Page 123 of Theirs for the Holidays

I let out a sigh of relief. All things considered, it could have been much worse.

“Tell her what happened with the bracelet,” Lennox prompts, looking amused.

Dr. Warren smiles. “It would have been easier for the x-ray if we could have cut the leather bracelet he’s wearing, but he was adamant that we couldn’t do that. Even through the drugs.”

“It was a gift,” Rhett says. “I’m keeping it.” He turns his head where it’s propped up on the pillows and smiles at me again.

Dr. Warren chuckles and smiles in my direction as well. I can feel my cheeks flushing, knowing he’s probably guessed correctly that the bracelet was a gift from me.

“I could have gotten you another one,” I murmur.

“No,” Rhett says, shaking his head.

“Don’t do that,” Lennox tells him. “You’re going to scramble your brains even more.”

“If no signs of concussion present in the next hour or so, we’ll be releasing him and you can take him home. I’ll leave you all to visit with him for now.” He withdraws from the room, closing the door behind him.

Sawyer drops into the chair on the other side of the room, and I move closer to the bed.

“How are you feeling?” I ask Rhett, reaching out to touch his good arm.

“Like there’s cotton in my head and bathwater in my veins.”

That startles a laugh out of me. “Bathwater?”

“Mm-hm. It’s warm.”

“That will be the painkillers,” Lennox explains. “It’s very weird when they first hook you up to the IV. But it fades.”

I remember that Lennox has probably been in a hospital like this, when he was first injured.

A strong hand wraps around my wrist, and when I look down, Rhett is tugging at me, trying to get me to sit down on the bed with him. “It’ll help. I already feel better now that you’re here,” he murmurs.

I smile at him and sit down on the bed, reaching up to gently brush some of his shaggy hair out of his face. “Good. Now please, please never do anything like that again. You almost gave me a heart attack.”

“Me too,” Sawyer chimes in. “And I’m too young and beautiful to go out like that.”

“I just don’t want you to get hurt,” I say.

“No promises,” Rhett says. “I don’t want you to get hurt either.”

I should be arguing with him about it, but all I can feel is warm and protected.

39

VIOLET

Rhett is dischargedfrom the hospital a couple of hours later, and we bundle him back up and get him in the jeep to go home. His wrist is splinted, and he’s under strict instructions to try not to move it for the next month.

When we got those instructions, Sawyer snorted and rolled his eyes, giving me a look that said he was already dreading trying to keep Rhett from making his injury worse.

For the moment at least, Rhett isn’t fighting any of it. He lets us drive back to my house and get him set up on the couch. The drugs gradually start wearing off, and the clarity returns to his eyes.

He’s obviously fine, getting back to his old self, but it’s still so hard to get the image of him getting hit by that car out of my head.

It makes me want to be doubly sure he’s fine, and I spend the rest of day doting on him, making tea and fixing him a plate when we order dinner.

Lennox and Sawyer tease me about it, but I can tell they understand why I’m doing it.