“Help me until I can think. Don’t let ’em just pacify me. Don’t you do it neither!” She squeezed his hand tighter to make her point and with a note of pleading told him,
“Find Romeo. You fix it for me, Wy Wy. Promise.”
342
The doctor and nurses surrounded Jules and forced her to think about other things, but she noticed what Wyatt was hoping she didn’t—he never promised.
* * * *
It was long past dark before Wyatt finally made it across the hall in the ICU. Clay and Melody had driven over from the hotel after Jules woke up. Melody was better at distracting Jules than Wyatt was, but even Melody was running out of things to help Jules keep her mind off Romeo.
The longer Jules stayed awake, the clearer her thinking became and the more demanding she got. There was no way they were going to make it through the night without Wyatt giving her a straight answer. He had been staring at the room across the way for the past few hours, desperate for the right break in the storm. He saw two federal agents go in, and he waited until they left before he used the excuse of finding dinner to walk over there.
The door was partially open when he walked in and peered inside. Rather than look at the bed, he glanced at the Moretti brothers. Nova sat on the ground instead of in a chair. His back was against the wall, and he stared at Romeo on the bed as if deep in thought. Tino was lying on the floor, his head resting on Nova’s thigh. He appeared to be asleep. They had beds in the ICU, Wyatt knew, because he used one last night to try and get a few hours rest, but it hadn’t worked out too well.
Why Tino was sleeping on the floor, he had no idea, but knowing how hard it was to get sleep when they were under stress, Wyatt backed away.
“You can come in, Conner,” Nova said without looking at him.
Wyatt frowned. “How—”
“Size fourteen police boots make a very distinct sound against linoleum,” Nova explained. “I heard you stomping from across the hall.”
“Why’s he sleeping on the floor?” Wyatt asked as he walked into the room.
“’Cause he doesn’t wanna leave.” Nova sighed. “But he’s exhausted.”
343
Wyatt glanced to the other side of the room. Romeo was such a huge man that even with the larger hospital bed, he seemed too big to fit. This room was filled with more of everything than Jules’s was. More equipment, more beeping and clicking, more tubes running into Romeo, and Wyatt remembered again why he’d been avoiding answering Jules’s questions. Seeing Romeo, prone and pale against the white sheets, had Wyatt feeling extra grateful as he told the brothers, “She’s awake.”
“We heard,” Nova said softly. “Congratulations.”
Wyatt paused, wondering if it was protocol to apologize that his sibling was a little less shot up than theirs was. Figuring that would rub salt into an already painful wound, he said, “They think the babies are gonna be fine. They told Jules there ain’t nothing to stop ’em from being completely healthy.”
“Can I see?” Tino asked groggily, rolling onto his back, his head still on Nova’s thigh. “I saw them rolling that machine up to her room—”
“Ultrasound,” Nova filled in for him.
“Yeah, I wanna see them,” Tino said with a wistful smile. “Can we see Romeo’s babies the next time they do it?”
“Well”—Wyatt shrugged, fighting for the right words—“she’s been frantic ’bout Romeo and—”
Nova snorted. “That means, no.”
“I didn’t say that. I just need to tell her something first, or she’s gonna be asking y’all ten million questions you might not feel like answering.”
“What does she wanna know?”
Wyatt huffed. “I think she wants to know if she’s gonna have a husband to help raise these twins.”
Nova turned and arched a dark eyebrow at Wyatt. He looked exhausted. He was still wearing the same clothes he’d had on when they released him from jail. Wyatt had seen him get to the hospital, but he wasn’t going to tell Nova he’d seen the tears and 344
wild panic as he yelled at doctors, calling them idiots for trying to explain in layman’s terms why his brother was in emergency surgery. He saw the FBI agents pull him aside to question him too, even while he was frantic over his brother—which, even Wyatt had to admit, was pretty damn inconsiderate.
“You can tell her,” Nova started, a small smile tugging at his lips, “that yeah, she’ll have a husband to help.”
Wyatt sucked in a stunned breath, staring at Nova hopefully. “Really?” Nova nodded, his smile becoming more confident. “The surgery went well. They think he’s gonna be okay. They got him in a medically induced coma to help him heal a little, but they’re gonna try and bring him out of it tomorrow.”