Page 12 of After All

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So, he’d finally figured out how to get Peyton Wells to come to him.

He just had to get shot.

Scott tried to lift a hand to drag it over his face, but found he was pulling a long tube attached to a needle in the back of his hand as he did it. IV. Right.

He used his other hand, scrubbing it over his stubbled jaw and through his hair. He felt like hell. He wasn’t in pain—the IV was helping with that—but he was groggy and he fucking hated that.

Especially when he was going to have to deal with Peyton. The woman could make a saint lose his shit. And Scott was no saint. Especially considering how much he was enjoying her being bent over, stowing something in the drawer in the cabinets across from his hospital bed.

But the fact that she was here at all made his pulse pound harder than the sweet curve of her ass in those jeans. She’d come back from Baltimore—fucking Baltimore—because of him.

“Hey, Trouble.”

She gasped and whirled, clutching something to her chest. Her brows almost immediately slammed together over the blue eyes that shot sparks that always went straight to Scott’s heart. And other places. Lower. Much lower.

“Damn,” she muttered.

“Whatteryoudoin’?” Fuck. He was slurring. It was the damned pain meds. And the anesthesia that should be wearing off any damned minute. He hated both.

“Honestly? Wishing you were still unconscious.” She tucked her hands behind her back.

Yeah, he had to see what she was holding. “Sorry.” He worked on sitting up more fully in the bed. The head of the bed was propped slightly, but he definitely couldn’t get a good look at her in his position.

He sucked in a quick breath as his leg moved.Fuck. He gritted his teeth and reached for his thigh, moving it with his hand instead of the muscles that had been pierced by the bullet.

“Oh, for God’s sake.” Peyton was at his side a moment later. “Lie still.”

“Wanna siddup.” Scott closed his eyes as his tongue refused to articulate his words again.

“Why?”

“So I can see you.”

He heard her sigh and felt her move in closer. He opened his eyes and found her leaning on the railing by his arm.

“Here. I’m here.”

Her voice was softer now, and Scott wondered if it was the meds that were making her eyes look as if she was actually concerned. Truth be told, there were a few times in the past three years that she probably would have gladly shot him herself. In the leg. Nothing fatal. But still.

“Whaday issit?” he asked.

“Saturday.”

“You were in Baltimore,” he said, grateful that it at least came out as four separate words this time.

“Yeah. I was.”

“When did you come back?”

She sighed. “Last night.”

“Right away?”

“Yes. This is a pretty elaborate way to keep me from going on that date,” she said.

It was almost as if she was teasing him.

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