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“Oh god!” she exclaimed, and Eli winced. “Sorry!” she whispered, forgetting about the concussion, which was the icing on the cake of the two fractured ribs and—as Eli figured out himself—a collapsed lung.
Her eyes adjusted, and he came into focus. Other than one tube—which she learned was called a cannula—delivering extra oxygen through Eli’s nose and another one traveling out beneath the sleeve of his hospital gown—the one draining fluid from his chest—he still looked like her Eli. So why did she feel the hot threat of tears behind her eyes?
“You should go home,” he replied, his voice hoarse. “I’m sure Midnight is worried about you. And the guesthouse has a really nice shower.”
She sucked in a sharp breath, suddenly realizing what it was. He was awake. Eli was awake. And did he just crack a joke?
“What?” Beth asked, choking back a sob. “You’re not a fan of this look?” She gestured to her navy sweatshirt with the word HOSPITAL embroidered on it in white. She at least had to hand it to the gift shop for providing a much-needed dose of humor to her evening. Or was it morning? She pulled her phone out of the still damp back pocket of her jeans, noting the 2:06 a.m. time on her lock screen before the battery used its last bit of juice.
“You’re a little blurry,” he admitted. “But I’m positive you’re still the prettiest one in the room.” He coughed and winced again. “I mean any room,” he managed to add.
“Eli…” Beth’s voice shook on the second syllable of his name. She was seconds away from losing it, so she had to get the words out before they didn’t sound like words anymore.
“Wait,” he whispered, then patted the sliver of room on the mattress to his left. “If you’re not going to leave, then I need you to come closer.”
Her breath hitched, and she sat there frozen for several seconds. Eli responded by pressing both palms against the bed and shifting his entire body to the right, a swear escaping his lips as he did.
“Are you crazy?” she hissed, springing from her chair. “You’re not supposed to be moving!”
A muscle in his jaw twitched, and he fisted the sheet at his sides.
“You’re right,” he ground out through gritted teeth. “Won’t be doing that again. But now that there’s more room…” He gave the bed another pat even as beads of sweat broke out on his forehead.
Instead of taking Eli up on his invitation, Beth darted for the bathroom, returning a few seconds later with a cool, damp washcloth. She folded it in half and laid it gingerly on his forehead. He closed his eyes and sighed, his shoulders relaxing.
Only then did Beth gently climb onto the bed, careful to cause as little movement as possible before awkwardly leaning on her right elbow to face him. She had to use every muscle in her core to keep from toppling onto the floor.
Eli’s brow furrowed. “I might not be able to see straight right now, but I can still tell you look ridiculous.” He slid his arm out from where it was pinned between their bodies and reached behind her to lift the bed rail and lock it into place. “Now lean back,” he said. “And put your head here.” He nodded toward his left shoulder.
Beth let out a breath and let the bulk of her weight fall against the rail, then rested her head softly on his shoulder.
She watched his chest fall as he exhaled, marveling at the sight of something she once took for granted. And when she tilted her head up to look at him, she found him smiling back at her, the big, beautiful Eli smile she used to think didn’t exist. Knowing now that she had the ability to put that expression on his face felt like a superpower she never knew she wanted until it was in her possession.
“I should have listened to you and stayed away,” she whispered.
“I should have never shut you down like that,” he whispered back.
She inhaled the unmistakable sterility of high-powered cleaners, the scent of iodine and soap, and somewhere beneath it all something inherently Eli, and for the first time since her adrenaline-induced escape from the barn on Midnight’s back, Beth finally felt like she could breathe.
“I get it now,” she continued, her barrage of I’m sorries and Please forgive mes replaced with the simple truth that up until this very moment, she’d never completely understood the man beside her. But tonight, she did.
“Get what?”
She was half on her side, half on her back, not sure where to put her arms. She couldn’t exactly wrap them around a man whose body was broken on one side, and letting them simply lie straight at her sides just felt weird. Where was the manual for what to do with your freaking arms while lying in a hospital bed with the man who loved you but didn’t know yet that you loved him back?
It was then that his left arm, which must have still been on the bed rail, wrapped around her torso like a safety belt, and she held on to it for dear life.
“I get why, when I first got here, you never wanted me to ride Midnight in the first place. And I get why you were such an asshole about letting me be there tonight.” She forced a laugh, then tilted her head toward his. “You were thrown off a motorcycle.”
A shallow laugh escaped his lips. “Is that why I feel like hell?”
Beth swallowed. “I was so scared when I saw you just lying there. And I know you’re eventually going to be okay, but god, Eli. I don’t know what I would have done if I lost you like…”
She couldn’t say it.
So he surprised her yet again when without missing a beat, he could. “Like I lost Tess?”
She pressed a palm to his cheek, careful not to tug his oxygen tube, and nodded.
