A Million Different Ways (Horn Duet 1)

I was in bed. A sandy head was resting on my hand. I tried wiggling my fingers again.

The head moved…Sebastian.

It all came back to me in a tidal wave of thoughts and emotions. Suddenly my head felt like it might explode. A swell of tears pushed up, with them came an acute pain in my head that made it impossible to cry. They seemed to logjam in my throat, unable to go further.

He stirred and looked up, and when our eyes met, my heart stuttered. His face was ravaged with pain, his cheeks hollow, cheekbones sharper in contrast. He had lost weight, too much of it. Dark circles hung under his eyes, and he had about a weeks worth of beard growth on his handsome face. He squeezed his eyes shut, breathing a deep sigh of relief once the thick fan of his lashes lifted again.

I made another half-hearted attempt at wiggling my numb fingers. Realizing what I was trying to do, he began rubbing my hand between his, trying to restore feeling in it. He kissed each finger in between the rubbing. I brushed his sharp cheekbones with my index finger and his jaw flexed, pulsing from tension. I had to touch him––unsure if this was a sick fantasy I was conjuring. Only I wouldn’t be in this much pain if it was a dream.

A strange croaking sound rose up my throat. I licked my dry lips and tried to speak again but earned the same result. His brow creased, his worry palpable. He squeezed my hand.

“Let me get the nurse.” His deep, rough-hewed voice cracked in an attempt to hold in emotion.

I squeezed his fingers and mouthed the word ‘water’––moving anything other than that hurt too much. He got up so quickly that the chair he sat on toppled backwards. The loud sound exploded in my head painfully. As the sound reverberated down the hall, a stout nurse entered in a hurry.

“You’re awake, Miss Sava. Good, I’ll get Dr. Rossetti.”

“She needs water immediately,” he demanded, his tone overly curt.

If I could have smiled then, I would have. My tender, despotic lover. The nurse raised her thin brows at his high handedness. She pinned Sebastian with an icy glare but her expression thawed instantly when her attention returned to me. “I’ll be right back with some ice water, and the doctor,” she announced before she walked out.

I squeezed his fingers again and his gaze, filled with concern, met mine. “How?” I croaked; a small miracle that actual sound came out. A million how’s were caught in my throat. How long have I been here? How did you find me? How’s our baby…

“Let me get you some water first,” he said quietly. “Don’t try to speak yet.” He kissed my hands again before he left my side, and stopped short when the nurse bustled in with a cup and a straw. Sebastian grabbed it from her none too politely. Fiddling with the control button, he elevated my bed, cupped the back of my neck gently and held the straw to my mouth. The nurse thinned her lips and grumbled in French about a sense of entitlement and something that vaguely sounded like ‘American asshole’.

In the middle of unbelievable lethargy and pain, as I watched the two of them jockey for position, I had the overwhelming urge to burst out laughing. I had missed this, missed him…desperately. Everything turned blurry as tears slipped down my face. He scowled, his expression pained, while his eyes, burning brightly, absorbed every detail of me.

“It’s okay, baby. I got you…you’re safe,” he murmured.

I took small sips of water that required more strength than I had. My eyes fluttered shut while he brushed the dampness on my cheeks away with the back of his fingers. I felt his soft kisses on my temple, my eyelids, my lips, assuaging my battered soul. I couldn’t hold on much longer. Just before consciousness slipped away, I remembered the blood. I wanted to open my eyes and ask him but I drifted further into the void. Where nothing existed––except absolute black.

To be continued