Page 65 of Fully Loaded
“Excuse me, my husband was brought in with a gunshot wound to the head. I know your policy is immediate family only, but I’m his wife?—”
The older woman placed her hand on her chest. “Mon dieu. Of course you can see him.” She plucked a clipboard from the counter and led her down the hall. “He came to once and asked for Dani. Is that you?”
Hope surged in her chest. “Yes! Ohmigod.” Fresh tears misted her eyes as she followed the nurse down the hall and into a room. Brock lay in a hospital bed, machines beeping all around him. His head lolled to the side and a bandage was wrapped around his forehead. She stepped closer to the bed and wrung her hands in front of her. His normally tanned complexion was almost gray. His hospital gown was tugged down on one side, revealing another large bandage, beneath his shoulder. Unease sloshed in her stomach. She stopped at the side of the bed and stared at the dark stain on the bandage above his ear. Lowering into one of the chairs at his side, she brought her hand to his.
He didn’t respond to her touch, and his clammy palm felt nothing like the warm, strong hand that had touched her a million times. The soft whoosh of the door sounded as the nurse left.
“B-Brock? I’m here.” She cleared her throat. He didn’t respond. Could he hear her? Would his subconscious recognize her voice? Rhett’s words replayed in her head: He’ll pull through.
Brock was one of the strongest people she knew. But seeing him like this was shocking. She squeezed his hand.
“It’s me, Dani. I hope you’re not in pain.” She shook her head. That was stupid. “God, of course you’re in pain. I just mean, well, I . . .” Tears spilled on her cheeks and her nose started to run. She reached for the tissue box on the table and grabbed one of the cheap, rough papers to wipe her eyes and then her nose. “I’m not going to be the strong one here, so you’ll just have to deal with my sobbing. It’s my fault you’re hurt. You never should have come to Geneva. I shouldn’t have called you. You’ve always been so dependable. Even when I couldn’t stand you, I knew I could rely on you.”
She sniffed and rubbed her thumb over his motionless hand. “You were wrong to lie to me about the Vitali heist. Wrong to cut me out of it.” She leaned forward in her seat and rested her forearm on the bed and her chin next to his arm. “But I should have forgiven you. Especially after I was kidnapped. I just got scared, you know? Anyway, what I’m trying to say is that I love you. I need you to pull through this so we can be together. I don’t want to spend a single day without you.” She closed her eyes and pressed her lips to his knuckles.
Fatigue weighed her head down, and she mouthed a prayer against his skin. His hand tensed. She jumped and lifted her head.
“Brock? Are you awake?” She stood and leaned over him.
His head turned toward her and he squinted. A smile trembled on his lips and then disappeared. “Well I was trying to sleep, but you kept talking.”
She swatted his arm lightly and he grunted. She winced. “Sorry. You were awake that whole time?”
“Not the whole time.” He lifted his uninjured shoulder and tugged her down on the bed. She sat next to him and took in the magnificent gleam of his hazel eyes. Even though the humor and spark had dimmed, even though exhaustion and pain had created dark pillows beneath his lids, relief—wide and great—expanded in her chest.
He lifted her palm to his lips and kissed. “Are you okay?”
She chortled. “You’re the one who got shot in the head.”
His mouth slanted in a sardonic smirk. “I didn’t get shot in the head. It skimmed my head. But to be honest, when I woke up, I almost wished I hadn’t survived. Christ, I’ve never had a headache like that before.”
“Did you speak with the doctor yet?”
He shook his head. “No. I was out of it when he first assessed me. I remember the nurse telling me I’ve got a concussion, twelve stitches, and a damaged rotator cuff from where the bullets hit.”
She pressed her hand to his chest and rubbed. “I’m so sorry.”
He lifted his hand. An IV was attached to it. “Don’t be. Whatever juice they’re pumping into me is liquid gold.”
She cringed. “Pretty sure that’s morphine.”
He pointed a shaky finger at her. “Don’t get all judgy on me. You get shot in the head and see if you don’t take what they’re offering.”
She laughed. The sound rolled off her tongue and the corners of her mouth ached from smiling after so many hours of fear and worry. “I can see you’re going to milk this. But in all seriousness, thanks to you, I wasn’t shot at all, let alone in the head.”
His eyebrows rose. “What happened? The last thing I remember is shoving you into the electrical room. Everything’s blank after that.”
She glanced at the hall and then at the steadily beeping monitor next to the bed. She should probably tell the nurses that he was awake, but on the other hand, he was clearly not in distress and she desperately needed these moments with him to calm the sea of uncertainty she’d been surfing on since he was loaded into the ambulance.
She traced her thumb over his knuckle. “Romy came down the hall. He’s the guy I . . . uh . . . let’s just say he wasn’t very happy with me.”
Brock’s teeth flashed between his lips. “I heard about that. Didn’t you whoop his ass?”
She sat straighter with pride. She had kicked his ass. “He needs to learn to tie knots better. When you didn’t come bursting in the room, I got worried and knew I had to get out. I told him I had to pee and hit him with the fire extinguisher when he opened the door. He fought back, but I knocked him out. Thankfully. Otherwise that could’ve ended badly.” She grinned ruefully.
His cheeks hardened and he squeezed her hand. “Don’t ever do that again.”
She lifted her shoulders. “I’ll try.” She skimmed the bandage on his forehead with the tip of her pinky then coasted her fingers through the hair on top of his head, well away from the wound. “I’m going to let the nurses know you’re awake. The doctor will want to see you and you need rest.” She stood but Brock didn’t release her hand. Instead, he caught her elbow and towed her onto the sheet next to him.
