Cracked Kingdom (The Royals #5)(53)

“How’s he doing?” Sawyer asks.

“He’s in a bad mood.”

Ella grimaces. “Still? I thought once he got his bearings, he’d be okay.”

Sawyer laughs. His grin is so wide, the ends reach each ear. “So what if he’s in a bad mood? He was in a coma for over two weeks.”

“He asked about Lauren,” I relay.

My brother’s grin disappears. “Shit.”

“I didn’t say anything.”

“Don’t. I don’t want him hearing any bad news.”

“I’m not going to tell him.”

Sawyer swings a glare toward Ella. She holds up her hands. “Me either, but the longer you wait, the worse it will be.”

“He’s going to notice something’s off when she doesn’t show up,” I point out.

“Just keep it to yourself,” Sawyer snaps. “I’ll decide when he finds out.” He pushes past us into the room.

Ella hangs back, and as soon as the door is closed, she turns to me. “Something is wrong with Sebastian.”

“You mean because our sweet, docile brother woke up a rude sex fiend?”

“Yes,” she nods emphatically, “exactly that. I walked in and he asked me if I was there to give him a blowjob. He said it was my sisterly obligation. And when I reminded him that I was his brother’s girlfriend, because I thought maybe he had some kind of amnesia like Hartley, he replied that since we weren’t actually related I could climb up on the bed but that he preferred the reverse cowgirl so he didn’t have to look at my face!” She ends with a shriek.

The few staff in the hallway turn in our direction. I grab Ella’s arm and drag her down the hall, away from curious eyes.

“Like Sawyer said, Seb’s been in a coma for two weeks. It’s normal to wake up with a boner, and maybe he’s not processing his feelings appropriately, but he’s probably loopy on drugs. Why don’t you go home? Sawyer and I have got this.”

Ella casts a guilty look over her shoulder toward the hospital room. “I really shouldn’t.”

But she really wants to. “Go. We’ll be fine,” I assure her.

She doesn’t need to be told twice. She squeezes my arm, mumbles some platitude, and scurries off. Seb must’ve really freaked her out.

When I get near the room, I hear a bunch of shouting. I hurry up and push open the door. Inside, it’s a flurry of motion.

“What’s going on?”

“We’re doing tests,” one of the staff members informs me.

More people shuttle in, and soon Seb is being wheeled away to get his head examined—literally. All the while, he alternates between cursing the staff out “Fucking get your fucking hands off me, you fuckers!” and harassing them, “On a scale of one to wet, what’s the condition of your panties now that you’ve stared at my dick for five minutes?”

“What was that all about?” I ask quietly when Sawyer joins me in the hall. “Did something set him off?”

Sawyer slumps against the wall, all his smiles replaced with a weary, exasperated expression. “The nurse made him piss in a bedpan.”

“Ah, so that’s what the shouting was about.”

“It took two orderlies and me to hold him back from throwing the pan at the nurse’s head. I don’t know what’s wrong with him.” Sawyer looks baffled.

I pat my brother on the back. “He woke up on the wrong side of the bed, obviously.”

Sawyer cracks a small smile at this bad joke. “I guess it doesn’t matter. He’s awake and that’s what’s important.”

“Yup. Now you can go home.”

“What?”

“Go home, Sawyer. You’re exhausted. You haven’t slept a full night in the last fourteen days. There are finals coming up and you need to take care of yourself.”

“Since when did you become Dad?” Sawyer jokes, but I can see the relief in his eyes.

“Since our real one flew to Dubai to get some rich Arabs to buy planes from us. Now that we gotta share part of our inheritance with Ella, the real one has to start making more money.”

To my surprise, Sawyer agrees. He must be exhausted. “All right. But if Seb is mad, I’m blaming it on you.”

“I can take it.”

“Remember—no Lauren.”

“Trust me. I’m not bringing it up.” If Seb’s throwing around bedpans because he can’t piss standing up, he’s going to do a lot more damage when he finds out his girlfriend couldn’t keep her shit together for two measly weeks.

It’s nearly three hours later when Seb is rolled back to the room, completely out of it. I follow the staff inside and wait for an explanation.

“We had to sedate him to do the CT,” the nurse says when I ask what’s wrong. “But everything is fine. You should go home, too. He probably won’t wake up anytime soon.”

“Someone’s got to be here when he does.”

“We’ve really been lax about our rules, but now that Mr. Royal has turned the corner, we need to impose some order for his own health. You want him to get better, don’t you?”

What kind of dumb question is that? I seethe. “Of course.”