Page 25 of Riding the Line (Steel Saints MC #1)

I woke to the sound of a very annoying beeping.

The unfamiliar room was dark, and I looked around to get my bearings.

Now that I was awake, my whole body ached, and I shuddered as I remembered why.

Daniel, in my apartment. The glint of a knife.

My blood, a shocking red against the grey carpet.

My heart pounded in my chest, and the stupid beeping machine, which I assumed was a heart monitor of sorts, started beeping faster.

I took a few calming breaths, but then I saw Mac and Dalton.

The panic still hummed under my skin, but the sight of them…

it quieted the noise, just for a second.

My boys.

Mac was asleep in a tiny chair by my shoulder, his arm stretched out on the bed with his hand inches from mine.

His head lolled at an awkward angle. He must have fallen asleep while holding my hand, an unexpectedly sweet gesture.

Dalton was in another chair, this one only slightly bigger, by my feet.

His back was to me, and he faced the door like he was on guard duty.

But he had his hand on my ankle, and from his vague outline, I could see that he was reading.

The spine of the book was just about discernible from where I lay.

My heart cracked open when I realized it was the Hemingway stories I’d bought him .

I tried smiling again, but felt my lips crack.

“The world breaks everyone,” I rasped, my voice little more than a breath, “and afterward, many are strong at the broken places . ” I wasn’t even sure he could hear me.

I hadn’t understood everything I’d read, not really—but that line had buried itself in my chest and made a home there.

I hadn’t read it for me. I’d read it for him.

Maybe I hadn’ t understood Hemingway. But I was starting to understand him.

Mac lurched to his feet, immediately adopting a defensive position, while he tried to figure out what had woken him.

I laughed, or tried to. I sounded more like a cat hacking up a hairball, and I found out that laughing hurt like being stabbed all over again.

Dalton came up beside me as Mac leaned over, his eyes desperately searching mine.

I could see the fear and the worry in his dark blue eyes, and both he and his brother were sporting some serious under-eye bags.

Dalton smoothed my hair back from my face, and I leaned into his touch. “There’s our girl. How are you feeling, Vixen?”

Mac pressed a button on the wall. “Someone should be here soon, baby.”

I smiled at him. “Oh, so it’s baby now? Careful, I might start thinking you care about me.”

When neither he nor his brother laughed, I looked between the two of them. They looked about as bad as I felt. Rough stubble lined their jaws, their hair was a mess, and their clothes were rumpled.

I went to sit up and couldn’t stop myself yelping as the wound across my stomach pulled tight. There was an excruciating throbbing across my abdomen as well, and it radiated from my side. Dalton immediately reached for me, a strong hand on my back. Mac grabbed my hand.

“Tell us what you need.”

Oh my God, it hurt unlike anything I had felt before. It made me think of the first time I’d gotten shot. I panted. “Help me sit up, I can’t stand lying down like this.”

Mac sat on the bed next to me, pulling me into his chest and letting me use him for support, while Dalton gathered every pillow he could find and arranged them behind me. With a press of a button, he raised the back half of the bed until it was more chair-like .

Tears blurred my vision by the time I relaxed back into the pillows and I whimpered—despite their gentleness, every small bump just really fucking hurt.

Mac scooted his giant frame further into the small bed, squeezing himself next to me.

I pressed up against his side, and he put his arm around me when I buried my face in his shirt.

Dalton was rubbing my back soothingly and I tried desperately to focus on anything but the agony racking my body.

I didn’t even bother looking up at the knock on the door.

A sweet, female voice said, “Well, good morning everyone. Isn’t this a nice surprise?”

I wanted to tell her that I very much disagreed with her choice of words, but I didn’t dare move.

The throbbing was finally starting to subside, and I was afraid it would come back if I so much as looked at her.

I heard her fiddle around with the machine around me, and then felt her mess with the IV in my hand.

“Alright, I’ve paged the doctor, and he should be here soon—but right now, I need to get some vitals.” The room was dead silent, and I opened one eye to see her looking at Mac expectantly. “Sir, that means you need to move. Please.”

He didn’t, his arm still around my shoulders.

