Crashed (Driven, #3)(97)
“I’m okay,” I tell him, pressing a kiss to the underside of his jaw, drawing strength from the steady pulse beating beneath my lips, before leaning back on my propped up pillows so I can look at him. I blow out a breath to get my hair out of my face, not wanting to use my hand and break our connection.
The look in his eyes is so intense, jaw muscle clenching, lips strained with emotion, that I look down at our joined hands to mentally prepare myself for the things I need to say to him but fear his responses. I take a deep breath and begin. “We need to talk about this.” My voice is barely a whisper as I raise my eyes back up to meet his.
He shakes his head, a surefire sign of the argument that’s about to fall from his lips. “No.” He squeezes my hand. “The only thing that matters is that you’re okay.”
“Colton …” I just say his name but I know he can hear my pleading in it.
“No, Ry!” He shoves up off the bed and paces the small space beside it, making me think of him on the side of the freeway yesterday, overwhelmed with guilt. Was it just yesterday? It feels like a lifetime has passed since then. “You don’t get it, do you?” he shouts at me, making me cringe from the vehemence in his voice. “I found you,” he says, his eyes angled to the ground, the break in his voice nearly destroying me. “There was blood everywhere.” He looks up and meets my eyes. “Everywhere … and you …you were lying in the middle of it, covered in it.” He walks to the edge of my bed and grabs both of my hands. “I thought I’d lost you. For the second time in one f*cking day!”
In an instant, his hand is holding the back of my neck tightly and he’s pressing his lips possessively against mine. I can taste the raw and palpable angst and need on his tongue before he pulls back and rests his forehead against mine, hand still tight on the back of my neck while his other one comes up and cups the side of my cheek.
“Give me a minute,” he whispers, his breath feathering over my lips. “Let me have this okay? I just need this … you … right now. To hold you like this because I’ve been going out of my f*cking mind waiting for you to wake up. Waiting for you to come the f*ck back to me because, Ry, now that you’re here, now that you’re in my life … become a part of me, I can’t f*cking breathe without knowing you’re all right. That you’re coming back to me.”
“I’ll always come back to you.” The words are out of my mouth before I can think, because when the heart wants to speak it does so without premeditation. I hear him breathe in a shaky breath, feel his fingers flex on my neck, and know how hard the man who’s never needed anybody is desperately trying to figure out what to do now that the one thing he’s never wanted he suddenly can’t do without.
We sit like this for a moment, and as he leans back to press a kiss on the tip of my nose, I hear the commotion before I see her barrel into the room. “Christ on a crutch, woman! Do you enjoy giving me heart attacks?” Haddie is through the door and at my side in an instant. “Get your hands off of her, Donavan, and let me at her,” she says, and I can feel Colton’s lips form into a smile as he presses them against my cheek. Within seconds I am engulfed in the whirlwind that is Haddie, held tight as we both start crying. “Let me look at you!” she says, leaning back, smiling through the tears. “You look like shit but are still beautiful as ever. You okay?” The sincerity in her voice makes the tears well again, and I have to bite my lip to prevent them from falling. I nod and Haddie looks up and over my bed, and meets Colton’s eyes. They hold each other’s gaze for a few moments, emotion swimming in both of their eyes. “Thank you,” she tells him softly, and I close my eyes for a moment as the enormity of everything hits me.
“No tears, okay?” Her hand’s squeezing mine and I nod my head before I open my eyes.
“Yeah.” I blow out a breath and look over to meet Colton’s eyes. There’s something there I can’t latch onto, but we’ve both been through so much in the past few days it’s probably emotional overload.
We sit for some time. Each moment that passes, Colton becomes more withdrawn, and I can tell Haddie notices it too but she just keeps chatting away as if we aren’t in a hospital room and I’m not mourning the loss of a baby. And it’s okay that she is, because as usual, she knows just what I need.
She’s in the middle of telling me that she’s spoken to my parents and they’re on their way up from San Diego when her phone receives a text. She looks at it and then looks over at Colton. “Becks is down in the parking lot and wants you to come show him where to go.”
He gives her an odd look but nods, kissing me on the forehead and smiling softly at me. “I’ll be right back, okay?”
I smile back at him and watch as he walks out the door before looking over at Haddie.
“You want to tell me what the f*ck is going on here?” I laugh, expecting nothing less than her frankness. “I mean shit.” She blows out a breath. “I told you to have reckless sex with him, clear the cobwebs and shit. You couldn’t be any more Jerry Springer if you tried. Getting knocked up, wrestling a gun-wielding man, and miscarrying a baby you didn’t even know you were carrying.”
The tears come now—tears of laughter—because anyone else listening to this conversation would think Haddie is being callous, but I know deep down she is dealing with her sudden anxiety the only way she knows how—with sarcasm, and then some. And for me, it’s my own personal therapy because it’s what I’ve clung to the past two years on the really rough nights after Max’s accident.