Surrendering Series Box Set

I left Violet’s office and went back to mine not knowing how I felt. But I went back to work anyway.

~*~*~

Dad never did catch up with me, so I’d have to wait to see him the next day, or call him later. That was probably good, because I could talk to Lucah about what I should and should not discuss.

I counted down the minutes until I could leave. I had everything packed and ready to rocket out the door, and I probably would have punched anyone in the face if they’d come to me with a crisis at five minutes to five.

No one did, and I ran out of the office so fast, people probably thought I was on fire. I paid the cabbie extra to get me to the hospital faster, and he did.

I ended up getting too impatient for the elevator, so I ran up the steps, arriving on Ryder’s floor sweaty and out of breath.

What I found when I walked into Ryder’s room was not what I expected. It was pretty much almost exactly as I left it, only this time Lucah was tuning a guitar, April was fussing over Ryder’s pillows and he was minus a few of the IV lines.

And I nearly crashed into Sloane, who had two trays of coffee.

“Best friend,” I said reaching out to take one of the trays from her.

“Hey, I figured you were going to get here around now. How as work?” Never mind that.

“How is he?” She smiled.

“He’s doing much better. He didn’t try to kill himself, we don’t think. He just took too many pills.” That seemed a little bit too convenient an excuse, and I wasn’t buying it, but I would hold off judgment for now.

“Sunshine,” Lucah said, beaming at me. He didn’t look any more rested, but he seemed a lot more cheerful.

“Where did the guitar come from?” I said, handing out the coffee as Lucah got up to give me a kiss.

“Tate brought it. He had one at home and figured we could use a little music.”

“Kill me, please,” Ryder said from his bed.

“Not today,” April said, making sure his one remaining IV line didn’t have any kinks in it.

“How was work, Miss Clarke? Did you miss me?” Only every other millisecond. No, that was a lie. I’d missed him EVERY second.

“It was not as fun without you. How’s everything here?”

“Pretty much what you’re seeing. Nurses have been in and out, checking and testing.”

“Please kill me,” Ryder said again. “If one more person asks me if I’ve pooped today, I’m going to lose it.” It appeared Ryder wasn’t a model patient, but that didn’t surprise me. Men were horrible when they were invalids.

“Hush,” April said. Sloane came in behind me and Ryder’s eyes went immediately to her. Drawn to her. She wasn’t as spruced up and fabulous as last night, but he didn’t seem to care. And she stared back just as much as she handed out coffee.

There weren’t enough chairs, so I sat in Lucah’s lap, April took the other chair and Sloane sat on the edge of Ryder’s bed and absentmindedly rubbed his feet. He closed his eyes and lay back, moving the bed so he was more horizontal.

“Where’s Tate?” I asked as Lucah took my hair down and ran his fingers through it. It was pretty gross since I hadn’t showered, but he didn’t seem to mind.

“He went home to take care of the girls. He’ll be back tonight. We’re going to switch,” April said, sipping her coffee.

“You don’t need to,” Ryder said in a loud voice, his eyes still closed.

“Or we could leave the girls with the neighbors again . . . ” she trailed off, thinking.

“Or you could just leave, seeing as I have enough babysitters already,” Ryder said again, but everyone continued to ignore him.

“Well, you need babysitters,” Lucah said, picking up the guitar and plucking a string that let out a sound of dissonance. “When was the last time you tuned this thing?” He fiddled with the strings and kept tuning.

“This is hell. I must be dead, because this is hell,” Ryder said. Then he opened his eyes and looked at Sloane. She pretended to be watching Lucah, but I could tell she was paying attention.