“Of course. Follow me. She’s going to tire easily for a while, so keep it short and sweet if you can. She asked for you when they woke her in recovery.”
I tune out everything else beside the path in front of me, following the footsteps of the doctor down the hall, into the elevator, and down another long corridor until she finally turns into a room in the Intensive Care Unit.
“They’ll move her to general tomorrow, but she’ll spend the night here and stay on the monitors so we can keep track of her vitals as she wakes up from surgery.”
I nod and don’t even register the doctor leaving.
She’s hooked up and plugged in, as is to be expected, but it doesn’t pad the freefall my heart dives into upon seeing her like this. Prone and vulnerable, her chest rising almost imperceptibly with oxygen assistance.
“Kat,” I rasp as I fall to my knees at her bedside. When I clamp her hand in mine, I take comfort in the fact that it’s warm. Life moves through her, and that’s all that matters to me. Not money, not clout, not space or time, just the even, steady breathing, the rhythmic beating of her beautiful heart. “I’m sorry. I’m so fucking sorry for everything.”
She squeezes my hand almost imperceptibly, but I’m positive it’s not just my imagination. I rise and pull her into my arms the best I can without disturbing the monitors. I hear her vitals rise by the beeping of the machines, so I release her gently back onto the bed, still keeping my arms wrapped around her.
“I love you, Kat. I’ve loved you with every breath, and I wish we could have done everything differently. I would never have left had I known the horrors that awaited you.” Tears stream down my face unabated, but I’m not ashamed of being overcome by emotion. “I’ll never let you down again, never leave your side. You mean the world to me, and from here on out, it’s you and me forever, for all eternity, if you’ll have me, Katelyn Shaw.”
I’m on my knees again, begging the woman I love for forgiveness.
“Heath, it’s not your fault.” Her voice comes out in a broken whisper, but it’s my Kat and she’s conscious. She’s here, and she’s responding to me.
She clasps both of my hands. I lower my head to her soft belly and melt into the flesh of her abdomen, crying like I did to my mother when I was a small boy.
“I pushed you to leave all those years ago to protect you,” she strains.
“I know, I know, but it’s my job to protectyou, Kat.”
“I didn’t want him to hurt you. I couldn’t live with that. You are my whole heart, Heath. My world. You’ve always been. Money never mattered. I loved you penniless, and I loved you flush. You can do your very worst, and I’ll always love you, no matter what.”
I squeeze her hands and bury my face in her bosom, kissing her neck, her cheek, and her forehead, which registers as clammy and cold. I kiss the tip of her button nose that’s always freckled in the summer sun.
“I’ve loved you to hell and back and I’d do it all again,” she says. She sniffs as tears flow from her soulful blue eyes.
“Nothing in this whole universe would make me happier than sharing my life with you, Kat. Exploring the beach, catching tadpoles, fishing, studying for finals, whatever the fuck you want to do, I’m in. Life is unequivocally better when I experience it with you. I don’t want to live another minute if it hasn’t got you in it.”
Kat cries freely, but her mouth curls into a smile, and her joy is obvious as she cradles my face in her hands. She wipes my tears away with her thumbs, and I return the favor.
“Whenever I think life is unfair, that it’s handed me a raw deal, all I have to do is look at your face, and I remember that I’m the luckiest woman in the whole goddamn world.”
“Look at us, a bunch of crying, lovesick fools,” I say.
“Better to cry over the lost years than to never have a true love that was meant to be.”
I kiss her full pink lips gently, over and over, treasuring their warmth and vitality.
She kisses me back and wraps her arms around my neck, yanking me in close. “Heath, the ocean brought you to me,” she whispers.
I break the seal of her lips with my tongue and she opens beneath me, pulling me under like the swift tide. I love Katelyn Shaw irrevocably, and I’ll gladly drown in the ocean of her love if she’ll have me.
EPILOGUE
Six Years Later…
Heath
My arms are wrappedaround the most precious thing in my universe as we walk, one small step at a time, on unleveled rocks and gravel.
“Can I take this blindfold off?”
I hold her hands firmly against her soft, round stomach, “Two more steps.”
