Chapter 27 Lucas
Lucas
Hospitals smelled like fear, bleach, and final endings.
I’d been in and out of the emergency room several times because of sports injuries, and I never liked the atmosphere it evoked.
Nor did I care for all the sounds. People moaning in pain.
Monitors beeping. Doctors and nurses running toward a code blue. Death hanging in the balance.
A nurse had escorted us to a quiet and private waiting room reserved for families of surgical patients an hour ago. Thank fuck because I couldn’t sit in a packed ER waiting room, listening to kids cry.
“You could’ve been killed,” my mom whispered from her seat on the other side of the room.
My amazing mother was trying to keep it together while I was ready to kill my father.
That possibility that someone would finish him off was still on the table if Kurtis didn’t settle his debt. Or worse, target my mother. Or even Mazzie, for that matter.
I did my best to wear a hole in the shiny white floor, pacing like a madman. Luckily, no one but my mom and me were in the room. After what had happened to Kurtis and that call with Mazzie, I was about to lose my shit.
The phrase we need to talk clawed at my mind, dragging me back to the dreary, rain-soaked day in high school when Natalia uttered those dreaded words right before the morning bell rang. By the end of that day, she’d broken up with me. I would never recover if Mazzie ended things between us.
But why would she? She just told you she loved you.
“Lucas, please sit. You’re making me more nervous than I already am.”
I couldn’t stay still. I needed to punch something and feel more pain than I was already in. My fucking father and his addiction.
She dabbed a tissue under her nose. “I have money to pay Mr. Blackwood.”
“I’m pretty sure his son, Shane, is behind this, not him,” I said, throwing her an angry look she didn’t deserve. “And until we know the whole story, we can’t do anything.”
Shane could be doing his father’s dirty work. Whatever the case might be, Kurtis had to shape up or else the goons would keep coming and coming until someone was dead.
“We need to call the police,” my mom said.
I ran my tongue over my split lip. “What will we tell them, Mom? We don’t know anything other than someone beat up him and me. And I don’t know the men who roughed me up.”
“You’re lucky it wasn’t anything that would ruin your football career.” She shuddered as she dipped a hand in her purse for something.
I dared not tell her that my attackers had threatened to do exactly that if Kurtis didn’t pay.
The life that we’d spent ten years rebuilding was about to be shattered because my father was still a loser.
I heard footsteps and hushed voices in the hall and one voice I knew well.
Mazzie breezed into the room, her hood falling back from her head.
One look at her swollen eyes made my heart stutter. Whatever had her upset was deep and dark. She’d mentioned her mom. Maybe she’d been beaten up in jail.
She ran straight to me. “Lucas.” Her hand flew to her mouth as she examined my face.
“I’ve taken worse hits on the field.” I wrapped my arms around her, but it didn’t ease the knot in my throat that seemed to be suffocating me. “But you? What’s going on?”
Her lips parted then pressed shut.
“Let’s take a walk,” I said.
Bailey came in and took a seat next to my mom.
“Bailey, Mazzie and I will be around the corner. Can you come get us if my dad comes out of surgery?”
“Sure,” she said.
I guided Mazzie out of the waiting room and to an alcove that I’d seen on my way in. Mazzie sobbed the entire way, and each sob crushed my soul.
She plucked tissues from her bag. “I’m a mess.” She blew her nose. “Mom got a year in jail.”
I kissed her forehead. “I’m so sorry.” I’d been unemotional when my father had been arrested and then convicted, but I’d felt for my mom.
She slid down the wall and sat on the floor. “I feel like everything is crashing down around me. My mom, your dad, you. Those men beat you pretty good. Please tell me that Josh didn’t do this to you.”
I mirrored her movement, lowering myself to the floor until our legs touched.
“He warned me. I saw him in the library right before I was attacked. Shane Blackwood is behind all this. Josh was with Shane when he gave my dad the black eye. I’m not sure that Josh was present this time.
But Blackwood’s goons did this to me.” I touched my swollen cheek.
