Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 146548 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 733(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 146548 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 733(@200wpm)___ 586(@250wpm)___ 488(@300wpm)
We won’t end here.
9
MAXIMOFF HALE
Anesthesia fogs me, especially after my surgery. I can’t recall how I ended up back at my townhouse. Maybe I apparated or a teleportation power kicked in. I do know that I slept most of the day.
At 7:56 p.m., I’m more coherent, but I’m sweating.
I kick down my orange comforter. A red sling braces my right arm to my chest, mostly secured by a cross-body strap and a wide band velcroed around my upper abdomen.
Noise booms from downstairs. Music mixed with tons of chatter—it echoes off the brick walls of my small attic bedroom, but I’m alone up here.
I sit up more—the room spins three-sixty-degrees. So damn lightheaded. Breathing through my nose, I move to the edge of the bed. My bare feet hit the floorboards, but I don’t stand.
Dear World, you should know this is the worst pain I’ve ever felt. Worst Regards, a pained human.
Every muscle screams at me, sore from the crash. But sharp stabbing radiates in my shoulder.
I’ve broken my ribs before, and I had a minor ankle fracture when I was thirteen, sliced my palm pretty badly on a rock, and I’ve torn my hamstring.
None of those required a metal plate and screws. None of those immobilized me this badly. I want my shirt off, the white fabric drenched in sweat.
So I reach back and try to unwrap the sling’s band. I’m struggling when the door opens.
My mouth falls. “Your hair.”
Farrow subconsciously combs his inked fingers through bleach-white strands which contrast his brown eyebrows. He looks beyond fucking sexy. His Third Eye Blind V-neck molds his muscles and reveals his neck, throat and chest tattoos. Black pants fit snug on his legs and package.
And I’m sitting on the edge of my bed. Sweating my ass off.
But I also notice the concern that grips his eyes while he studies me.
“I just dyed it,” Farrow explains, kicking the door shut and drowning out the downstairs commotion. “You’re breaking a rule.”
“What rule?” I ask as he nears me.
His brows ratchet up. “You’re not supposed to take your sling off for four to six weeks.” Off my confusion, he realizes, “You didn’t hear the post-op instructions.”
I want to combat him, but I’m in too much pain. “A lot is hazy. I gotta get out of this shirt,” I tell my boyfriend, slowly rising to my feet. I’m unsteady—Farrow reaches me, his sturdy hand on my waist.
We’re practically eye level.
“Let me,” he says, his tone like rough sex.
I watch him reach behind my back and detach the band. Gently, he slips the strap off my neck. My pulse thumps, and I’m a billion times hotter.
I’m not even protesting and saying I can do it myself. Right now, I need him.
Farrow helps me take my arms out of my shirt and fills in the hazy pieces of my memory. “You can’t pull, lift, or stretch with your right arm for about eight weeks. Stretch rehab starts after that. In three months, you can add strength exercises.”
Three months.
That seems like forever without full mobility and swimming. Butterfly stroke requires total range of motion on both shoulders.
“Christ,” I mutter, and I try to pull my shirt over my head, my gray drawstring pants low on my hips. “What else did I miss?”
He frees me of my soaked shirt. “You were groggy after you woke up from surgery, and your dad asked you how you were.” Farrow tosses my shirt aside and starts carefully reattaching the band around my bruised abs.
I’m hanging on his every word, and he notices. He’s irritatingly drawing this out.
“What the fuck did I say?” I have to ask.
Farrow is close to laughter. “You told your dad you’re naming your son Batman.”
My eyes pop out of my head. “No I didn’t.” He has to be fucking with me.
“Yeah, you did,” Farrow smiles wide. “Your dad asked you, what son? And you said the one in the Batmobile.”
I blink slowly. “I killed my dad. He’s dead, right? Death by Batman talk.” I’m dying right now because the one time Farrow and I have spoken about our future like marriage and kids—it was last night. When I was lying beside the wreckage. And we haven’t resurfaced what Farrow told me in the rain.
Except my anesthesia-brain decided to talk about a fictional kid named Batman. Of all damn things.
I feel like I’m bathing in a broiler.
“Your dad is alive,” Farrow says easily, “but he said your son sounds like a little prick.”
I nod stiffly. “That’s definitely something my dad would say about a kid named Batman.”
“I think you mean your kid,” he corrects.
“No,” I shake my head. “I wouldn’t name my kid Batman. Can’t be mine.” I attempt to retie my drawstring pants with one hand. They slip way too low on my waist. I struggle to get the job done.