The Reluctant Romantics Box Set (The Fall, The Mind, The Heart)

“Mom,” I said, terrified as Dean leaned in and rubbed his hand down my back, straining to hear.

“Dallas, I’m at the hospital. You need to come right now.”

“Mom, what is it?”

“It’s Grant. Dallas, he’s been in a terrible accident.” Dread coursed through me, and though I knew the answer to the question, I had to ask. Before I could get the words out, she answered me.

“He’s gone.”

Dallas

Now

I don’t remember the trip to the hospital aside from the fact that Dean murmured words of comfort I wasn’t catching and never let go of my hand. I wanted to tell him that I am not the one who deserved consoling. I knew in the moment my mother told me Grant was gone that I had also just lost a large part of my sister. I held Dean’s hand tightly to me like a lifeline.

When we walked into the hospital lobby, my father greeted us, hugging us both tightly to him. He didn’t bother to hide the tears he was shedding. I saw my mother behind him and pulled from my father’s embrace and ran to her.

“She’s with him. She’s refusing to leave.” She walked quickly to a room, and I followed through the open door without hesitation. Rose was sitting calmly in the corner of an empty room, her hands folded in her lap. I quickly walked over kneeling in front of her. As I feared, the look in her eyes was distant. My little sister, normally so full of life, looked so small.

“They just took him away,” she said absently. “He was so beautiful. I’ve never seen a man so beautiful…have you?”

I shook my head no and waited. I had no idea what to say. I let my tears fall and waited for words that never came. She just fixated on the wall behind me. My mother made her presence known by placing her hand on my shoulder and I gripped it.

“Rose, baby, let’s go home,” she urged.

“But he’s here,” she said adamantly. “I don’t want to leave without him.”

Neither of us said a word as we waited on her. I prayed for the right words, all of them jumbling together in my mind and none of them being the right ones. I watched a wave of calm pass over her and knew it was false. I was just about to speak up when she spoke before me.

“Okay,” she said quickly standing and taking my mother and I both by surprise. “Let’s go.”

We quickly scrambled to her side, but she ripped her arms away. “I can walk!” I cried harder as she moved in front of us, walking past my father’s out stretched arms in the waiting room. When she got to the sliding doors, she stopped suddenly. We all watched as she paused her next step, bracing herself against the door. “No, no, no, no, NO! NO! NO! I can’t leave him here!”

My father ran to her just before she completely lost it and began to collapse. I buried my head in my hands with thoughts of his warm smile and kind eyes replaying over and over.

“I’ll be a good brother, I promise.”

The level of pain I felt in that moment for my sister and her loss had me sagging against Dean, who caught me quickly. I watched my sister fall apart as my father held her to him. He looked up at my mother, completely lost as she looked on, crying right along with her. Paul walked in moments later, seeing the scene unfolding and quickly gripping them both in his embrace, helping to support them as they slowly walked out the doors. We rode back in silence to my parent’s house and sat in the living room as Rose buried her head into my father’s chest and cried silently for hours. My mother gave her a low-grade sedative and when we finally got her asleep, we all hugged tightly and wordlessly and made our way to our bedrooms. I turned to Dean.

“I’m not leaving her. Please call the hospital, also please hav

e Nichols check on Beatrice. You can go home.”

“I’m not leaving. I’ll handle it, but I’m not leaving.”

“It’s Christmas, Dean. Your mother—”

“I’m not leaving. I’ll see her tomorrow.”

“Okay, take the guest room.” He nodded quickly and pulled me into his arms. “I’m here, for whatever you need.”

“It’s whatever she needs,” I corrected as he nodded in agreement. “I love you, Dean.” I pulled him to me and kissed him hard, pulling away only when I was forced to take a breath. He seemed to understand my urgency, kissed me deeply, and then let go to make his way to the guest room. “I’m not going anywhere,” he assured me as he gave me one last soft kiss.

“Never, I won’t let you,” I said as I grabbed his hand, pulled him back to me, and wrapped my arms around him. We stood in the hall for several more minutes until my eyes fell heavy and we parted reluctantly.

I slipped into bed with Rose, noting the pain written across her features even while she slept. I studied her beautiful face and cried silently, lying next to her, replaying the brief time I had seen my sister happier than she had ever been. Her life had been ripped away one week before her wedding. Grant had been struck and crushed by a driver who had fallen asleep behind the wheel and was killed on impact. I couldn’t imagine the gentle giant who I’d spent only a few stolen precious moments with a few short weeks ago not being anything but indestructible. And yet here I lay, staring at the beautiful woman who was supposed to become his wife in only a few short days and she would never know another day with him.

I found the world a cruel, unforgivable place in that moment as I prayed for my sister and the gentle giant who had left his young bride behind.