“I saw Josh after I got out of biochemistry.” She wiped her nose with the tissue. “He told me that you should watch your six.”
“He’s been trying to find you to protect you,” I said. “Nothing more.”
She smiled through tears. “Now we know.” She crawled over to me and snuggled against me. “I love you.”
I kissed her head. “Why do you sound as though you’re about to say goodbye?” I couldn’t hold back anymore. “The way you said we needed to talk sounded as if it was related to us. Is it?”
My gut was telling me something was off. She was upset about more than my injuries or the news about her mom’s sentencing.
She sobbed against my chest.
I squeezed her to me. “You’re killing me. Talk to me.”
My mind raced back to our last moments together, frantically searching for any clues, any misstep that could explain her sudden shift. But I had nothing. We’d barely seen each other since dinner with my mom. Still, she’d been fine when we spoke on the phone.
Her body trembled, and except for the drone of noises in the distance, the silence between us was deafening.
“Lucas, I—” She pulled away to look at me, a storm of sadness swirling in her eyes. “I heard your mom talking about marriage and babies after dinner the other night.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Is that what has you so upset? She was only voicing how much she liked— Oh. You heard the marriage part?”
“It scared me,” she said.
“But she was referring to someday. Not now.”
She mashed her lips together. “Do you want kids?”
“Kids?” I raked a hand through my hair. “Mazzie, that’s someday stuff. I’m not ready, and neither are you.”
I heard the sound of shoes scuffing the floor and then Erik’s voice. “Dude, your dad is out of surgery.”
I’d called Erik and Ryker to fill them in on what had happened to my father, but Ryker couldn’t make it to the hospital.
I hesitated as I regarded Mazzie. “We’ll talk later?” This conversation wasn’t over.
I pushed to my feet then helped Mazzie up.
Erik examined my face. “You look like shit.”
I felt like it, too, but I kept that to myself so I wouldn’t upset Mazzie any more than she already was.
Dr. Armstrong, wearing a white lab coat and a patterned surgeon’s cap, was talking to my mom by the time we returned to the private waiting room.
“Your husband will make a full recovery. I was able to repair his collapsed lung, and he had internal bleeding. He was beaten up to within an inch of his life. He’s lucky that a concerned citizen found him and called the paramedics. ”
A collective sigh zipped around the room as I draped an arm around my mom.
“Can I see him?” Mom asked.
Dr. Armstrong removed his surgeon’s cap. “He’s in and out of consciousness. He needs rest. I would recommend coming back tomorrow.”
Bailey raised up on her toes. “Thanks, Dad.”
Dr. Armstrong gave me a once-over. “Are you okay?”
“Just bruised,” I replied.
Satisfied with my answer, he said, “I need to go. Bailey, a word, please.”
I hugged my mom. “I’ll take you home. You can get your car tomorrow.” Because of the storm and how tired she appeared to be, I needed to make sure she got home okay. “Erik, can you follow the girls home?” I eyed Mazzie. “We can talk tomorrow.”
She nodded. “Sounds good.”
I really wanted to continue our discussion, but it was clear she wasn’t ready to spill whatever was bothering her.
After a quick kiss on Mazzie’s cheek, I watched her walk away with Bailey and Erik as the weight in my chest grew heavier.
“Is Mazzie okay, son?” Mom asked.
“Her mom was sentenced to a year in jail. But I don’t think that’s it. She heard what you said about marriage.”
“And that scared her?”
“Not sure.”
My mom flattened her hand on my face. “Son, be gentle with her. It’s probably a combination of her mom, her sister, and falling in love with you.
All that is a lot to handle. Plus, you said she’s working two jobs.
Give her some grace. And don’t think for a second she’s about to break up with you because Mazzie looks at you like you’re her entire world.
I’m sure hearing me say something about marriage terrified her. ”
“You’re probably right.”
But as my mother and I left the hospital, the heaviness in my chest felt worse than the bruises on my face or the throbbing in my gut. Whatever Mazzie was holding back felt big enough to break us.