Jeremiah (Stud Ranch 5)

Ruth! I screamed, even though I knew it would earn me a beating, even though I knew another woman’s name on my tongue would infuriate her.

Predictably, I felt the tug on my leash.

And then I frowned.

The tug wasn’t coming from the leash around my neck.

The tug was at my hand.

And more than a tug it was a squeeze. But the squeeze was so tight. So tight, a hand holding mine.

Victoria had never once held my hand.

Why couldn’t I open my eyes? Had she blindfolded me? She did sometimes, but usually only during what she called ‘scenes.’

I struggled again to open my eyes. And realized I couldn’t open them because they weighed a thousand pounds. My whole body wasn’t right.

What was going on?

Nothing made sense.

Where was I? It didn’t smell right. Nothing was right, nothing was—

I cracked my eyes the tiniest bit and glaring bright light flooded in, causing me to immediately close them again.

And God, my side hurt. Fuck, it fucking hurt. How had I only just now registered it?

Noise too, there was noise all around me, though it sounded like it was coming through a long tunnel, distorted. Like a bunch of voices were all talking over one another.

And then someone yanked my eyelid open and shined a light in it.

I winced back and the voices got louder. What fresh hell was this? Some sort of medical play Victoria had cooked up with her twisted followers?

“Mr. Walker? Mr. Walker? Can you hear me? Do you know what day it is?”

I blinked or tried to, my eyes crusty, and finally opened them against the light again. Where I was met by a man in a lab coat looking down at me very seriously.

“Mr. Walker, you’ve been involved in an incident. I’m going to check out your vitals quickly.”

I shook my head, still struggling to understand what was happening.

I opened my mouth and tried to ask, but only a croak came out of my desert dry throat.

“Shh, don’t try to talk,” said the man dressed as a doctor. He looked toward the side of the room. “Nurse, can you get him some water. And then let the family know he’s awake?”

Family? Was this really a hospital and not some twisted setup of Victoria’s?

The nurse he’d spoken to, a round woman in her late fifties, came forward with a cup and helped fit the straw in my mouth while the doctor kept talking.

“A bullet was lodged in your abdomen, causing a severe intraperitoneal hemorrhage as well as damage to your liver and intestines. We managed to stop the bleeding just in time and did surgery to repair your damaged liver, and then put you in an induced coma to heal. But two days later you developed peritonitis and we thought we might lose you all over again. In short, you’re a very lucky young man.”

A bullet? What the hell was he talking about?

I awkwardly sucked on the straw, dribbling some down my chin, which the nurse wiped away. I felt like a damn child. I struggled to clear my throat. “Ruth?”

Then I blinked. Reece. I’d meant to ask for Reece, my brother.

But as soon as her name came out of my mouth, I remembered. Not everything—but I remembered I’d gone after her. And then something…something bad had happened.

“Ruth?” I asked again, more urgently, frantic almost. I tried to sit up but was barely able to, my energy was so drained. And the pain in my abdomen roared at the attempt.

“No, no, sit back,” the doctor urged, grabbing my shoulder and pushing me back down. “Nurse, go get his brother.”

I watched the nurse hurry out of the room helplessly. “Ruth,” I managed again before my head collapsed back on the pillow.

I felt woozy, like I was about to pass out again, when I heard voices.

The door opened. “I told you, I’m his fiancée, goddammit. I don’t care if visiting hours are over. He was shot because of me and you are letting me in there. Reece, tell her.”

I knew that voice. A rush of relief so hard hit me that I didn’t fight the goddamn tears that suddenly filled my eyes. She was here. She was safe. Nothing else mattered. I didn’t care how the fuck we’d gotten here.

I heard the harsh slapping of bootheels against linoleum, a quick bang bang bang bang, and then her scent was surrounding me.

Ruth. She hugged my neck and I inhaled her.

Oh my God. Oh fuck. It had all been real.

She was real and she was here and we were safe.

She pulled back long enough to look me in the eyes, our foreheads touching. I met her hazel eyes, still blurry and confused about all that brought us here. But I knew what I wanted, forever and ever.

So I got it across in as few words as possible to spare my still sore throat: “Let’s elope.”