Page 38 of Free Fall

Jesse gave his head a small shake, still out of it. “Sorry, tired,” he muttered, moving into the room like a robot. “It’s not as bad as it seems. We were at a frat party. Zelda was there. She got shit-faced and fell off a table.” He picked at his shirt, his nose wrinkling. “This is her blood. She cracked her head open.”

My body ran cold. “What?” I moved too fast, almost shoving Jesse against the wall to get more information. Zelda was hurt? My gut squeezed. “Tell me.”

Jesse looked at me in fresh surprise, his eyes wide as he slid to the side, releasing himself from my grasp. Shit. He was too calm. I was too worried. He glared at me for a moment, then sighed and frowned, yanking his bloody top over his head, throwing it toward the laundry hamper.

“Head injury,” he repeated, tapping his skull. “I took her to the hospital in her friend’s car. Cole came and got Henry because he’d had too much to drink too… Cole’s still at the hospital, I think. But I… I had to change.” He watched my reaction closely, confused. Tense.

I threw a shirt over my bare chest, yanked some socks onto my feet.

“What are you doing?” Jesse asked, watching me with open curiosity like he was trying to work out my secrets. That look was one his brother usually wore. If you knew them, they were far from identical, but right now it could have been either twin before me.

I sighed, ran my hand through my hair. Needed to breathe. Stay calm. I was going to make sure my best friend was alright, that’s what everyone had to see. I turned to Jesse. “Gonna swap out with Cole, keep Henry company.”

Jesse nodded slowly, looking like he didn’t believe me. “…Okay.”

Zelda was unconscious when I got to the hospital, passed out from the mixture of alcohol and pain medication they’d administered. Her skin was pale and blotchy, make up streamed down her cheeks and her lips bitten and flaky, with dried patches of blood to match her stained bandage. I’d never seen her look so vulnerable. Even in the times we’d fucked and I pushed her further than we expected, she had that resilience. Now she looked weak.

“She’ll be fine,” the doctor was saying when I slipped into her bay, finding Henry and Delilah — looking a bit bleary themselves — nodding along. Cole was nowhere to be seen.

Henry gave me a nod, unsurprised to see me, which I returned, but my eyes were only for Zelda. The urge to scoop her up or stand guard, growling at anyone who looked even a tiny bit nefarious, rushed through me. I wanted to shove Henry and Delilah out of the way and claim her as mine to protect. I shouldn’t have come. But there was nowhere else I’d rather be. I tucked my urges away and focused on my friends.

Henry. I was here for Henry. Best friend duties.Shit.There was no way the look on my face wasn’t obvious, the fierce protectiveness leaking from my fucking eyes.

“She just needs to sleep off the concussion, spend a few days at home, no driving, no heavy machinery. We’ll keep her overnight for monitoring, and when she wakes up, I’ll run a few more checks. I’ll be back with her blood results, too.”

“Thank you,” Henry said to the doctor, standing to shake his hand. “Doctor…?”

“Sterling,” the doctor nodded, looking like he might have something else to say before dipping from the room. He looked as exhausted as I felt. It was past 3am, and I needed a fucking coffee.

“Appreciate you coming,” Henry said, pulling me in for a quick hug. His shoulders slumped.

“Always,” I told him, patting his back. “I can sit with her for a bit if you want to go grab some food or a coffee. Or go home and get changed.” I glanced down at them both, half dressed in pajamas and coats thrown over the top. Delilah winced, plucking at the ratty t-shirt she wore, but Henry managed a chuckle when I gave him a pointed look. They both looked grateful, content with my offer. Their daughter was safe with me.

“Need to find your son and thank him, too. He came and got us when I couldn’t drive. Good guy you have there.”

I almost snorted. Jessemaybe, but Cole was about as far from a good guy as I was.

“And Jesse,” Delilah added, running her hands over her face. “He brought her here.”

“I saw him,” I acknowledged. “He’s gonna be fast asleep by now.”

Delilah nodded, making a clear mental note to find him later.

Reluctant to leave their daughter, it took them another thirty minutes to slump away, promising to be back asap and demanding I call if Zelda woke up. I agreed, shoving them out of the bay with words of them needing a coffee, needing to get dressed. But I was desperate to have her alone. The pounding in my heart told me if I didn’t soon, I was going to do something drastic.

With them gone, I sank into the chair closest to her head and studied every inch of her visible. Unconscious, vulnerable, I cataloged each part of her body from her finger tips to her crown, listing every bump and bruise from her stupid fall. She was lucky. She banged her head up, but she was undamaged otherwise, no broken bones to ruin her talent. Nothing to stop her once she was awake and healed.

She was snoring a little, her head lolled to the side, the bandage coming down almost to her left eye. “Shit, Zel,” I muttered, running my thumb along her jaw. Sometimes I forgot how young she was, how reckless she could be outside of what we had. She threw herself through the air on ribbons, for fuck's sake. But she couldn’t fall off a table without smashing her skull open?

I kissed her on the lips, a quick one, no lingering, I just wanted her for a moment. Her parents weren’t here, I could have her to myself for a second, just pretend she was mine to kiss as I wanted, even in a public place with just a thin curtain protecting us. That it wasn’t disgusting or taboo or twisted. I kissed her lips again, pressing our mouths together and sighing at the feel of her breath on my cheek.

In those quiet moments in the hotels, when she would doze off after an orgasm, before she woke up and realized we were slipping into ‘couply shit’ as she called it, so she’d leave… those were fast becoming my favorite. I wasn’t a sap, but I was sinking for her. I let myself pretend in those moments while she was asleep, like I did now.

Dragging the chair even closer to her head, I sank down, grabbing her hand in mine, kissing each of her knuckles. She was going to be fine. I trusted that exhausted doctor with the frown on his face. There was something unnerving about a happy doctor. Who the fuck could be chipper in a place like this?

As the clock ticked, I let myself imagine a different world, one where I did not need to bury these feelings deep, pretend they didn’t exist. Where falling for this little witch of a woman wouldn’t destroy everything else I’d built. She stirred about thirty minutes after her parents had gone, her eyes flickering open, landing on me, then shutting again right away.

“This is weird,” she muttered, and I laughed. “What the hell is going on?”

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