Page 11 of Stockman's Stormcloud

‘I’m not dying.’

‘No. But it’s serious, knucklehead.’

‘How serious? I don’t want the doctor’s mumbo jumbo. Give it to me straight. I’ll handle it.’

‘You’ve bruised your ribs.’

‘So what? They always are after a fight. It’s normal.’

Then the doctor with his blond hair got into his peripheral vision, pushing out his view of Nurse Kitty. Was he dating Nurse Kitty? He’d heard doctors and nurses were a thing.

Bree clicked her fingers in his face. ‘Focus for five, Dex.’

‘What?’ He scowled at the redhead, then at the blond doctor.

‘Doc says it’s an occupational hazard. Besides your cauliflower ears, cucumber, the years of abuse have scarred your ribs. And it’s the scarring, and the swelling you suffered from tonight, that is making it harder for you to breathe.’

‘No way.’ He tried to sit up, but Bree pushed him down again, as her words rattled around in his foggy brain.

Thanks to his ribs, it hurt to rake fingers through his hair, wearing an oxygen mask, and on good painkillers. Yet it still hurt to breathe. He just couldn’t get a lung full of air into him, and that light-headed feeling was annoying. ‘Am I going to, um…’ He couldn’t say it.

Bree shook her head, her green eyes firm and full of truth. And he respected her for that. ‘They’re keeping you here in case ofany complications.’

‘What complications?’ He looked to Nurse Kitty, who was the only sunshine in this room of doom and gloom.

‘I don’t want you getting an infection,’ said the doctor. ‘And you’re at risk of your lungs spasming.’

Dex didn’t care about the doctor. He wanted Nurse Kitty’s opinion.

No, he didn’t. Normally he shied away from all things female, he didn’t trust them.

Okay, so he trusted one female, and leaned back into the pillow, preparing for Bree’s brand of brutal truth. ‘Bree?’

‘Scarring tissue on the lungs hinders your ability to breathe properly. It’s why you can’t take a deep breath.’

‘Aw flip.’

‘They’re badly bruised, Dex, and they don’t want your lungs to get infected with all sorts of nasties that will stop you from breathing or you could end up carrying an oxygen tank for the rest of your life. Which means…’

‘Don’t say it, Bree.’ He needed to fight. It’s all he had. It’s who he was. It’s how he made a living, as the outback’s bare-knuckle champion. Sure, it was an illegal sport. So what? He’d won more on the side bets, winning thousands per bout, all from betting on himself to win. Always. ‘I’m not ready to hang up my gloves.’

‘I know you’re not.’ This time, Bree squeezed his upper arm. Loud, brash Bree was being tender. And that scared him more. ‘But the hospital is equipped to help you breathe easier.’

His eyes widened at the tubes, the mask, and the cool compressed air that tasted like he was licking spoons. Yet, he struggled to breathe. The drugs were no longer helping, and it flipping hurt to take one simple teeny tiny inhalation of metallic-tasting air into his lungs that were filled with razor blades. ‘What are they doing?’ Why was he getting worse? Wasn’t the hospital meant to help him?

Alarms started pinging and ringing from the machines that stood around his head.

‘They’re going to knock you out for a bit to control your breathing and they want to put you on a machine, a ventilator, to help you, Dex. I swear it’ll help you.’

‘Bree? Don’t leave me?’ He gripped her hand. The foreign foul taste of fear was like cold metal creeping up the back of his throat. No, it was something else.

He scowled at Nurse Kitty, who’d put something different into his IV line. Sweet Nurse Kitty had betrayed him. It was another cruel lesson on why he could never trust a woman.

But everything got cloudy as his lungs struggled to work. He squeezed Bree’s hand tighter. ‘Promise you won’t leave me?’

‘I’ll be right here, Dex, I promise. Just breathe…’

And his world went black.

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