CHAPTER 31 #4
“She’s right, mate. You need to lie down and let the nurses see to that bleeding. You’re scaring Cara,” Dio added.
“You’re scared of me?” Dante asked as he looked to me with pain.
“No. I’m scared something will happen to you and we won’t get the chance to make things right between us.”
“Us?” Dante looked to me with question.
“Yes. Us. There can still be an ‘us’ can’t there? You told me I was yours before. Have you changed your mind?” I asked. It wasn’t the time for this conversation, and yet it was keeping Dante calm.
“You’ll always be mine,” he rasped as he reached a hand towards me. I stepped forwards and wrapped both of mine around it, holding it tight. “But…I messed it up. I h-hurt you.”
“You did.” There was no denying that. “But we can fix things. I never stopped loving you, even when I was angry with you. I want you, Dante. We have to work things out between us, and it will take time, but my feelings for you have only ever gotten stronger. You own a piece of my heart, just like Dio, Cal, and Arran do too.”
“I love you. I’ll never drink again. I swear that here and now. I won’t fuck up like that ever again.” He strained his voice and his strength to get those words out and it showed as he wobbled where he stood.
“We can talk about it all later. For right now we love each other. Everything else is repairable,” I told him. “But only if you lie back down and stop bleeding everywhere.”
“You need to go home. Rest,” he grumbled as he started to move backward, aiming for the edge of the bed.
“I will, once I know that you’re okay.” I held his hand tightly in both of mine, the uncast hand doing all the real work as I tried to help him lower to the bed. Dio rushed around me and wrapped his arm around Dante, helping way more than I could ever have.
Once Dante was laid back down two nurses attended to the mess he had made of his wounds as Dio and I stood back, staying close enough to keep him calm, but out of the way enough so we weren’t under the feet of the nurses.
By the time they were done, and Dante’s abdomen was redressed with clean bandages, he was almost asleep and in a fight with his heavy eyelids.
“Get me out of here, Dario,” Dante slurred as he moved his head sluggishly to glare at Dio.
“Not yet, pal. You’re too badly injured. They need to keep you under observation until they’re sure you’re not going to start bleeding internally again,” Dio replied carefully.
“Fuck that. I’m going home,” Dante growled, or tried to, but it came out more slurred. I wondered what pain drugs the nurse had given him.
“Being an awkward fucker as usual, I see,” Arran announced as he and Cal walked into Dante’s room.
“Piss off,” Dante threw back but there was a hint of a smile on his face as he lifted his head to see Arran.
“How is he?” Cal asked, looking to Dio for the answer.
“Not fucking deaf!” Dante bit out.
“He ripped some stitches when he woke up punching again, but they fixed him up, for now,” Dio explained. “Did you get discharged?”
“Yep. Good to go home,” Cal replied.
“Good. Let’s go!” Dante started pushing back the sheets covering him and moved to get up, even though he was barely conscious. I dove towards him and pressed my good hand to his wide shoulder, pushing him back down to the bed.
“You can’t go home yet. Stop trying to get up!” I demanded.
“Maybe if ye lay wi’ him, lass. He willna move if he fears hurtin’ ye,” Arran suggested.
“I’m more worried about hurting him,” I worried.
“Hurt me?” Dante scoffed, and before I could do anything to stop him, he had grabbed me around the waist and picked me up, setting me on the bed beside him.
“Your stitches!” I gasped.
“I’m fine. Stop!” he growled. He wrapped his arm around me and moved me until I was laid alongside him, my head resting on his chest. “You’re too light. Get her food!”
He was glaring daggers at Dio and Arran when I glanced up to his face.
“I don’t need food. You all need to stop worrying about me so much,” I huffed. “And you definitely need to stop manhandling me to where you want me all the time, especially when you’re all injured.”
“You love being manhandled,” Cal teased, and I couldn’t help but smile when he did. He wasn’t wrong.
“Only by the four of you,” I admitted, feeling a happiness growing inside me that felt almost foreign. But how could I not feel some happiness when the danger seemed to finally be over? I was exactly where I wanted to be – with the four men I loved.
“So you and Dante have figured yer shit out then?” Arran asked.
“Not exactly. I think it will take a while to fix everything that’s happened between us and rebuild the trust we had, but I love him, and he loves me.
The rest will come in time,” I surmised.
“You’re all good with that, right? I mean, Dante was always a part of what we have, wasn’t he?
You knew that, right?” My nerves ramped up as I looked between Cal, Arran, and Dio.
“We knew, babe. And I’m happy as long as you are,” Cal agreed easily.
“Me too,” Arran chimed in with a soft, reassuring smile.
I looked to Dio with worry. I knew he was still resentful after finding out about what had happened between Dante and me in Chicago. He’d been so angry with Dante before.
“I know you hurt her…bruised her,” Dio accused, looking right to Dante.
“Dio….”
“It won’t happen ever again,” Dante cut in, his words filled with truth and promise.
“It better not. She’s been through more than anyone ever should have to face. I won’t have her being hurt by someone who is supposed to love her,” Dio threatened.
“It won’t. I was drunk that night, but I will never touch a drop of alcohol again. I love her. All I ever want is to make her happy and keep her safe,” Dante promised.
“Then we’re on the same page,” Dio nodded.
“Not so sure about Rafe,” I reminded them all.
“He’ll come around, especially when he realises there’s nothing he can do.
It’s too late to get rid of us. We love you, Cara, all of us.
You’re our world, and we’re not going anywhere, no matter what comes or what your brother threatens,” Cal proclaimed, and the others all nodded in agreement, even Dante.
Happy tears fell free when Dante leaned down to place a soft and reverent kiss on the top of my head.
“What’s wrong, wee one?” Arran asked as he came closer and swiped a tear from my cheek.
“I’m happy,” I sniffled. “I never thought it was in the cards for me, but here it is…here all of you are….my happiness. I can finally start to see a future ahead that I’m not scared of, and it has all of you in it.”
“Damn right it does.” Dante squeezed his arm around me and held me tighter.
With the others surrounding us, I had never felt more secure or hopeful in my entire life, as I did right then.
I felt stronger. I had a long way to go before I’d be healed, but I had found a piece of myself that had been missing, and for that moment, that piece, and the men I loved, along with a brother I knew I could always turn to, gave me the strength I had feared had left me.
Whatever came next, I felt, for the first time in months, like I could face it - good or bad.