AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Is Cam all right? He’s not responding to my texts. If you’re with him, please tell him to check his phone. Or let him know that a doctor is with Lucian right now. It’ll be a while before we get the results from the blood work, and I think the plan right now is to get him to calm down. The nurse told me I’d get to see him in a few minutes. That was about ten minutes ago.
I sent it off, then promptly opened my conversation with Noa and wrote him a new message.
Are you with Cam, baby? In case he or Santiago didn’t tell you, Lucian will recover from this. He’s not having a heart attack. Now he needs to rest a lot. I will come get you and Cam as soon as I can, hopefully within the hour. I love you. (Please get a snack from the vending machines. You haven’t had dinner yet.)
Just as I sent it, the door to the room where Lucian was opened, and I saw the doctor leaving.
My heart instantly drummed faster. Thankfully, I didn’t have to chase down answers; I was standing close enough—and probably had a sign on my forehead—because the doctor spotted me and simply knew.
“Mr. Hayles, I take it.”
I nodded. “Is he okay?”
She offered a quick, polite smile. “I can’t say anything with certainty until the blood work comes back, but judging by the symptoms—as I told Mr. Leroux—I hope he will listen to the warning bells.” She paused briefly. “You’re welcome to go in and see him. Just a fair warning, we gave him lorazepam intravenously to decrease his anxiety, and given how severe it appears to be, we’d like to keep him overnight. We’ll also test his blood again in a few hours. Tomorrow, he should make an appointment with his regular doctor to discuss a treatment program. If all this is stress-related, he needs to make lifestyle changes sooner rather than later.”
Didn’t I fucking know it.
She was about to say something else, when the nurse came out and said Lucian was calming down.
The nurse flicked me a quick look. “I’ll come back in fifteen minutes.”
By then, maybe I’d need some goddamn lorazepam too.
After wrapping up my lovely chitchat with the doctor, I finally got to limp inside Lucian’s room, and the sight was as funny as it was tragic. Christ, it nearly broke my fucking heart. I was supposed to be the constant patient of our family. After my accident, the painful rehabilitation workouts, sessions with therapists and personal trainers, a couple bouts of depression, I was the head case, and Lucian was the ever-collected port in the storm.
He smiled drowsily from his bed, the corners of his mouth tugging at his…nine-o’clock shadow. Hair in complete disarray, shirt and pants replaced by a hospital gown and blanket…
“You fucking asshole.” I headed over to his bedside, unable to take my eyes off him, and rested the crutches against the nearest wall.
“I love you too,” he yawned. “I’m not…hypervent-ventilating anymore.”
They’d definitely given him the good stuff.
“That’s nice.” I dragged the chair closer before collapsing in it, and I leaned forward so I could reach his hand. “How’s the chest pain?”
He lifted his free hand and pinched his index finger and thumb together. “Slight twinge.” He smacked his lips, as if his mouth was dry. “Twinge is a funny word.”
My mouth twisted.
It was…indescribable, this whole scene. Seeing him like this, so…ruffled. For chrissakes, he’d started wearing suits in high school. When someone tried to tease him for it, calling him Baby CEO and Yuppie Boy, he’d calmly walked over to them, towering over most of them, and talked them to pieces. Lucian wasn’t a fighter; he was a debater, a salesman, and an adviser. He could talk a fish in the ocean into buying water.
I’d seen his mental strength waver maybe two or three times in all the years I’d known him. When his dad had died our senior year of high school, then right around the time he’d finally broken up with his ex and confessed he couldn’t stop thinking about Cam, all while…commitment suddenly scared the shit out of him, and…well, he didn’t look particularly strong right now.
I squeezed his hand and kissed his knuckles. “Lucian, you gotta get your shit together. You gotta take this seriously.”
If we lost him, I wasn’t sure how any of us would cope.
He released a breath and shifted his gaze to stare up at the ceiling. “It’s possibly—possible…I have fucked up a little.”
A little?
Next time, it could be an actual heart attack.
Something came over him, and he closed his eyes. It looked as much like the effects of good drugs as it did like regret. His expression became pinched before it relaxed.
“Or I fucked up a lot,” he whispered, eyes remaining closed. “I thought I had more time.”
I suppressed a sigh and withdrew my hand; I had to rub my leg. It was spasming pretty bad.
