Page 49 of Some Cowboys Brave the Flames

It was the person seated in the chair to his right that he hadn’t expected.

Mason was asleep, his chin resting on his chest at an awkward angle.

Ash attempted to sit upright, but pain sliced through his muscles again. Dizziness made it impossible to do anything more than lay back on his pillow. It was the middle of the night, based on the dark window.

He turned his head again toward Mason and flinched when he found his friend’s eyes open and staring at him. “Geez,” Ash croaked. “What’s wrong with you?”

“What’s wrong withme?” Fury laced each and every word Mason spoke. “What’s wrong withyou?” He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his legs and dropping his head. His hair was mussed, and it looked as though he hadn’t slept in days. “Do you have any idea…” His voice trailed off, and he shot to his feet.

With one hand on his hip and the other one dragging down his face, Mason paced the small hospital room.

Ash watched him, the trepidation in his body only growing. If Mason was here—the one guy in Ash’s life who likely despised him—then what did that mean for Charlie? Had she been here? Did she know?

Of course she knew. Mason wouldn’tnottell her.

His chest heaved and his pulse accelerated, causing the machine to do the same. “Where’s Charlie?” He didn’t think Mason was capable of sabotaging his relationship with his sister, but he wouldn’t put it past his old friend to nudge Charlie into a position where she wouldn’t be able to cope with what had happened.

Mason froze and glowered at Ash. “She’s at home. Hopefully sleeping. I made Daniel take her back.”

So she’d been here. That thought filled him with joy and worry at the same time. Ash instinctively shrunk back from Mason’s stare. The anger that was carved into his features was from more than simply dating his sister. There was an anguish in them that Ash hadn’t expected to see.

“Do you have any idea how worried we were?” Mason rasped.

Ash couldn’t bring himself to maintain that stare. He looked down at his hands on the white hospital bedding. “I could guess,” he said.

“Apparently you saved someone’s life.”

His head snapped up so hard that a sharp pain erupted in the back of his skull. “Marcus?”

By the look on Mason’s face, Ash knew. His head dropped back on his pillow, and he shut his eyes as he pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes. He’d known Marcus’s condition was bad. Cooper was going to be okay; the tree had only landed on his leg. But Marcus had taken the brunt of it.

Mason’s footsteps approached, but Ash couldn’t look at him, not with the tears slipping from his eyes. He felt his friend’s hand on his shoulder, but Mason didn’t say anything. Marcus was gone. While Ash had been telling the truth that casualties were rare, that didn’t mean they were impossible.

His throat was too raw for him to let out an anguished cry, so he just let the tears slide down his cheeks. Time slipped away until a faint light filtered into the room. At some point, Mason had moved his chair a little closer. Their stilted conversation about the fire and how Mason had found out where Ash had been admitted could only last so long.

The room grew quiet with an awkward sort of heaviness, and Ash knew what was coming next.

Mason sighed and raked a hand through his disheveled hair. “I don’t like what you did, Ash.”

He flinched. Yep. Here it came.

“I will always think it was wrong. There’s no way to rationalize it.”

“I know,” Ash muttered. He felt the same, but that likely didn’t matter to Mason at all.

“But that being said…”

Ash lifted his head to look at Mason with a question in his eyes—and maybe a degree of hope.

Mason shrugged. “You’re always going to be my brother.”

The tightness in Ash’s chest stole the oxygen from his lungs. Even with the tube running to his nose and around his ears, Ash found it hard to breathe. “Thank you,” Ash croaked.

His friend gave him a sharp nod. For a moment it felt like the conversation was over, and then Mason shifted in his seat again. “I will beat you into an early grave if you hurt her, you know.”

A smile tugged at Ash’s lips unbidden. “I wouldn’t expect anything less.” He waited for Mason to look at him again. “How is she?”

Mason’s expression faltered. The peace they’d felt in the quiet room immediately dissipated. He blew out a long breath and fidgeted in his seat, no longer able to get comfortable. “She’s been beside herself.”

---