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I chuckled over her lack of words, my eyelids sliding closed. “I know. Don’t bother resisting. It’s futile.”
Soft lips landed on my cheek then lips. Firmer ones brushed my forehead then my mouth.
“Love you,” I murmured, smiling even as darkness tugged on my mind.
“Love you too, baby,” Rhett murmured, his voice close.
“Love her,” I added, feeling myself drifting into content peace.
“I plan on it.”
The best thing about Rhett Stirling? When he decided a course of action, he stuck to it. I didn’t doubt Skylar had one hell of a night ahead of her.
My smile still held in place as sleep claimed me.
43
Rhett
The prognosis couldn’t be better.
We spoke with the doctor after Ash had fallen asleep. No damage had occurred to his pancreas, and no surgery would be necessary.
However, he would be in the hospital for a few days, on antibiotics and an IV for extra fluids. Rest, a bland diet for the foreseeable future, and they expected Ash to be okay.
No more alcohol would be the biggest lifestyle change but more for me than him. I enjoyed wine with dinner but would give it up to do away with the temptation for him altogether.
Whatever Ash needed, he would have.
That included me loving on our angel, giving her the attentiveness she craved and should have had from me all along.
She clung to my hand the entire ride home, surprisingly silent and still. I expected extreme tiredness similar to mine subdued her usual liveliness.
Or perhaps nervousness clammed her up seeing as how she chewed on a fingernail.
“What are you thinking?” I asked.
She turned to face me. “You want my racing thoughts?”
“I wouldn’t ask if I didn’t.”
“Okay. Well…I’m so damn tired but happy. I could sing at the top of my lungs even though it would suck and yet I want to burrow under some blankets and snore for hours on end.”
“You don’t snore.”
That shut her mouth for a few seconds. “I don’t?”
“Nope.”
“Do you hate that I’m in your bed?” she blurted and bit her lip.
“It’s our bed,” I corrected her, flipping the turn signal to take a right. “Ash’s, yours, and mine.”
Silence settled again, and I glanced over. “What?”
“You’re sure about this—really sure? Like there are no reservations lingering somewhere deep inside you that are waiting to leap up and strangle my hope? Because I’m nervous as hell right now. I’m afraid you’ll have another taste of me and shut down again.”
“I’m sorry for what happened that night.” I recalled the feelings that had knocked me on my ass when Ash had been all about her, ignoring the fact I’d been buried balls deep inside her body and offered him my mouth. “I was jealous, plain and simple. I wanted his attention in that moment, and he gave it to you.”