Need You Now (Love in Unknown) - By Taylor M. Lunsford Page 0,99

to get you once he’s settled.”

Hands red with Caine’s blood, she tried to find the energy to argue with the other doctor, but she couldn’t. Shock settling in, she knew. One of the nurses led her to the waiting room and forced her to sit down. A little while later, a cup of coffee was pressed into her hands. At some point, Micah showed up, leaving their mother to take care of Jax. That’s when she really broke down.

“It’s okay, squirt. It’s okay.” With her big brother’s arms around her, Mel almost believed that. Intellectually, she knew that Caine’s injury wasn’t fatal, that he would recover. But here in this waiting room, she didn’t get to be the calm, rational doctor. She had to be the scared, worried girlfriend.

“I could have lost him tonight,” she sobbed. “I could have lost him and I never even told him I loved him.”

Another hand joined MIcah’s rubbing soothing circles on her back. Gage. “He knows you love him. Don’t worry about that. Get it all out now so he can see that beautiful smile of yours.”

Mel honestly didn’t know what she would have done without them. The brother of her blood and the brother of her heart. They’d supported her through every major change in her life. Having them with her now made it almost impossible for her not to feel better. All of the worry and pain and uncertainty of the past few months crashed into her. Her chest tightened and loosed with waves of relief. No more crazy phone calls. No more vandalized cars or trashed offices. The only things between her and the man she loved right now were an elevator, a few doctors, and a really big apology. At this point, she’d grovel if she had to, as long as she saw him breathing.

By the time Dr. Jameson came down to the waiting room, she’d stopped the tears, but still hadn’t let go of Gage’s or Micah’s hands. They were keeping her sane. “You can go up and see him. We’ll keep him overnight for observation, but the wound was mostly superficial. Lots of stitches, but he’ll be good as new in a couple weeks.”

She barely registered Gage and Micah thanking Dr. Jameson. All she cared about was seeing Caine. Feeling his pulse beating healthy and strong under her fingers. Some remnants of her doctor self kept her from sprinting through the halls and up the stairs. One of the nurses on the second floor saw her coming and directed her toward the right room. Mel stopped just outside the door and took a breath.

Caine’s big body look so out of place in the narrow hospital bed. An IV drip was attached to the bed of his right arm. A bandage covered his left shoulder and sent a wave of nausea through her. Just a few inches lower and Portia could have got his lungs, his heart, an artery. Mel looked down at her hands, expecting to still see blood. Vaguely, she recalled Micah or Gage wiping them with a wet cloth at some point. Didn’t matter. She still felt the warm stickiness of the blood that had pumped out of Caine from that shoulder. The tang of iron still filled her nose, the familiar scent that she’d thought herself immune to after all these years.

“Stop standing there worrying, sunshine. Trying to rest over here and your brain’s being too damn noisy.” Caine didn’t open his eyes and his voice sounded like it’d been run over gravel, but a smile tugged at his lips.

She walked over to sit on the chair beside his bed. The second she sat down, he took her hand in his right one. The fingers of her free hand rubbed light circles on the pale skin on the inside of his wrist, taking solace in counting the steady beats there. Eventually, his eyes opened, warm and blue and alive. “You okay, sunshine?”

“You were stabbed by your crazy ex-fiancée and you ask if I’m okay?” Mel sniffed, tears stinging the back of her throat again. “I really must look like hell. Probably all red and splotchy.”

Caine shook his head, wincing a little at the movement. A lock of shaggy hair fell in his eyes. “You’re always gorgeous. I’ve just never seen you cry before.”

“Well, being held at gunpoint and seeing the man I love gushing blood is a bit much for even me to handle.” She looked down at their entwined fingers, his big hand so