Page 63 of Myla: The Hawthornes

“It’s not?” She shook her head. “I mean, I know it’s not.”

“I get you,” I said. “Something’s going down. I don’t know what’s happening because they don’t tell me shit, but if you lookat the guys, you can see it. Did you notice Uncle Mack outside keeping watch?”

“Oh,” she said faintly.

“I’m sure it’ll be fine,” I reassured her. “If Dad didn’t think so, he wouldn’t have even let you get out of the car.”

“Titus talked to Bas yesterday,” she said, chewing the inside of her cheek. “But we hadn’t talked to anyone else before we came.”

“Seriously, no,” I said, crumpling my wrapper into a ball. “I’m sure whatever’s going on is being handled.”

“I wouldn’t have brought Ruthie if—”

“What are you two talking about?” my mom asked, poking her head over my shoulder suspiciously. “You’re over here whispering.”

“I’m not whispering,” I argued.

“Noel looks like she’s going to shit herself.”

I looked at my sweet sister-in-law. She did look a little pale.

“I was just telling her that something is going on that none of the guys are talking about.”

“Something’s always going on that the guys won’t talk about,” my mom said dismissively.

I hummed.

“It’s fine,” Mom told Noel. “They’re just trying to figure out why all of this happened.”

“Richie’s awake,” Titus announced, hurrying toward us. “Cian just texted me.”

“Thank God,” I breathed.

“I’m gonna wake Bas up so he can head over with us.”

“He needs to sleep,” my mom protested.

“He’ll kick my ass if we leave without him,” Titus replied. He tossed me a set of keys. “You guys load up and I’ll be down in a minute.”

I ran back to my room to grab my purse and almost collided with Frankie as she came in the door as I was rushing out.

“Richie’s awake?” she asked, grabbing her purse and Lou’s from the dresser.

“That’s what Cian said.” I paused in the doorway.

“Hallelujah,” she sang, following me outside. “God, what a relief.”

“I know,” I said, hurrying down the stairs to where Lou and Noel were standing next to the Tahoe.

I could have walked to the hospital in less time than it took us to load up and drive over there, but I knew from experience that the men would’ve lost their minds if I’d tried. I’m sure they would’ve tried to make it seem unreasonable for me to walk instead of just saying that they wanted to keep us close, so I didn’t even bother to try it.

The girls were talking and joking as we rode the elevator upstairs. Bas was groggy but relaxed. Titus was smiling. Richie was awake. His family had been waiting for him—Cian, who was ours, had been waiting for him—and now it finally looked like he was on the mend. Our relief was palpable.

We’d made it two steps into the waiting area where Aunt Molly was sitting when I noticed Uncle Will’s expression across the room and my heart sank.

Something was wrong. How could something be wrong? Titus had talked to Cian only a few minutes before. Richie was awake. That was good news. Why did Uncle Will look like he wanted to hit something?

Titus must have noticed what I was seeing. “What’s goin’ on?” he asked in confusion as the doors to the ICU swung open.

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