Lock Me Out (The Locked Duet #2)
1. Colt
1
COLT
“Get the fuck out of the way!” I punch the horn with my fist, making it blare loud enough that Leni winces in the passenger seat. I see her over there, and I’m even sorry for upsetting her, but I can’t find it in me to apologize. Besides, I know she understands. This is what I’ve waited for these past six months since finding Mom in the hospital and moving her closer to us so I could be with her when this day finally came. Until now, I wasn’t sure it ever would. It wasn’t until we got the call not more than twenty minutes ago that I believed it was possible for my mother to wake up after being in a coma for years.
“Colton, she’s awake. Your mother woke up a few minutes ago.” I was deep asleep when the phone rang, but by the time I heard those words, I was wide awake and already out of bed. Leni stared at me in a mixture of dread and confusion as she sat up, scrubbing a hand over her tousled hair. She finally pulled it all together over the course of the questions I fired at the doctor, and by the time I ended the call, she was already getting dressed.
Mom is awake. I don’t know what life is going to look like for her, but she’s awake. That can’t be anything but a good sign.
“Maybe slow down a little.” Leni’s voice is barely louder than a whisper, and it’s filled with nerves. But this isn’t her mom we’re rushing to. It’s my mom. My mom, who I hadn’t seen in years before she was found in that hospital where Dad stashed her, far away from her sons, the people who actually loved her and needed her. There’s part of my soul—what little of it is left—that craves the sight of her. That longs to have her look into my eyes and see me for the first time in too long.
“We’ll be there in a minute.” I can’t slow down. When the asshole in front of me taps his brakes instead of trying to beat a yellow light, I swerve around him, honking, ignoring the shouts through his window as I speed through the light and travel the last block before the hospital comes up.
“You have to try to calm down.” Leni’s hand covers my leg, and I have to resist the impulse to brush it away like I would a mosquito or a fly—like she’s a pest when she is anything but. “You don’t want her to see you like this. She would want you to be calm.”
She’s right. The fact that I almost swatted her away proves that. But she doesn’t know how it feels, either. Thinking for so long something was lost forever, then finally getting it back.
I wish Nix was here. That would make it perfect.
My heart is sinking by the time I take a quick right turn into the hospital parking lot. Dammit. He should be here. She should have both of her sons with her, letting her know we never stopped thinking about her, that we’ve been waiting for her to wake up ever since finding her alive.
But no. One of us is supposedly dead.
A burning coal of resentment lodges itself in my gut every time I think about him and the way the rest of the world is ready to accept the idea of him being gone. Nobody knows him like I do. He’s alive. I feel it.
I’m the only one that believes it. Not even Leni gets it. She’s content to believe what everyone else does: that he died in the explosion, that it’s his body in the grave in the cemetery. I went to his funeral and probably looked like a heartless, unfeeling bastard when I didn’t shed a tear while people all around me wept their hearts out.
Leni was one of them, whimpering softly, dabbing her eyes with a tissue and holding onto my arm for support. I gave it to her, but I felt nothing. It was like going through the motions in a nightmare or a fever dream, something that didn’t make any sense.
I sort of feel like I’m in a dream now, rushing to the hospital door once I’ve parked the car in the first available space. Leni has to trot to keep up with me and finally catches up by the time we’ve reached the elevators beyond the front desk. I’ve been here so many times, I practically know the hospital like the back of my hand. I recognize the people behind the desk, the security guard sitting with them, and I nod to them before jabbing my finger against the button.
“Seriously, Colt. Breathe.” Leni takes my hand, ignoring my tension, running her thumb over the back of my knuckles. “You want her to see you at your best. We don’t know how much she’s going to remember or whether she knows time has passed. It could be enough of a shock just to see you older than she remembers you.”
She’s right, isn’t she? While waiting for the elevator to arrive, I force myself to take a deep breath. There’s no way of knowing right now how much Mom will be able to handle. I need to be calm, gentle, even if I feel anything but as the doors open and we step inside.
