Page 13 of Life Or Death

Your wife.

Every time I hear those two words, the lie burrows deeper into my skin, branding me with something I have no right to claim. Dismissing that feeling, I give him a tight nod and watch as he turns and walks back through the double doors. The moment he’s gone, Tori turns to face me fully, her arms crossing over her chest.

“You’re not staying,” she snaps.

“I am.”

“Lucifer.” My name sounds like a curse in her mouth. “We had a deal. You said you’d let me make the decisions about her care.”

“I’m not making any decisions. I’m just going to sit with her so she’s not alone.” I meet her gaze, and something in my expression must give her pause because she doesn’t fire back immediately. “Go get your daughter, Tori. She needs you. I will call you if anything changes.”

She studies me for a long moment, and I can see the war playing out behind her eyes.

“Fine,” she sighs. “I’ll be back tomorrow as soon as I get Poppy situated.”

She holds my gaze for another beat, then reaches for her purse, slinging it over her shoulder before making her way toward the hallway that leads to the bank of elevators.

Alone, I sink back into the plastic chair, the one that’s been torturing my spine for hours, and I wait. A while later, my phone chimes with a text. I reach into my cut to retrieve it, spotting a text from Dread. His words from earlier ring inside my head as I unlock the screen and open the text.

Dread: Spoke with our friend, the judge, about your situation. Call me.

Those words and what they imply stare back at me like a loaded gun, and as much as I want to dismiss them like I did when he first suggested I marry Jess, I can’t. I took every fucking dollar that man had, and had he not offered it to me, I would’ve taken drastic measures against my club. The kind that finds a president in a pine box or, at the very least, stripped of his patch.

Before I can think better of it, I type out a reply.

I’ll hear you out, but not tonight. She just got out of surgery, and I haven’t seen her yet. Come to the hospital in the morning.

Dread: Copy that.

And keep this shit to yourself.

Dread: So cancel the marriage announcement in the Tribune?

This motherfucker.

I lock the screen and shove the phone back into my pocket without responding. The plastic chair squeaks under me as I lean my head back against the wall and close my eyes. I must doze off because the next thing I know, I’m startled by the sound of someone calling my name.

“Mr. Holland?”

My eyes spring open as I come face-to-face with a nurse I’ve never seen before. Careful not to terrify her like I have the others, I scrub a hand down my face and concentrate on shaking off the fog. “What is it?”

“Your wife has been moved to the ICU. You can go see her now.”

I’m moving before she finishes speaking, my boots eating up the hallway in long, purposeful strides. It takes me a moment to find her room, but I waste no time entering once I do, my gaze instantly moving to the center of the bed where Jess lies. Relief settles over me as I stare at her. She looks so fucking fragile, and yet still so fucking beautiful.

I pull a chair up to her bedside and drop my ass into it. Up close, I can see the faint rise and fall of her chest, the way her lashes rest against her cheeks, the slight part of her lips as she breathes through the tube they’ve got taped to her mouth.

I used to stare at her from across the room, watching as she smiled and chatted with random patrons, wishing I were them. That I was worthy of her attention. The longer I stared at her, the more unhinged my thoughts became. I stopped craving to be the man on the receiving end of her smiles and started wondering what those lips of hers would taste like. Imagining myself claiming her mouth was always a prelude to a laundry list of filthy desires, ones I tried to fulfill with saddle bunnies night after night. It never worked, though.

I was an insatiable bastard.

A man starved for one woman and one woman only.

A ticking fucking time bomb just itching to go off.

My eyes trace every inch of her face. I’ve done a lot of shit in my life that has secured my spot in hell, but marrying her without her consent takes diabolical to another level. Even knowing that, I can’t help but let myself picture it—not realistically, where she wakes up distraught, angry, and wishing she had died in the explosion. Instead, I imagine her sporting a smile that belongs to me as she climbs on the back of my bike, wearing a cut with my property patch on it. Her hair is a mess, and it’s not because of the wind. It’s because I’ve fucked her thoroughly, and when her thighs cradle mine, I rev my engine knowing her panties are still a mess.

Pretty sick thoughts for a man to be having about a woman who is unconscious and fighting for her life. But I don’t feel a lick of shame as I reach for her hand. I trace the lines of her knuckles with my thumb, the way I’ve done a hundred times in the last few days, and then my fingers drift lower until they reach her left ring finger.