“You fucking dick,” Nico stated and punched Damien in the shoulder. “Why didn’t you tell me you were coming home? I was not prepared, bro, not prepared at all. You just made me fucking cry!”
Damien laughed and wiped under both of his eyes. “What? You’re too cool to cry?”
“I don’t cry!” Nico growled, brushing the back of his right hand across his cheeks.
I grunted. “You cried when Kane was in hospital and we found out he was going to be okay.”
Kane perked up. “Aww, sweet little brother, you do care.”
“Fuck you, Kane!” Nico snapped then flicked his eyes to me. “Couldn’t have kept that to yourself, could you, princess?”
I grinned. “No, husband.”
Nico’s lip quirked.
“What does she mean by husband?” Damien questioned, his eyebrow raised.
“Yeah,” Kane chimed in, his brows drawn together. “What the fuck does she mean by husband?”
Nico chortled. “The day you collapsed I had to pretend to the security guard in the ER that Bronagh, Branna, Aideen and Alannah were all my wives. He said they needed to be family so I said they were. He believed me, too,” he said proudly.
Kane waited only a second before he burst into laughter. Damien and Nico quickly followed suit.
I rolled my eyes.
Brothers.
“Worst day ever,” I whispered.
That shut them up.
Kane leaned over to me and kissed my head. “I think the worst day ever occurred last night, babydoll.”
When I got hurt.
I blinked. “Do you think he knows I didn’t die?”
The brothers’ faces hardened. Any mention of Big Phil, or their old life, seemed to have that effect on them.
“Wait till I find that motherfucker,” Nico grumbled under his breath.
“Not here,” Kane muttered to his brother then focused on me. “Don’t think about him, he doesn’t deserve a second of your time. Think about our little one. It’s not long now until he is here.”
I didn’t think I would ever stop thinking about the man who almost killed my unborn child, an innocent student, as well as me.
I thought of Caleb then, and felt so grateful to him. Most teenage boys wouldn’t have risked getting hurt in order to help a teacher of theirs, but Caleb did. I met his parents earlier in the day and thanked them profusely for their son’s bravery. I didn’t get a chance to talk to him, because like me, his throat was pretty torn up from coughing. The good news was he would be leaving the hospital soon, which comforted me; it meant he wasn’t harmed as badly as he could have been.
I smiled for Kane’s sake and said, “She.”
Kane grinned. “You aren’t going to let up on that, are you?”
“Nope, because she is a girl,” I whispered.
“You’re going to give my son a complex, calling him a girl all the time.”
I smiled wide and rested my head back against my pillow.
“Where is Bee?” Damien asked Nico as the three of them sat down.
Damien sat back down on the end of my bed, but was mindful that he didn’t touch my injured leg. You couldn’t miss it though even if you tried. The cast on it was bright blue, and there was a ramp of sorts along with pillows tucked under it to keep it elevated.
Nico jabbed his thumb over his shoulder. “She was following me up. She wanted to park my car.”
“And you let her?” Damien gasped.
Nico laughed. “I taught her how to drive, she’s decent.”
The ‘for a girl’ he implied in that statement was silent.
“I want to freak her out,” Damien stated happily. “How will I do that?”
Nico stood up and shrugged out of his grey hoodie. “Put this on and sit with your back to the door. There are no extra seats so she will sit on your lap thinking you’re me.”
Oh, this was going to be so good.
Damien had a shit-eating grin on his face as he put Nico’s hoodie over his head. Nico moved over to the door and hid in the same spot Damien did only minutes before. Damien then sat in Nico’s seat and pulled up the hood as Kane fluffed up the blanket on the bed, making it look like there was less room to sit down than there really was.
We waited a few minutes, but when the door to my room opened, we all held our breath.
“Hey,” Bronagh whispered as she stepped into the room and closed the door behind her without turning around.
“She’s awake,” Kane smiled. “No need to whisper.”