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Her thumb keeps moving and her lips shift into a smile. “So let me get this straight… we’re together, and I’m not to date anyone else now. Or did I screw that up?”
The thought of her dating anyone else causes my gut to tighten. I pull her to me and bruise her lips with a rough, deep kiss and growl, “You got that damn straight; you’re not to date anyone else now.”
Lust clouds her eyes and she bites her swollen bottom lip as she
nods. “Just checking, baby.”
I let her go and take a long breath.
At least one good thing has happened today.
* * *
We sleep for hours and just after ten that night, my phone buzzes.
Dad: I’m taking your mother home to rest. Claudia is asleep and okay but thought you might want to know she’s by herself now.
Me: I’ll head up to the hospital now.
Presley stirs but doesn’t wake fully when I move off the bed. My gaze drops to her body as the sheet shifts, and the sight of her naked breast causes my dick to jerk. I haven’t fucked her since yesterday morning and that’s too long in my opinion, but I’m not going to wake her now because my only goal at the moment is to get to the hospital as fast as I can. I don’t want Claudia to wake up to a room with no one in it.
I dress quickly and let myself out of Presley’s apartment and head downstairs to her car. She told me to borrow it if I woke up, and as I ease into it, I grimace when I hit my head. Small cars and me don’t get along, and Presley’s tiny Mazda needs to go if I’ve got any say in it.
The traffic isn’t too bad, and the fact Presley lives close to the Princess Alexandra hospital means I make it there in around ten minutes. And less than ten minutes after that, I enter Claudia’s room and breathe a sigh of relief when I find her peacefully asleep. Closing the door softly behind me, I make my way to the armchair and drop into it. I’m exhausted with jet lag catching up and little sleep since arriving back in Australia, but my mind is going a million miles an hour and I know I won’t sleep much tonight.
“Why are you here?” Claudia asks as she shifts in the bed to face me. She coughs as she does this and I reach to pass her the glass of water that’s sitting on the table next to her bed. Taking it from me, she says softly, “Thank you, but seriously, why are you not at home sleeping?”
I lean back in my chair and stretch my tired legs out in front of me. “You can’t tell me you wouldn’t be here if the roles were reversed, Princess.” Memories of our childhood before her cancer struck flood my mind; Claudia always looked out for me, even though I was the older one. She always went to battle on my behalf. I remind her of the first one that comes to mind. “Remember that time when you were about seven, and you took the blame for me putting that hole in my bedroom wall?”
She takes a sip of water and passes the glass back to me as she smiles recalling the memory. “You mean the time you were practicing your rockstar moves on your bed? When you were playing air guitar, jumping around like a dickhead and ended up falling against the wall?”
Chuckling, I nod my head. “Yeah, that time.”
“I remember Dad being so mad with me for days over that.”
“But you wouldn’t let me fess up and admit it was me… you always had my back, Princess.”
Fear slices through my chest at the thought of losing her.
I don’t want to contemplate it.
But, fuck…stage four cancer.
I push out of the chair and stand, desperate to force these thoughts out of my mind.
She reaches for my hand and I give it to her. Hell, I’d give her anything she wants. It fucking kills me that I can’t give her the one thing she needs. “Jett.” Her voice is so soft…so kind. Jesus, it’s full of compassion when she shouldn’t be the one giving it. “Look at me, Jett,” she begs, and I give her that, too. It’s dark in her room but there’s a sliver of light falling through the curtain and I can see the sorrow she’s feeling. “I’m sorry.”
Her words threaten to rip my heart out and I struggle for breath. “You have nothing to be sorry for.” My throat dries up and I have to force the words out, but she needs to know the last thing any of us expect is a ‘sorry’.
“I didn’t know… there were no symptoms…” Her chest heaves and her voice cracks as she begins to cry.
I drop my knees to the floor and kneel next to her so our eyes are level. Taking a firm hold of her hand, I say, “You don’t have to explain any of that. This is not your fault and I never want to hear you say that again.”
Tears flow down her cheek as she stares at me, taking in everything I’ve said. “Okay,” she whispers as she tries to wipe the tears away. When she gets herself together, she says, “I like Presley. You did good, big brother.”
I nod. I don’t want to discuss this because I know why she’s bringing it up, and I fight it by changing the subject. “Did you manage to catch up on your studies?”
She frowns. “Why are you asking me that?”
