Tyler's Undoing (Gloves Off #1)(77)

Tyler stood and came to my side and shook her hand as well.

“It’s hard to say right now,” she admitted honestly. “The tests show he has a dislocated vertebra in his neck. We don’t think it’s damaged the spinal cord, but we’re going to go in and see what we can do. He’s experiencing some numbness from the neck down. Now, I need to prepare you. If we can’t fix the problem . . . there is a chance he’ll be paralyzed.”

“Oh my God,” I choked. “Will he ever walk again?”

Tyler’s face paled and he sat back down in the chair, covering his face with his hands. I knew he blamed himself, but I had watched the fight. He didn’t try to deliberately hurt my brother.

Dr. Peters grimaced. “We’ll do our best and hope for a good outcome. Sometimes, all it takes is a little bit of faith. If you want, you can go in and see him now, before we take him into surgery. We’ve already contacted your mother and she’s coming in on the next available flight.”

Hopefully, my mother would be able to take care of him because I knew I wasn’t going to do it. Kyle made his bed and now he had to sleep in it.

Dr. Peters walked away, leaving me and Tyler to ourselves.

I knelt down in front of him and took his hands in mine. “This isn’t your fault. Injuries like this happen all of the time in the MMA. You can’t blame yourself. I, for one, don’t blame you.”

“Are you sure about that?” he asked softly, staring at me with his stormy gray eyes.

I squeezed his hands and leaned over to kiss his lips gently, since my brother split his bottom lip at some point during the fight. “I’m positive. I’ll only be a minute, okay?”

Taking a deep breath, I left the waiting room and started down the short hallway to Kyle’s room. It was dark and quiet inside, except for the lights and sounds of the machines. Kyle was motionless, his neck held stiff in a brace, but his gaze followed me as I stood beside him.

He started to speak, but I held up my hand. “You don’t get to speak right now,” I snapped, glaring down at him. “You need to listen to me and listen well. I am not going to feel sorry for you because of what happened. All of this,” I said, waving around his immobilized body, “is payback for all of the bad shit you’ve done in your life. Did you think it wouldn’t catch up to you?”

He closed his eyes and squeezed them shut. Tears started to blur my vision, but they were from anger. “Open your eyes, Kyle,” I demanded.

He did as I said and opened them. For the first time in my life I watched him cry. I held up my hands and ripped open my gauze so he could see the marred flesh on my wrists from the cable ties. “This is what you did to me. You left me in the hands of your scumbag friends and if it wasn’t for Tyler, Liam would’ve—” I choked. I couldn’t even finish the sentence. It was too scary to even think about.

“I would’ve killed him,” Kyle rasped. “I never wanted anything to happen to you.”

Shaking my head, I closed my eyes and wiped away my tears. “I’m sorry, Kyle, but I don’t believe you. You’re about to go into surgery and I wish you all the best. Mom is on her way, so hopefully, she’ll be able to take care of you and figure out what to do. Because there sure as hell aren’t any of your friends out there in that waiting room. It’s just me and Tyler.”

He kept his gaze on me, his lips trembling. “I’m sorry, Kacey. Please say you’ll forgive me.”

Swallowing hard, I reached for his hand and touched it briefly, before taking a step away. “You will always be my brother, Kyle, and for that I love you. But right now, I can’t say the words you need to hear. It will take me some time. I don’t like who you’ve become and I hope one day you decide to change.” I backed away to the door, out of his range of sight.

“Kacey, please,” he begged.

“Goodbye, Kyle.” Quickly, I shut the door and leaned against it with my eyes closed.

“Are you okay?” Tyler asked.

“Yes,” I replied as I opened my eyes. “I feel much better now.”

Putting his arm around my shoulders, we started down the hall toward the elevators.

“Do we have to go to the police station now?”

“Actually, no. I called the station and they said we could wait until tomorrow.”

Once we got to the elevators, Tyler pressed the button and the doors opened. “So what are we going to do then? I’m sure there’s some kind of party in your honor for being the Heavyweight champion.”

Tyler put his hand on the small of my back and guided me into the elevator. “I’m sure there is, but they’re just going to have to do without their guest of honor. Tonight there’s only one person I want to be with.”

“Oh yeah? And who might that be?”

The elevator doors closed and he pushed me against the wall with his body firmly pressed into mine. “Surely you know,” he murmured against my lips. “It’s always going to be you.” He pressed his lips against mine, and opened my lips with his tongue, going deeper. When he leaned back, I gasped for air and tried to close the distance again.

“You promise?”

Brushing the hair off my face, he rubbed my cheeks with his thumbs and smiled. “I promise, and one day soon I’m going to prove it to you.”