Page 17 of Hollywood King
"I never asked you to come back. Actually, I don't remember calling you at all," I said, trying to keep my voice level, but the words came out clipped and short.
Heath took a step forward, the perfect blend of menace and elegance. "Obviously, you were thinking about me in some way, or you wouldn't have put me down as your emergency contact."
I tried to sit up in the hospital bed, using the rail on one side to pull myself, but some of the meds were working. I couldn't haul my weight forward. The struggle on my face must have been obvious, because he skirted the end of the bed, arms crossed under his chest, until he stood hovering at my left elbow. His cologne reached me now, and part of me wanted to hold my breath out of spite. With his wild country scent came the memories, and I wasn't strong enough to face those yet.
He gently slid one arm under the curve of my back, his cool hand meeting my bare skin for a flash of a second. I squeezed my eyes shut, pretending he was someone else, anyone else. With seemingly zero effort, he pressed me forward so I could sit up properly. "There," he whispered. “Now you can yell at me and pretend to mean it."
I didn’t have the energy for this. No one had told me why I passed out yet, and here I sat, half-dressed after a long shift in a hospital bed, and in walked Heath. Darling of the Hollywood scene for the last five years. Even at four in the morning, his messy curls told the world to fuck off while those full lips and cheekbones promised delights.
I didn’t have the energy to deal withhim.A man who should use the royalwe.The presence, the way he looked at me now, all six-and-a-half-foot inch of man I’d wanted to myself for ten oh so long years.
“What are you doing here? I don’t buy for a second you came because someone told you I was in the hospital. No one in our family is that selfless.”
“You included?” he asked, crossing his arms again.
“Me included. I haven’t spoken to anyone in years. I’ve purposefully isolated myself from everyone to get out of that life. If someone called me to tell me they were in the hospital, I’d find them a taxi and tell them to have a nice life. I don’t want back in. I can’t go back.”
“For someone so isolated, you still get your fair share of the photographers and fans.”
He’d seen the picture. The one that asshole at the bar took when we didn’t notice. It probably made him a few hundred thousand. “Are you here to tell me off about Eddy?”
He mouthed the word Eddy with a look of disgust.
I rolled my eyes and continued. “If you are, there are better times. I just finished working, and obviously, something is wrong here. Go home. I don’t need you.”
Patricia bustled back into the room. “I’m afraid you do, honey. Can’t discharge you without someone to take you home. There was morphine in your drip.” She smiled. “We give our folks the good stuff.”
Ah, which explained why my mouth felt so fuzzy. Morphine did funny things to my senses. “If you find my phone, I can call someone else.”
Heath folded himself into a chair beside the bed. I tried not to groan out loud while he shifted around in the chair to get comfortable. When he finished, he stared at me pointedly. “Oh who? Eddy?”
Patricia cut in. “I can call Dr. Linton if you want me to, Dr. Earnshaw. Everyone in the nurse’s lounge are saying you two are an item.”
I threw myself back into the pillows. “Not you too. We are not together. We went on one date. We agreed, it was awful. Spread the word. And can’t you dose me with something to put me out of my misery while I’m trapped in this bed?”
Patricia shook her head, wrote some things on my chart, and tsked. “Doctors make the worst patients.” Then she left again without another word.
I should have been nicer, so she stayed and I wouldn’t be alone in a room with him. “Why haven’t you left yet?”
“You heard the lady.”
“Because you’re so good at following directions and rules. Or hell, keeping promises. So, go, leave.” My voice had steadily risen in volume during my tirade, and I stopped before I started screaming at him.
“Is that why you’re so mad at me for being here? Because I didn’t come back to you? Why should I? Father and Hindley made it very clear I wasn’t welcome in your life, and you were soon to be engaged to Eddy.” He said the name like it tasted bad in his mouth.
I shot back. “And since when have you believed a word Ley said to you? We both learned that lesson early on.”
Sharp pain flickered behind my eyes, and I laid back into the pillows and closed them. “Can you turn off the lights please?”
To my surprise, he didn’t hesitate or bargain. I heard him stand, walk the length of the room, flip the switch, and return to his seat. Once the rustling stopped, I said, “Thank you.”
Footsteps stomped in a few minutes later, and I knew his stride anywhere. “Good morning, Dr. Earnshaw,” Dr. Roberts said, pulling my chart from the stand.
“Not so far.”
He hadn’t heard me, but Heath snorted from his chair.
“Looks like you took a fall. We have your test results started, but you’re going to be bruised, and you sprained your wrist when you tried to catch yourself. There are some tests we are waiting on, but I think you can leave, as long as someone keeps an eye on you. I think you should take the day off and rest though.”
