Liability (Suncoast Society #33)(74)

Cole didn’t want to say it aloud to Kim, that these might be skills they’d have to know to teach any daytime caretakers Mason had once he was moved out of the ICU.

Especially if he needed long-term care at home.

This evening, Kim had to go home to sleep despite how early it was. She was falling apart at the seams, and Cole currently wasn’t strong enough to hold it together for her right then. He’d ordered her to go home and sleep. Well, to go to Mason’s and sleep.

Cole wasn’t getting good sleep anyway, so he figured he might as well be sleeping there at Mason’s side.

Earlier that day, they’d started decreasing Mason’s medication, wanting to bring him slowly out of the induced coma to make sure his body would tolerate it. Because he was still on the ventilator, they’d put restraints on his hands so he wouldn’t try to pull the breathing tube. Tilly had warned Cole of this happening, that they’d want to verify his ability to breathe on his own before removing the ventilator.

Also, they wanted the breathing tube kept in place in case they needed to immediately sedate him again.

Cole couldn’t help but think Mason might find it ironic that he was the one now tied down.

Another reason he’d sent Kim to Mason’s, because when she’d spotted the restraints earlier she had burst into tears. Although the staff didn’t understand the true reason for her distress.

Because it was too much of a grim reminder of what she was missing.

He got it, because it’d made him cringe when he’d arrived earlier and saw them.

So here he sat, staring at Mason while the nurse sat on the stool with the laptop cart and worked on charts and monitored Mason’s readings.

One moment, Cole was sitting there, staring at Mason’s face. He’d closed his own eyes only for a second, then opened them again.

Mason was staring at him.

It took him a moment to process that, to feel the catch in his throat, to force himself to sit up, stand, lean in close. “Hey, buddy. Welcome back.”

The nurse looked up and walked around to the other side of the bed. “Hello, Mr. Lange.”

Mason’s gaze didn’t waver from Cole’s. Cole’s vision doubled, tripled as tears filled his eyes.

He didn’t care. Mason was awake, looking at him.

The nurse raised her voice just a little. “Mr. Lange, I’m Rosie, your nurse. Can you please look at me for a moment?”

Slowly, Mason’s gaze shifted, looking at her, apparently trying to focus on her.

She smiled at him. “Very good. Can you please blink for me?”

Cole choked back a sob as Mason slowly blinked.

“Excellent. I’m going to get the doctor to come in to see you. Cole is right here with you. I’ll be back in a minute.”

She left, and Mason seemed to follow her with his gaze before it slowly swung back onto Cole.

“I love you,” Cole said. “I love you so f*cking much, I want you to know that.” He gently grasped Mason’s right hand with both of his. “Kim loves you, too. I sent her home to sleep. It’s almost eight o’clock at night.”

He didn’t want to overwhelm Mason with the full details yet.

Like how much time had passed.

There’d be plenty of time for that.

Mason tried to lift his left hand and realized he couldn’t. When he tried to look that way, Cole distracted him. “Hey, no, look at me,” he said.

Not just a distraction for Mason, but he didn’t want to stop staring into Mason’s gaze. He wanted to look into those hazel eyes and never stop staring.

The nurse returned with a doctor. Cole leaned in and kissed Mason’s forehead before letting go of his hand and moving out of the way, watching as they put Mason through a series of basic commands and tests, including seeing if Mason felt pain in his feet, could move on command.

The whole time, Mason’s gaze seemed to seek out Cole when the doctor wasn’t asking him to respond directly by looking somewhere specific or blinking.

Finally, Cole breathed out a sigh of relief when the doctor turned to the nurse. “Let’s go ahead and check his breathing, see if he’s able to breathe on his own. If so, we’ll go ahead and pull the breathing tube.”

One more victory.

That took another hour, Cole once again standing out of the way while they did it, the sound of Mason’s weak cough like music to Cole’s ears.

No sleep for me tonight.

He’d be calling in to work tomorrow, because he’d want to sit up all night and be there, awake and aware and ready to respond to Mason.

I’ll need to text Kim in the morning and tell her to call in. She could sit there with Mason while he went and got some sleep.

The nurse warned Cole that Mason might go back to sleep, due to the effects of the sedation, and not to count on him being too awake or aware this soon. That it might be days before he was really coherent.

Cole didn’t care. Mason was awake.

That meant, as far as Cole was concerned, that any prognosis was possible. Including the best-case scenario.

Finally, Cole was once again able to sit at Mason’s bedside. They kept his hands restrained for now because of the NG tube. They’d replaced the breathing tube with a cannula delivering oxygen directly into Mason’s nose.

Cole reached over and clasped Mason’s right hand once more.