need everyone to give us some air, okay? His mum and fiancé can stay. Everyone else, out.”
Jamie blinked groggily. Fiancé? He didn’t have a partner. Unless Ellie lied to get medical information on his behalf by saying she was his fiancée. That would be typical and actually pretty smart.
He could hear his mum praying in the corner, or doing whatever it was she did when she was nervous. She was probably lighting incense or whatever—
“James, I’m Doctor Wilson. You were brought to the trauma clinic two days ago with a head injury. Can you understand me?”
“Uh, yes. I can understand you. How did I get a head injury?” All he remembered was going to a pub and then going home to a very hot guy’s flat. His cheeks got hot. The doctor didn’t need to know those details. Neither did his mother, for goodness’ sake, because she didn’t even know that he was…
“Jamie, holy fuck. Jamie.”
A deep voice filtered into the room, followed by frantic footsteps. The voice was American and familiar. He was fairly certain he had heard it in his sleep.
Hands cupped his cheeks, then his shoulders, and suddenly he was being kissed all over.
“Oh my God. You’re awake, thank fuck, oh my God.”
The smell of something warm and masculine filled his senses as this person kissed his cheeks and then his neck. “Sweetheart, I’m right here. I’m so glad you’re okay.” The person leaned away enough for Jamie to register large brown eyes and a cut jaw.
“Caleb?”
What was the guy from the pub doing here? Oh, shit. Had he gotten into an accident on the way home from Caleb’s flat?
Caleb’s eyes were red, like he’d been crying, and his tight curls stuck out in all directions. They looked longer than he remembered.
“J, I’m right here, okay? I’m not going anywhere.”
With great effort, he croaked, “What are you doing here?”
“What do you mean? Of course I’m here.”
“I…” Jamie glanced nervously around. “I don’t know that you should be.”
The worry in Caleb’s eyes quickly morphed to confusion and then hurt. Jamie felt bad. He hadn’t meant it to be harsh, but, well, his mum was watching, and he hadn’t even come out to her yet. Hadn’t he told Caleb that?
A hand appeared on Caleb’s large shoulder, and he was pulled gently out of Jamie’s line of sight. The next thing he knew, Jamie was being peppered with questions by the doctor.
What year was it? What day of the week? What did he do for work? It was kind of annoying, and he had a weird, gnawing feeling that he was failing a test or something.
“Give us the room, please. Mum, you can stay.”
“What? No, I’m staying, too.” He heard Caleb’s angry voice. “I’m not leaving him.”
The doctor muttered a few words, but all Jamie caught was confused and important.
“Can someone please—” Jamie tried to sit up and winced. “Bloody fuck—please just fill me in.”
A door opened and closed, and a loud bang sounded from the hallway, followed by Caleb’s muffled voice apologizing to the staff outside.
Instant relief flooded Jamie’s body as his mother stood above him. “Honey, lie back down.”
She was bundled in a large, striped jumper, brown hair thrown hastily into a bun.
“I’m sorry, Mum,” Jamie said quickly. “I didn’t mean to give you a fright, and…” His eyes flicked to the door. “I should have told you, erm, about…well, but it’s not like I did it on purpose, I am still just—”
Her thin eyebrows pulled together in confusion. “Sweetie, I adore Caleb. I’m so grateful he got here before I could. You have nothing to apologize for.” A soft smile graced her lips, not meeting her eyes.
“What?” Jamie ignored the pain as he sat up. “How do you know Caleb? I barely know him.”
“Maggie,” the doctor warned.
His mother’s green eyes went wide, flicking back and forth between Jamie and the doctor. Her panic added to the tight feeling in his own chest, making his vision blurry.
The feeling that he was missing something important.
“Honey, what do you mean you barely know Caleb? You’re—”
“Maggie,” the doctor snapped. Jamie’s mother ignored her.
“He’s your fiancé, Jamie. You’re engaged.”
“He’s my—?”
“You got engaged last month.”
“Maggie, enough.”
The last thing Jamie remembered was the frantic beeping of the stupid hospital machines and the fluorescent lights fading to black.