Chapter 26 #2
“If I give you my information, can you write it down for me?” I asked pitifully. “I don’t know my insurance information off the top of my head—”
“I know it,” he interrupted as he started filling out the form.
“—but it should be in my purse…wait, you know it?”
Blake glanced at me, and his hard face softened.
“Sweetheart, I have it memorized. I always worried you might end up in an emergency situation, and I wanted to be prepared. I know your full name, date of birth, address, insurance information…the only thing I don’t know is your social security number and the date of your last period.
” He laughed. “And sometimes I feel like I’m crazy, because I want to know those things, too.
Like if I know everything there is to know about you, I’ll be able to keep you safe. Unlike tonight. I’m so sorry, Lucy.”
That same warmth encompassed my chest, my toes kept tingling.
He may not be holding me, but I could feel him around me.
This was attention. This was care. Maybe he got too stuck in trying to be the right guy for me, but it was clear—I mattered to him.
In a way I often worried I’d never mattered to anyone.
“You did keep me safe. If you hadn’t shown up…”
“I don’t even want to think about what would have happened if I hadn’t been there.
But I didn’t get there in time, and if I had been quicker on my feet, this wouldn’t have happened in the first place,” he said.
“I didn’t keep you safe—if I did, you wouldn’t be holding your wrist like that right now. ”
He was right. I was cradling my wrist to ease some of the pain. But he was wrong about not keeping me safe. Because I’d never felt safer.
He finished the forms.
“Don’t go anywhere, Lucy,” he said, waiting until I nodded in agreement.
“Yes, daddy,” I said quietly, and his eyes lit up.
He bent down and kissed my hair, then bent lower and pressed his lips to my cheek, sending those toe tingles up through the rest of my body. Before he stood, he whispered in my ear, “I need to kiss you for real, but if I do we’re going to make a scene in the ER.”
With those words, he walked away, leaving me feeling like I needed a defibrillator. Who knew it took stealing his car and getting stupid drunk to get him to tell me he wanted to kiss me?
I watched him as he walked back to the desk to give the forms to the nurse.
He walked like he meant business, but then he always walked like he meant business.
His long legs ate up the floor, his narrow hips and perfect bubble butt impossible to look away from.
His back was straight but relaxed, his broad shoulders taking up the entire room.
Everything about him screamed power, confidence, and charisma.
He was a magnet everyone was drawn to, and I couldn’t help but feel special that he was drawn to me.
I need to kiss you for real, but if I do, we’ll make a scene in the ER.
Whatever conversation with the nurse was taking awhile, but then Blake settled back into the chair next to mine, his leg pressing against mine. It had done that earlier tonight at the game too, but this time it wasn’t accompanied with the fear of him going on a date with someone else.
What had happened with that?
“Was Professor Putrovski upset that you bailed on your date early to find me?”
He glanced at me. “There was no date.”
Psh. “Could’ve fooled me,” I said, not wanting him to see how relieved I was.
“Lucy, I only went along with it to protect you. You have to know that, don’t you? That woman has so much power over your future, and I refuse to risk you losing out on any opportunity that gets you closer to your goals. I had to distract her, but you were gone before I could explain.”
Oh.
Well, duh.
Part of me had assumed as much, but the deep hurt from my past had been too loud. And it was hard to completely blame myself when he’d been so hot and cold with me. How was I supposed to know he was trying to protect me and not that he wanted to go out with a beautiful, age-appropriate woman?
“Troublemaker,” he said quietly and calmly, “Come here.”
“Where?” I asked, confused.
He patted his lap.
“Where I know you aren’t going anywhere, and I can feel with my own body you’re alright,” he said, not that he needed to.
I was already climbing off the seat and moving over to sit on him.
I’d barely bent my knees when I was being pulled gently backward and down, until I was on his lap, my ass resting above his cock, my bare legs layered over his slacks, my feet on top of his.
He pulled me deeper into his chest, resting his head on top of mine.
I both felt and heard his sigh as he wrapped his arms around my waist and seemed to finally relax.
“There we go, that’s better,” he said. “Daddy’s got you now.”
I wriggled at his words, even with the ache in my wrist, and his cock hardened underneath me right between my ass cheeks. The brush of it sent pleasant, unfamiliar shocks through my belly. I’d never realized that pressure there could feel good, but—
“Yeah, we’re going to have to save that for later, sweetheart,” he growled.
“We need to talk about all of this,” I reminded him.
“You mean, you stealing my car and running away like a brat?” he said.
“Or you bugging my room and stealing my underwear like a creep,” I shot back, being careful to keep my voice down.
“Yeah, that too.”
But before we could get into it, my name was called.
