Chapter 12
THAD
Once I had Cash’s meds on the nightstand, with a few bottles of water and hydration packets sitting next to them, I dropped into the chair at the foot of his bed.
Sometime between me settling him in bed and returning with all the things he’d need, Cash fell asleep.
His brow held a slight furrow, but his skin looked as healthy as it could following ortho surgery.
I should go sleep in my own bed, but something held me in place—the pill count I did on Cash’s pain meds. I knew he took something with the nausea meds before dinner, but it wasn’t what I thought. What I’d hoped he’d take.
The man had no narcotics in his system, and it worried me. Opioids were scary shit, but ortho surgery was fucking brutal. It gave me a work out, and it put my patients through the fucking wringer.
He wasn’t hurting right now. But the nerve block Michael used would be wearing off soon, and without something onboard when it happened, Cash was in for a world of hurt.
So instead of heading to my own bed, I leaned back, propped my feet up on the end of the mattress with my head in my hand, and watched the man in the bed snore softly.
Cash Benjamin was a beautiful man—strong with a vulnerability that brought out a protective side I’d only really explored as a doctor. His edgy, punk-rock style suited him. As did the tattoos.
Helping him get ready for bed had been a punishment I definitely deserved. It showed me clearly what the next year would be like. A lot of fucking cold showers and hand jobs. I was paying for the lack of sexual appetite I’d had since Chelly and I split.
My brain continued appraising the man before me. His gorgeous face was the last thing I saw before my eyes slid shut.
Plastic scraping, followed by a thud and the rattle of something hitting the floor, brought me awake. My eyes opened to darkness and an ache running from my neck into my shoulder. The chair in Cash’s room had been designed to look good, not for sleeping, especially for a six-foot-two man.
“Cash?” I asked, a groggy yawn drawing the word out.
“I’m fine.” His voice was too tight. He clearly was not fine.
I pushed myself to my feet, making my way carefully around the bed to the nightstand and flicking on the lamp. Cash slammed his eyes shut and flinched when light filled the room.
A quick glance told me all I needed to know. During the night, his face had gone pale. Exhaustion had created bruises under his eyes and sweat dampened his hair and chest.
The nerve block had worn off.
He leaned heavily on the hand braced against the mattress while the other wrapped around the edge of his brace.
“What are you doing?”
“Trying to get comfortable.”
By himself.
The medication bottles and water I’d left within reach had been knocked sideways on the nightstand. One of them lay on the floor next to a bottle of water. That explained what woke me up.
“Why didn’t you wake me?” I asked as I picked up the water and pills.
“You were asleep. You’ve been up since dawn.”
“Okay, well, that’s why I said to wake me. You generally wake people who are asleep when they’re needed for something.”
“Doc—”
“Don’t. Yes, I got up before dawn yesterday, but I’ve been trained to work long hours. What’s even more important is you just had surgery.”
The muscles of his jaw and temple jumped as his mouth tightened. “I can medicate myself, Dr. Vale. I don’t need help doping myself up.”
I bit my tongue to keep from saying that the ashen, sweaty look of him suggested differently. Instead, I asked, “How long?”
“I don’t know.” His tone of voice and lack of eye contact contradicted him.
“Cash?” I asked while holding out the prescription bottles. I wanted to ask how long he’d been awake and in pain, but that wouldn’t do anything but prolong his pain.
He snatched the pill bottle, gripping it so tightly it shocked me that the lid didn’t pop off. “A while,” he groaned, pressing his head back into the pillow, his back arching, but he held his leg perfectly still.
Ignoring his snarly attitude, I walked to the end of the bed and examined his leg, specifically his foot. The color and temperature were perfect, and when I touched it, it wiggled.
He lifted to his elbow, staring at me. The amber bottle was still clutched in his hand as he gasped, “That tickles, dammit.”
“Good to know. Any numbness? Burning? Pins and needles?”
“Fucking all of it!” he shouted, dragging a hand over his face as he fell back into the pillows. “Feels like someone stuck a hot poker through my damn knee.”
Glancing at the clock, I sighed. “You’re behind the pain.”
“No shit. I figured that out when the pain of a dozen blistering hot knives stabbed through my knee.”
I ignored his pissy attitude. I’d be more worried if he weren’t pissed off and growling at me. “I’m going to help you sit—”
“I can do that my damn self.”
I stood back, crossing my arms over my chest. “Dr. Vale is going to say some shit now.”
He glared at me but said nothing.
