The more he goes on, the tighter my ribs hug my lungs. “Why are you still talking? Get it done. Fix her.”
“Okay. If you can sign the release form, we’ll administer the drug right away.”
“Me? Why would I be the one to say it’s okay?”
“You are her husband, right?”
“Yes. We only got married this afternoon.”
“Then you’re her next of kin. It’s your decision.”
“Of course.” I take the offered paper and awkwardly use my left hand to scrawl my signature on the highlighted line.
I shove the pages at him. “Do it now. Please.”
I’m her only kin.
Her only family.
For now, anyway.
Until we get Caden and she divorces me. Then, at some point in the future, some other guy will be her next of kin. Her only kin. Well, until they have kids.
My thoughts spin out of control with images of Jo in some other guy’s arms. Jo walking down the aisle to a different groom. Jo melting as some other man kisses her senseless. Jo holding her newborn, a baby who isn’t mine.
Nausea pushes me to my seat.
I have to swallow three times to clear the tightening pain in my throat. To clear the bitter taste in my mouth that those mental pictures brought on.
I hold Jo’s hand as Dr. Meyer pushes a needle into the IV.
This will work. It has to work.
She’ll wake up and everything will be the way it’s supposed to be.
We’ll go home. She’ll be happy. I’ll get Caden. We can be a family.
A family.
No.
Wait.
My pulse beats in the center of my brain.
Whispers float around me like cottonwood seeds in the summer. Bright spots of soft sound in the quiet spaces of my head.
“You have to be okay, love. I don’t know what I’ll do if you aren’t.”
“Excuse me, Mr. Masters. I need to take your wife’s vitals again.”
Wife?
Wife!
Oh. Shit. I’m married.
“Is that blood?” I ask.
Ty looks down at his shirt but doesn’t answer. It’s like this is the first time he’s realizing that—
He’s been bleeding!
My throat tightens.
His eyes brighten, and his smile comes with what seems to be a sigh of relief. “You woke up. Hey, look. She’s awake.”
The lady with the stethoscope grins. “So she is. I’ll let the doctor know as soon as I finish.”
The woman comes to the opposite side of the bed from Tyson, placing a blood pressure cuff around my arm.
I grab hold of his shirttail and pull, my stomach turning to stone. “You’re—are you hurt?”
“No. I’m okay. Fractured clavicle and some teeny cuts on my hands, that’s all.”
“But…that’s a lot of blood. What happened?”
Ty runs his finger over my knuckles. “The doc says you’re going to be fine. A car hydroplaned and hit us—right where you were sitting. The limo flipped. Your head took a pretty hard hit. You had to have some stitches. And you got scraped up a bit. It took you a little while to wake up. You had me worried.”
A cool hand lands on my arm. “Mrs. Masters, I’m Dr. Meyer. You had a small blood clot in your brain. We administered a clot busting drug to break it up. Assuming there aren’t any further complications, you should be fine.”
I turn to the doctor. “Is he okay? Is all that blood on his clothes mine?”
The doctor glances at Tyson, and then his gaze returns to me. “Most of it is yours, but don’t worry, we got you all fixed up. You have some stitches on your scalp, but the scar will be minimal and easily covered by your hair.”
“So, he’s not bleeding?”
The doctor shakes his head. “No, ma’am. He’s not bleeding.”
“Thank goodness.” The tension in my chest loosens. “And thank you.”
“I told you, I’m fine.” Ty squeezes my hand. “You’re the one who wouldn’t wake up and scared the crap out of everyone. Don’t do that again. Ever.”
His face is pale, and his eyes have dark circles beneath them.
“You really were worried, weren’t you?”
“You’re my wife. Of course I was worried. As long as I’m your husband, it’s my job.” He leans to me and places a soft kiss on my forehead.
As long as he’s my husband.
I close my eyes, blocking out his handsome face. I can’t think about this ending right now.
The crash might not have killed me. Losing Tyson Masters? That will surely bring on my demise.
I wait on the nurse to call me to Jo’s room again once she returns from her second MRI. This one will hopefully show that the clot was destroyed and that she’s truly all right.