I glanced around the ER waiting room. There was a man with blood all over his face and neck, a woman holding a red, screaming baby.
“How are we already up? There’s no way she thought my wrist was more serious than what’s going on with all these other people, and they’ve been here a lot longer than we have,” I protested.
“I may have bribed her,” he said, nudging me to stand.
I rose. “Coach Samson, you bribed someone? Who are you?”
He took my hand. “Someone who realized how close he came to losing what mattered most,” he said, leaving me speechless for the first time in my life as he tugged me out of the room and down the hallway to where a medical technician waited to lead us into a room.
We didn’t wait long when another nurse appeared to take my vitals. Blake was quiet, a serious, protective, looming presence as she checked my heart rate, temperature, and blood pressure before taking some notes and leaving us alone. Blake remained quiet when the doctor showed up minutes later.
“Lucy?” the doctor was an attractive man, or I would’ve thought so if Blake wasn’t in the room.
“That’s me,” I said, brightly and a little drunkenly. Blake looked the doctor over, and his lips flattened and he moved further inside.
“I see,” the doctor said kindly. He glanced at Blake wearily. “And you must be her father.”
Damn it. I expected Blake to turn red or retreat emotionally from the reminder of our age difference and legal relationship, but he seemed to shrug it right off, standing at his full height like a reminder to the doctor of who the bigger man was.
“I’m her partner,” he corrected, and I fought not to gasp. Or faint.
Partner?
“Since when?” I asked, unable to help myself.
“Since the hotel,” Blake said gruffly.
“Well, Lucy’s partner, I’ll need to examine Lucy without you in the room.”
No, what he needed to do was ask me if Blake had been the one to fuck up my wrist without him in the room, but I didn’t feel the need to point out the obvious.
“I’m not leaving,” Blake said resolutely.
I looked at him. “Blake, it’s okay. Let me talk to the doctor real quick, and you can come right back in.”
It was like trying to pacify a bull. Blake shook his head, but I raised my chin, staring him down. Finally, he relented.
“Two minutes,” he told the doctor. “Don’t make her uncomfortable.”
The doctor looked affronted. “I’m not planning on it,” he said, and with one last look at me, Blake left the room.
The moment he was gone, the doctor relaxed.
“He’s a little old for you, isn’t he?” he said.
I felt like a cat with my hackles up. I didn’t need to hear that, and neither did Blake. Not when we were finally, finally getting somewhere.
“Please don’t say that when he comes back in,” I told the doctor earnestly. “He already feels bad enough about the power dynamic. I don’t need him questioning our relationship.”
The doctor laughed, surprised. “Alright. Well, I have to ask you some questions anyway.”
“No, he didn’t hurt me. I was pissed at him about…something, so I went to a bar, got too drunk, and these two creepy weirdos attacked me. Blake found me and rescued me before things could go too far. They’re who fucked up my wrist.”
The doctor’s eyes widened. “Do you need to file a police report? I can get them to—”
“No.” Who knew what they would do to Blake for going to town on those men’s faces. There was protection and there was full on vengeful rage, and I had a feeling the police wouldn’t take kindly to the latter.
“Alright.” He cleared his throat. “Lucy, do you feel safe in your relationship?”
That was easy. “Safer than I’ve ever felt in my entire life.”
The doctor nodded.
“Now, can you let him back in? I want him with me,” I told the doctor, and he went to open the door.
Blake stormed back into the room, stopping as soon as he saw me.
“I’m fine,” I told him immediately to calm him, still unable to come to terms with the fact that Blake could lose his cool, much less that I could calm him down.
“I don’t like leaving you alone,” he explained, and then waited as the doctor gently checked over my wrist. He declared it sprained, fitted me for a brace, and wrote me a prescription for pain medication, telling me I couldn’t take them until I sobered up tomorrow.
“What about potential alcohol poisoning?” Blake asked, clearly still worried.
The doctor laughed. “She seems completely coherent to me. Drink water, Lucy, you’re going to have a hell of a hangover tomorrow, but I think you’ll otherwise be alright. You’re clearly in good hands.”
With that, he left the room, and me alone with Blake.
“Can I go home?” I asked him, suddenly exhausted.
His eyes went dark.
“We’re not going all the way back to Gehenom tonight. I rented us a last-minute Airbnb, we’ll stay there for the night.”
That sounded good to me. I let Blake lead me out of the hospital and back to his car.
“How did you even get to me?” I asked him.
“Mason gave me a ride.”
Whoops.
“It’s okay,” Blake said to my unanswered question. “Let’s just get you to the cabin and in bed, we’ll deal with the rest in the morning.”
Dealing with the rest in the morning sounded good to me.
Especially because I fell asleep to Blake buckling my seat belt in his car.