Page 74 of Good Time Boyfriend
“Okay. We’re here for you. She’ll have you, but you’ll have us. Remember that. You’ll always have us.”
I swallowed the knot of emotion in my throat as Luca pulled into the ER. We piled out and ran in. I didn’t need to ask the nurse up front where Devney was, because I could see her family. All of them. The stepsiblings, the half-siblings, her parents. The spouses and kids weren’t there, but it was a big enough group anyway.
Devney’s mother met my gaze and walked over. From the look of compassion and fear in her eyes, she and the others didn’t know that I had broken her baby girl’s heart. That I didn’t have a right to be there.
“Oh, I’m glad you’re here. We realized that none of us had your number, but Paisley knew how to contact you.” She gestured towards Paisley, who was walking towards the front door while Addison ran through.
“Any news? What’s going on?” Addison glared and pushed past me. “What are you doing here?” Addison asked.
Luca pulled her off. “Be quiet.”
She glared at him but didn’t say anything else.
“She’s in the back, I don’t know what’s going on. We’re still waiting to hear. There was an accident. A huge truck dropped four or five mattresses on the highway in the dark, and cars hit them. Devney overcorrected when she was trying to get out of the way of the Jeep that flipped in front of her, and she spun out. She was lucky she didn’t hit another car when she did 360s on the highway, but flipped when she hit the embankment. The airbags went off, and people stopped to help her. But I don’t know any more than that. They got her in an ambulance and brought her here.”
I opened my arms, the only thing I could do, and she sank into me, crying into my chest. Devney’s father held one of his daughters, as my family mingled with Devney’s, and we waited for news.
It felt like hours.
Waiting to hear if the woman I loved was alive, if she would be okay.
She had to be.
Because I never told her I loved her. I had hurt her, and I needed to fix it.
I needed her to know I was coming for her before this accident. Before I thought I could lose her forever. Because I couldn’t. I couldn’t bear the thought.
I hated that it had taken me this long to realize that.
“Womack family?”
We all stood, all of us, and the doctor’s eyes widened, before finding Devney’s parents.
“We’re all family,” Devney’s mother said as she gripped Addison’s hand. I stood behind them, my hands shaking. Luca and Greer stood on either side of me, August behind me with his hand on my shoulder.
“Your daughter will be fine. She needed surgery to repair some things.” He listed them, but I couldn’t hear anything after “she will be fine.”
But she had been hurt. She’d needed surgery.
And I hadn’t been there. Hadn’t been there to protect her.
“She’ll be in recovery soon, but we can’t let all of you back there at once.”
“Can I see her? Can we see our daughter?” Devney’s stepfather asked.
“Soon. Once she’s awake from the anesthesia. Most of you can go home, though. It’s late, almost past visiting hours.”
“We’ll wait to hear,” Maureen said, her chin raised. “We’ll stake out this corner and stay out of the way. But we’ll wait to talk to our sister.”
The man nodded and left. I finally staggered back to a seat. August helped me sit down, and I put my hands over my face, letting the tears come.
I nearly lost her. Nearly lost her when I didn’t even have her.
I would fix this. I would fix us.
But first, I needed to make sure she was okay.
Chapter 19