“I am going to help you sit up,” I said, emphasizing the words by pointing at first myself and then him. “I’m going to give you a pain shot to catch you up to the pain as much as possible. Then I’m going to check your dressings, and once I reposition your leg, I’m turning the cold-therapy unit on.”
He glared at me, but then he nodded. The fight left him when I stepped forward and slid an arm behind his back. “Ready?” I asked.
“Do it,” he growled, sucking in a deep, harsh breath. His finger nails dug into my forearm, leaving deep indentations.
“Easy,” I whispered.
“That’s like waving a red flag in a bull’s face, Doc.”
“Noted,” I replied, instead of arguing with him.
His head fell to my shoulder as he gasped and panted. His fingernails were really digging now, tearing the flesh of my bicep and forearm. The pain must really have a hold of him because his respiratory rate increased as if he were trying to get ahead of the pain through sheer force of will.
“Cash…breathe with me. You’re going to hyperventilate.”
“Stop fucking doctoring me.”
“Then stop behaving like one of my patients.”
“I am one of your patients.”
“Not in this house and not in this room. Here, I’m the man taking care of you. Who wants you more than I want my next breath. And you are the asshole who refused to wake me up when you needed me.”
He sucked in a deep breath, and his head whipped around so our gazes met. His eyes narrowed, but his breathing settled into a more sedate rhythm.
“There you are.”
“If you’re not my doctor here, then I don’t want the shot.”
The other meds wouldn’t touch this. “What we have on hand might not be enough.”
“I know, but I want to try.”
I nodded, handing Cash the pills. He’d lost enough control since Michael knocked him out. And that didn’t account for the last eleven months, when everything he knew and loved had been ripped from him savagely, leaving behind a bloody wound still trying to scab over.
Cash took a deep breath and swallowed the pills before gulping down several mouthfuls of water. I laid him back against the pillows.
“I need to check your leg. Make sure nothing shifted when you tried sitting up.”
“It didn’t.”
“I woke up to you jerking on your knee brace. We need to make sure.”
“Fuck. Okay. Do it,” Cash ordered, staring at the ceiling.
I released the straps on the brace and opened it without moving his leg. The postoperative dressing remained clean and dry. There was swelling, but nothing unexpected. The compression sleeve and ace bandage were doing their job.
I sighed in relief.
No excessive bleeding.
No alarming discoloration.
No sign that his attempt to reposition himself had damaged anything.
Replacing the cold-therapy wrap he’d demanded I remove when he went to bed, I locked the brace down.
“I won’t remove that again. The cold—”
“I fucking hate the cold. I hate feeling like I’m tied down,” Cash whispered. The gutted sound of his voice told me more than the words he said.
Swallowing, I pushed away the metaphorical puzzle pieces Cash Benjamin had dropped over the last twenty-four hours. I walked out to the kitchen and returned with four frozen water bottles to replace the melted ones in the cold-therapy unit before reconnecting the unit to the wrap.
A few moments later, I asked, “Better?”
The breath he sucked in shuddered as he released it. “Yeah. Thanks.”
I adjusted the elevation pillow beneath his leg.
His breath hissed between his teeth until I had his leg settled again.
Davina had been a godsend earlier, gathering all the equipment Cash and I would need when I explained the situation.
I owed her flowers for not asking more questions.
And possibly a certificate for a massage since she also cleared my schedule for the next few weeks.
Or as much as she could clear my schedule.
I pulled the chair close to his bedside and lowered myself into it.
“You don’t have to stay here. You can go back to sleep,” Cash muttered, his eyes locked on his knee, his fingers picking at a thread on his basketball shorts.
“I’m not going anywhere.”
His eyes found mine. Pain stripped his defenses, leaving what looked to be a younger, far less confident Cash Benjamin than the one he showed the world.
“You don’t have to sit there all night. I’m sure you need your rest.”
“I know I don’t.”
His brow furrowed. “Then why stay?”
“There are several reasons.”
“Yeah?”
I nodded.
“What are they?”
Sighing, I responded, even though the small, shy voice that had asked for an explanation broke my heart.
“Your nerve block is wearing off. You’re in pain.
And, honestly, my gut told me you wouldn’t ask for help even if I slept in the same room with you, and clearly, you’ve proven that to be accurate, so… I’ll stay put.”
“You didn’t have to bring me here. I could’ve figured things out at Halo House.”
I bit my tongue, but apparently not hard enough because I muttered, “Yeah, navigating up and down the stairs would’ve been really therapeutic.”
“I could’ve stayed downstairs.”