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“Fine. They’ve got him on IV antibiotics and fluids. He’s got a good dose of morphine in him at the moment to help with the pain. They don’t think the burn is serious enough to need surgery at this point, but they said it depends on how he heals.”
“Can I take Pepper back there with me to see him?”
Norman nodded. “They were about to give him a tetanus shot and unhook his IV when we left, but they’re probably done now.”
Blake put his arm around Pepper’s back and escorted her through the doors and down the hallway to the emergency room suites.
“Have you seen him yet?”
“Yeah,” Blake said. “Ivy and I were the first to get here. We followed Mack. He’s in a lot better shape now, after getting the medicine and having the wounds bandaged. It was pretty rough when he first arrived.”
“He was in a lot of pain?”
Blake nodded, stopping outside room D, which was draped with a closed curtain. “They said that it could be worse. Most of his nerve endings are dead where he was burned. Now he’s just high as a kite. You’ve been warned. I’ll wait out here.” He pulled back the curtain for her to walk in.
Grant was lying in the bed wearing a pale blue hospital gown. His arm was bandaged from his wrist up to his elbow. There was another bandage across his forehead and what seemed like a hundred tiny abrasions all over the rest of the skin she could see. She could feel tears welling in her eyes at the sight of him.
“Hey, Pep,” he said with a weary smile. “Sorry I stood you up for our dinner date.”
“You have a good excuse.” Pepper sat down on the edge of the bed and shook her head. “You look awful. What happened?”
“Apparently I forgot to stop, drop, and roll.” He raised up his arm. “You forget that stuff when you’re knocked unconscious by a Smart car steering wheel flying through the air like a Frisbee. But I saved the dog. That’s the important part, right?”
Pepper scooped up his good hand and gently held it in her lap. “When you use this story to pick up chicks later, you be sure to lead with that. The women will melt.”
Grant frowned at her. “You’re stupid,” he said bluntly.
“Pardon me?”
“Why are you talking about me picking up women? I thought you were my girlfriend. I’m not supposed to pick up women. Unless you’re dumping me. Are you dumping me? It’s a really shitty time to pick, if you are.”
“I’m not dumping you,” Pepper replied, wondering why a part of her was determined to think of this relationship as temporary.
“Good. I want you to take care of me. It would make it more awkward if we broke up first.”
Pepper’s brows went up in surprise. “Me? I figured they’d haul you away to the family mansion and saddle you with a private nurse.”
“That’s probably what they’re wanting to do, but I’m a grown man. I don’t want my mommy hovering over me. I want to go home and I want you to stay with me. Please.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to override your father’s decree. He looked at me like a peasant in the waiting room.”
“He looks at everyone that wa-y-y,” Grant said dismissively with a slight slur to his words. “He’s a big, old, stuck-up snob just like Maddie is. But you want to know something funny?”
“What’s that?”
“As high-and-mighty as he acts, when he cheats on my mother, it’s always with the women he turns his nose up at publicly.”
Pepper’s eyes grew wide at Grant’s morphine-fueled proclamation. Had he really just said what she thought he said? She knew Norman was unfaithful and rumors abounded in the salon, but she always thought he was smart enough to hide it from his family. Was he so arrogant that he’d flaunt it in front of his own children? Torture his wife with his blatant infidelity? Perhaps her mother was lucky to get away from Norman while she could.
“He’s a real bastard,” he muttered.
“Honey, you may want to stop talking until the medicine wears off.”
He shrugged, unconcer
ned about his loose lips. “You’re not the only one with secrets, Pepper. But I can tell you. You’re my girlfriend. That’s like being my lawyer, right? Relationship privilege.”
“Okay, but try to think before you speak when you get around the rest of your family.”
