18. Chapter 18 #3
"And Colt figures out his own shit," Ditch added. "Because you're right. He doesn't get to put his survival on you."
I looked down at our joined hands.
"No."
"But Caroline?"
"Yeah?"
"Don't pretend he doesn't need you."
That hurt.
Because it was true.
I swallowed.
"I need him too."
The admission was barely audible.
Ditch heard it anyway.
Once everything calmed down, I called Dr. Patricia. I told her everything.
The kiss.
The panic.
The withdrawal.
The calls I ignored.
The referrals.
The way Colt had spiraled.
The way I had sat beside his unconscious body and finally understood that distance and abandonment were not the same thing.
When I finished, she was quiet. Then she said, "You need to address this directly with him."
"I know."
"No more running."
"I know."
"And Caroline?"
I closed my eyes. "Yes?"
"Do not overcorrect."
My fingers tightened around the phone. "What do you mean?"
"You are vulnerable to taking excessive responsibility for what happened because it gives you the illusion that you can prevent it from happening again."
I looked at Colt.
"His choices are not mine."
"No."
"But my choices hurt him."
"Yes."
Both truths.
That was the part I had been trying to escape.
"If you care about him—and it's clear that you do—then you need to acknowledge that honestly and deal with the consequences."
"I do care about him."
The words came easier this time.
More terrifyingly.
"I love him."
There was no relief in saying it.
Only truth.
"Then stop making decisions for both of you."
I ended the call and returned to Colt's bedside.
I waited.
***
Sixteen hours after Ditch's call, Colt moved.
At first, I thought I'd imagined it. Then his fingers twitched beneath mine.
I shot upright. "Colt?"
His face tightened. The monitor changed rhythm.
I stood so quickly the chair scraped backward.
"Colt."
His eyes opened slowly. Confused. Unfocused.
I hit the call button and leaned closer without touching him anywhere but his hand.
"You're in the hospital. You're safe."
His gaze moved.
Past me. Back. Then finally settled on my face.
For one terrible second, he just stared.
I couldn't read him. Couldn't tell if he was angry. Couldn't tell if he remembered.
Then his fingers closed weakly around mine. "You came back."
Four words. They broke me more completely than anything else had.
I sat down because my knees stopped working. "I never should have left."
His eyes drifted closed.
"Colt, I'm sorry."
He swallowed.
"I'm so sorry."
The nurse entered behind me, but I barely noticed.
Colt opened his eyes again.
"It's not your fault I made bad choices."
The fact that he said it immediately made my chest ache.
"No."
His brow furrowed.
"No?"
"It's not my fault you got into that ring."
I forced the words out even though every guilty part of me resisted them.
"It's not my fault you drank. Or stopped defending yourself. Those were your choices."
Something shuttered in his expression.
I kept holding his hand. "But I abandoned you."
His eyes returned to mine.
"I panicked. I made a decision for both of us because I was scared of what I felt. I ignored you when you reached out, and I told myself it was ethical when really, I was running."
My voice cracked. "That part is mine."
Colt stared at me. "So what now?"
There it was.
The question I had been asking myself for sixteen hours.
What now?
How did we move forward from a place where I'd hurt him deeply, where we'd crossed professional lines, where he had nearly died trying to punish himself, and where neither of us could honestly pretend we didn't need the other?
"Now," I said slowly, "you recover."
His mouth twisted.
"Clinical answer."
"No."
I leaned closer.
"Now I stay long enough for us to have the fight we've been avoiding."
Something flickered in his bruised eyes.
"A fight?"
"Oh, yes."
His fingers shifted around mine.
"About what?"
"About me leaving."
His expression hardened.
"About you deciding pain is the only thing you deserve. About the fact that you scared everyone who loves you half to death."
The word loves hung there.
Colt heard it.
So did I.
"And about the fact," I continued more quietly, "that I don't know what we are now."
His gaze held mine.
"But you're here."
"Yes."
"For how long?"
There was the wound.
Not accusation.
Not yet.
Fear.
I tightened my grip on his hand.
"I don't know."
Pain flashed across his face.
I hated myself for causing it.
But I didn't lie.
"I don't know what happens with my career. I don't know what happens with us. I don't know what the ethical consequences are going to be."
I took a breath.
"But I am not disappearing again."
Colt looked away.
I waited.
Finally, he whispered, "We'll see."
The words hurt.
They were supposed to.
Trust did not rebuild itself because I showed up at an ICU.
I nodded.
"Yes."
His gaze returned to mine.
"We will."
And I stayed in the chair beside his bed, holding the hand of the man I loved while understanding, finally, that coming back was not the same thing as repairing what I'd broken.
That would take longer.
It would hurt more.
And for the first time since the kiss, I was willing to stay for all of it.