Shifting my weight back and forth from one foot to the other, I can almost laugh at myself. I’m so nervous. What if she doesn’t remember me? What if she doesn’t know me at all? What if she’s awake but unresponsive? She had woken up only minutes before the doctor called, so there wasn’t much he could tell me about her condition. He probably still won’t have a clue. It will probably take time to get to the heart of the damage that was done.
I have to brace myself again as the doors open, taking a deep breath of disinfected air as we step out. Mom’s team is hanging around outside the door to her room, muttering things to each other, typing things on their tablets. One of them notices Leni and me as we approach and turns our way, meeting us halfway down the hall.
“I need to get in and see her,” I murmur, ready to push him aside if I have to. Dr. Spencer is probably my favorite of all of them. He’s honest, he doesn’t bullshit me, and I appreciate that. I feel like Mom would appreciate it, too.
That doesn’t mean I won’t bodyslam him if he doesn’t get the fuck out of my way.
The overhead light gleams off his bald head when he shakes it. “Just a minute. Let’s touch base before you go in there.”
Leni stays beside me, her grip on my hand tightening. There’s something about the way he said that which doesn’t exactly inspire confidence or hope. My heart drops like a rock, but I force my way through it, stiffening my spine. She needs me to be strong now. Both she and Leni need me to be strong. “Give it to me straight. How is she?”
Offering a faint smile, he claps a hand over my shoulder. “It’s not bad at all. I’m sorry if I made it sound that way. It’s just that some people, in situations like this, expect to find their loved one exactly as they remember them. That’s just not possible when a person has been comatose for as long as your mother has. The fact that she’s woken up at all is… Well, I don’t like to use the word miracle, but it’s close.”
“Okay. I’ll try to be realistic.”
“That’s good to hear. She’s not able to speak yet,” he explains with a sympathetic grimace. “She’ll need a little more time and practice. Even then, she’s going to need extensive speech therapy, not to mention physical therapy. But she has proven she is alert and aware, is able to nod in response to questions, and we could not be happier with what she’s shown us so far.”
“That’s great news.” Leni’s breathless whimper tells me she’s close to tears, and I pull her against my side, holding her close.
She’s right. It is great news.
And Nix should be here, dammit. He’s missing all of this. Why the hell won’t he come back? Maybe one day I’ll be able to understand, but right now I can’t imagine forgiving him for missing this. He’s going to regret it, the asshole.
“Can we go in now?” I ask. When the doctor nods, Leni takes my hand again, walking beside me as we take the last few steps into the room we’ve visited countless times in the last six months.
All this time, I’ve only seen her with her eyes closed, her face slack, lifeless. Now she’s sitting up a little more instead of lying back, her head propped up by a pillow, her eyes wide open as they take in the room around her.
And when they see me, they go wider and watery as tears fill them.
It’s like being punched in the gut, but in the best way. The shock is almost enough to make me sway on my feet, while my mind tries to make sense of what I’m looking at. Like I’m afraid to accept what I see. “Mom,” I whisper, almost laughing when her head bobs just a little, enough that I know she hears me and understands.
And now nothing matters more than being by her side. I cross the room quickly and sink into the chair next to the bed, taking her hand, touching my forehead to the back of it. After everything I’ve done and all the sins I’ve committed, I have no right to thank God for anything, but that’s what I do. Silently, in my heart, even though I doubt there’s any entity that will actually understand. Thank you. Thank you so much.
“They told me you can’t talk yet, but I know that will come back with enough practice.” I’m almost giddy, chuckling when I raise my head. “Can you imagine there would ever have been a time you couldn’t talk your head off? You’ll get it back. I know you will.”
Her eyes search my face, filled with wonder and confusion and so many questions. “You’ve been in a coma for a long time. I’m sure they told you that already,” I whisper, and she nods slightly, squeezing my hand. My mom just squeezed my hand. A sob tries to build in my chest, but I hold it back. I’m so fucking happy; I don’t know what to do. It’s like getting the biggest, best gift ever, and I have no idea what to do with it. “Do you know why?”
