Page 175 of Cook

“Keep your ass there,”Iordered this time. I didn’t want to see Cook in pain, or angry, but I couldn’t do this. Not if he was going to get injured again.

Not if I was going to be hurt again. I wasn’t sure I would survive it, not even with Cook at my side. And there was a chance he wouldn’t be. I had almost lost him once. I needed to turn away now before I lost him forever. At least I would know he was alive. That much would keep me going.

“Maddie, come here,” said Cook, laying back in bed and holding his side. He breathed heavily as the machines beeped quickly.

It wasn’t enough to drag the doctors and nurses back into his room like they had done before. He wasn’t that close to dying anymore, but I couldn’t wash my mind of what I’d seen. He was covered in blood. He was pale. Limp. Lifeless. It hadn’t been the man I loved.

“Maddie,” he ordered, jabbing his finger at the bed beside him. “Don’t make me punish you.”

He couldn’t punish me in his condition. It would only hurt him and me more. The world twisted around me, like the earth had fallen off its axis. My knees trembled as I reached toward the door.

“Maddie, where do you think you’re going?” asked Cook.

The machines were almost screaming now.

“Don’t leave me,” he said. “Not after everything.”

I held the door handle and murmured, “I don’t want to leave you.” I doubted he heard me.

“You’ll be safe,” said Cook. “I’ll make sure you’re safe. You don’t need to worry.”

But I worried so much. The day I had just lived through was torture worse than any I’d known before. I had lived through too much pain, but this was the first time that I had ever been worried about another. My heart had been erratic to the point I couldn’t breathe. I had been a zombie, a comatose patient stuck in a hospital where I wasn’t the one in the bed. I was tired and sweaty and cold, and I could barely survive. I didn’t think I would.

“I’ll secure the house,” continued Cook. “We’ll build a fence. Security cameras. Get a dog. Whatever you want to make sure you feel safe—you will be safe.”

I whipped around. “Will I?”

Red covered his cheeks. “Yes. I swear it.”

As much as I wanted to believe him—the words bubbling up that I believed him fully that he would protect me—I shook my head.

“Maddie,” said Cook, voice coming out more as a whine. “Tell me what you want. I don’t know.” He sucked in a deep breath, holding the side of his body. “I know I’m supposed to know. I’m supposed to be the Dom, but I’m floundering here. I don’t know what to say and I’m stuck in this bed, and I’m so fucking sorry for hurting you, and for getting shot. If I could, I would hold you close to me and never allow you to leave. You wouldn’t have gotten out of my arms. You wouldn’t—” He gritted his teeth. “Maddie, tell me. I’ll do anything.”

Anything? I didn’t know if it was enough.

“You’re a good Dom,” I said in a small voice. “You’ve always been so good.”

“Not good enough.” He shook his head. “Not after what I did to you at Serenity—”

“That wasn’t your fault,” I said.

“I should have seen what it was doing to you.” His voice was like gravel, so low and deadly. It rumbled the room like we were caught in an earthquake. “And then there was Massimo. That fucking—”

“You said there would be peace with the Mafia?” I asked, forcing the words forward. They hurt.

“Yes, but it won’t stop me from protecting you.”

“Protecting me means you’re not going to get shot. That you’ll always be there for me. That I don’t have to be scared every time you leave me alone. I thought it was all okay, but now...”

Alarm flashed into Cook’s eyes. “Maddie, I want to give you the world, but I cannot go against my brothers. You haven’t been here for all of it, but the MC bonds are sealed with blood. It’s all I know. War or not, they’re family.”

“I’m not talking about war,” I said, stepping toward him on the bed.

He raised his eyebrows, waiting for me to continue.

“The club,” I said, searching for an explanation. I wasn’t even sure what I wanted.

“Serenity?” he asked, his brows drawn together. “We don’t have to go back there. I’ll burn it down if you want. Maddie, you’ll never have to—”

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