I sighed, wincing as I turned to her. I held my stomach like I could possibly keep a hold on the pain, but the pressure made the knife wound hurt as well.

“It’s alright, I’m okay. Let the nice lady do her job.”

Mac frowned at me, and I did my best to give him a reassuring smile.

He grumbled as he went to go stand by his brother’s side.

The two of them stood at the side of the room in an identical stance—their arms crossed, their legs shoulder-width apart.

My own personal guards. I winked at them, trying to get them to relax. No such luck.

“You have some good friends,” the nurse said, giving me a friendly grin.

She turned on a small overhead light, and opened my shirt to look at my stomach.

There was a neat row of stitches that stretched from one side to the other, another small set on my shoulder and, judging from the itchiness in my leg, probably another set there.

I was Frankenstein’s monster .

“Any itchiness, soreness, fevers, or chills?” I gave her an incredulous look and she patted my knee. “I meant around the suture sites, dear. Any soreness there specifically?” She had clearly been doing this a long time, reading me like a book.

“My leg itches like there’s something crawling in my skin, and my stomach feels tight when I move, but other than that, nothing.”

She nodded. “Good, that’s to be expected.

The itchiness is from your body trying to build new tissue, bridging the gap between one side to the other.

That tightness is just proof that it’s working away.

Now, I’m sure you’re wondering why it feels like someone scooped out your insides with a rusty spoon? ”

“I have a few questions, actually.”

“Absolutely. The doctor is on his way, and he’ll be able to answer everything. Right now, I’m going to go find you a few extra pillows, and something to drink. Just water, for now, until you’re cleared for other fluids. I’ll be right back.”

She shut the door gently behind her, and I looked at the two men who had never taken their eyes off me.

“It was bad, huh?”

Dalton suddenly found the ceiling tiles very interesting, blinking furiously and refusing to look back at me.

Mac’s voice, usually so calm and cool, was ragged as he said, “You died in my arms. Then again on the table. These past three days, watching you fight to live while I could do nothing but… sit here. Just fucking sitting here and praying to a god I barely believe in, hoping you would come back to me.”

I stared at him. “Three days? I was out for three days?”

Before he could respond, the doctor came bustling into the room and flipped on the light, absolutely blinding me. The same nurse from earlier followed, putting a pitcher of water and some pillows on the counter.

“Alright, gentlemen, why don’t you wait in the lobby while I have a talk with my patient?”

They both looked at the doctor, but didn’t budge.

“It’s okay,” I reassured the doctor. “They can stay, I don’t mind.”

The doctor looked between the three of us and sighed. “In that case, let’s get started.”

He walked me through the details of my condition when I got to the hospital, which could be summed in a few words—really, really fucking bad.

As he talked, I ran my hands over my body, noting the bruises that were in the shape of teeth and the wounds that would scar.

More for my collection. I could almost feel the ghost of hateful hands on me.

I started shaking, realizing just how close I had been to dying.

Before he could finish with the whole recovery how-to, I jumped to my feet—or tried to.

I must have blacked out before my feet even hit the ground, because the next thing I knew, I was back in bed.

I don’t know if it was seeing myself in the light for the first time, or the clinical way the doctor spoke, or just the trauma of the whole thing hitting me at once, but I started sobbing.

Each broken gasp for air sent a lightning strike of pain through my entire body, making me cry even harder.

Mac and Dalton were damn near frantic, the doctor yelling at them to calm down, which I’m sure only made it worse.

When Dalton reached for me, I couldn’t help but flinch.

I barely registered the flash of hurt across his face.

Over their shoulders, my eyes met the nurse’s, and with one look, she understood.

“Enough, everyone. All of you, out. Dr. Jaques, respectfully, that includes you. Ms. Moore needs a moment to herself.”

Mac and Dalton protested, but she fixed them with an unwaveringly stern look.

“You may wait in the hallway. Surely you can see all this yelling and hovering isn’t what she needs right now?”

My sobs had dissolved into hiccups, and I was hunched in on myself, trying to pretend the pain away. Mac looked at me, and Dalton took a step back, giving me space.

“Vixen, baby?”

I couldn’t look at them.

“Please, please go.”