I looked to Deacon and flashes of the accident flooded my mind. I winced when I remembered the car exploding, then being in the back of Deacon’s truck.
“I was in a car accident. Deacon saved me.” I shifted my gaze back to Dr. Schneider. “How long have I been out?”
Dr. Schneider glanced at Deacon, then his dark eyes settled on me. “Five days total.”
“Five days?!” I gasped, feeling that dagger-like pain to my head again as I whipped my neck to the side, facing Deacon. “Casper?”
He chuckled. “I admit, it was Sherry who prompted me to remember the little rascal was at home. I was so lost in my worry over you. But he’s just fine. I’ve been checking on him every morning and night.”
“You’ve been here with me the whole time?”
“You didn’t think there was a chance in hell I wasn’t going to be by your side through this, did you?”
My heart stuttered at his admission, but then again, I’d known all along that Deacon was my safe haven. “No, actually,” I laughed.
“That’s my girl.”
Dr. Schneider cleared his throat and Deacon and I looked at him. “Now that you’re awake, there’s some more testing I want to do before I send you home.”
Home.
Yes. That’s exactly where I wanted to be.
And in a lot of ways, I already knew I was home because Deacon was right by my side.
Chapter 30
Charlie
“Charlie! What do you mean you were in a car accident? Are you alright, honey? What happened?” My mother’s shrill voice sang down the line as Deacon drove us home.
“Mom, calm down. I’m fine.”
“Fine?! How can you be fine if you were just released from the hospital?”
I looked at Deacon who gave me a sympathetic shrug of his shoulders. When I’d woken up, he’d told me that his plan was to give me one more day to wake up before he called my parents. He said he didn’t know how to tell them about the accident and hoped he wouldn’t have to explain that I was officially in a coma.
One day shy. That’s how close it had been.
Any longer and my brain injury would have been classified as a coma.
I couldn’t shake the shiver that ran down my spine. Especially when my mind wandered to what might havehappened if Deacon wouldn’t have found me in my car when he did.
“They wouldn’t have released me from the hospital if I wasn’t fine, Mom.”
There was a momentary pause like that fact made her think. “Just tell us what happened, sweetheart,” my dad chimed in—always the calmer voice of reason when my mom was freaking out.
So, I spent nearly the rest of the ride home explaining the accident and telling them how Deacon pulled me from the car right before it exploded.
“He saved you?” My mother’s voice was barely a whisper. “Again?”
I rolled my eyes as Deacon chuckled.
“Mom, you don’t need to give him a bigger head than he already has.”
When Deacon rose an eyebrow at me, I knew his thoughts had strayed to the gutter. I punched him in the arm, and he feigned pain.
“It sounds like you’ve found quite the catch, sweetheart.”