Her eyebrows draw together for a second, and I wish I hadn’t asked when I see the pain in her eyes. She remembers. But hey, at least now we know her memory wasn’t lost. If she remembers the bad, that means she’ll be able to remember the good, too. That’s how life works. Good and bad.
“Let me tell you something.” Looking her straight in the eye, I murmur, “He’s dead. Dad is dead. You never have to worry about him again. He can never hurt you again—he can’t hurt any of us. That part is all over. All you have to do now is focus on recovering. And I will do everything I can to help you, I swear. We’ve got this, right?”
The corners of her mouth twitch in a weak smile, but again, her brows meet over the bridge of her nose. When her lips part, I hold my breath, waiting. Is she going to try to speak? Will she be upset if it doesn’t work?
After what feels like forever, she lets out a frustrated sigh and mouths a single word: “Nix.”
Obviously, she was going to ask about him. I’m sitting here, practically in tears, but he’s nowhere in sight. “Nix isn’t here right now. We haven’t seen him in a while. He is… away, but it’s okay. I know he’ll be back.” It’s only when Leni makes a choked sound behind me that I remember she’s even here. I’ve been so focused on Mom, I didn’t think about her. She doesn’t approve of what I said, just like she doesn’t approve of me refusing to believe my brother is dead. But that’s because he’s not dead. I know he isn’t.
It’s safer and better to turn toward her and extend a hand. “Mom, Leni’s my girlfriend now. I know that will come as a surprise,” I add, turning back to her and watching her eyes go big and wide. “We live together, only minutes from here. We’ve come to see you so many times, and we’ll be back all the time, too. Both of us. I know you must have a million questions.”
Mom snorts softly, and Leni and I laugh. Even the fact that she can do that is a win. The sort of win I never hoped for.
She’s obviously getting tired, her eyes half-closed and her head sinking into the pillow. There’s been more activity in the past hour than she’s experienced in years. After promising to be back to see her tomorrow, I kiss Mom’s forehead and we leave the room, heading down to the cafeteria since we never took time to eat breakfast, and I’m not quite ready to leave yet. There’s too much to process.
I barely feel my feet touch the floor the whole way downstairs. My head is in the clouds. It was a short visit, but it was the best visit of my life.
“You were so great in there.” Leni waits next to me while the guy behind the counter scrambles eggs for us. The cafeteria is surprisingly good, with a huge selection of foods. We’ve eaten more than a few meals here ever since I had Mom moved so she could be close to us.
“It’s one of those things where you imagine a hundred times what you would do or say, but then the moment comes and everything you ever thought goes out the window.” Leni is the only person I would confess something like that to—well, her and Nix. I don’t know what’s worse: missing him or hating him for removing himself from my life, all our lives. Upsetting Mom, though I’m sure he never thought she would factor in. I didn’t learn until after the explosion that she was even alive and comatose in a Florida hospital.
“I don’t know how I would’ve handled it, so I’m in awe of you,” she says. I don’t know how she manages to be so supportive and loving sometimes. Like there’s this endless well of love inside her. I don’t think I deserve it, but she seems to think I do.
A handful of tables are in use, and I glance toward them as we pass with our trays. People in scrubs, grabbing a quick breakfast and coffee. A couple off in the corner, leaning on each other for support. There are so many stories around here—ours is only one of them. Today we are one of the happy stories, sitting together, grinning at each other every once in a while. I couldn’t have known when I fell asleep last night that the morning would turn out like this.
Just like I couldn’t have imagined watching my house explode one day. An explosion that killed my father and Leni’s mom… and someone else, a third body that was never identified, a body close enough to the source of the explosion that it was pretty much completely destroyed. Lazy investigators assumed it was Nix’s, and the fact that my brother decided to disappear only strengthened their theory, at least in their own minds.
I don’t want to think about that now, not when there’s hope and the promise of a future for a woman whose life was almost taken by the man who was supposed to love her. He destroyed her, he almost destroyed Leni, and he got what was coming to him. Now, with Mom being awake, there’s the possibility we’ll all be able to move forward.
All I need is for my brother to come back and prove I was right all along. That’s the only thing that will begin to erase the damage that bastard did.