Page 42 of Refusing Kendall

I look to the others, because in my manic state I wasn’t really paying attention.

Lucas touches his unhurt leg, “Nah, we lost, man.”

He lets out a deep sigh like he already knew what the answer was going to be, “Damn, that sucks.”

“There’s always next year,” Teagan slips in from his spot at the end of the bed.

Goose snorts softly, “I doubt I’ll be playing next year.”

Standing behind me, Maverick asks the question we all want to know, but also don’t want the answer to, “What did they say about it?”

His hand comes up to scratch at the gown that is straining against his bulk. He opens his eyes and looks back up to me, “Will you help me get this thing off?”

I nod and slip it off his shoulders. The one arm isn’t hard to do, but the one with the IV attached proves a little more difficult. Lucas finds some buttons on the back of the gown and pops them open, so he doesn’t have to fight the IV pole. With his left leg propped up, he’s hardly able to move to help us. Pulling it away from his body shifts the blanket some, and it flashes his goods to everyone in the room. All of us are so used to each other that no one even flinches. Lucas grabs the other side of the thin blanket and helps me pull it back up over his hips. By the time that we’re finished he’s already falling back asleep. Right before he goes under, Goose pulls me to him for a kiss.

Over the next few hours, he only wakes up for short periods of time, but long enough for everyone who stayed to come in for well wishes and thoughts. By midnight the nursing staff is pushing all visitors out the door. They already made an exception and let all of us stay later than we were supposed to.

His overnight nurse comes in and lets us know, none too subtly, that visiting hours are over.

I wait until she leaves the room with a hard sigh before I say, “I’m not leaving him here alone.”

Lucas steps behind the chair I’m sitting in and massages some of the tension out of my shoulders, “He’s got a whole staff of nurses, baby. You need to come home and get some rest.”

I’m shaking my head before he’s even finished, “I’m not leaving him.”

“Ok,” he says, leaning down to kiss the top of my head.

Teagan stretches out on the small loveseat in the corner, “I’ll stay with them.”

“You sure?” Mav asks from where he’s leaning against the windowsill.

“One hundred percent. No worries, boys. I’ll take care of them,” he yawns.

Mav rolls his eyes, “Cause that sounded promising.”

I laugh for the first time today, and Teagan smirks up at him, “Doing my job already.”

That elicits another eye roll from Mav, but he and Lucas drop a kiss on my lips before leaving.

I sleep off and on through the night. Every time Goose wakes up, it has my eyes opening too. Which happens quite often considering the pain meds wear off every few hours. Then again, it’s my own fault. I refuse to take the little sofa with or without Teagan when he tries to coax me over there. I sleep with the top half of my body laid on the bed beside Goose.

When daylight starts to streak in through the window, it really hits me how much sleep I haven’t gotten. I’m cranky, hungry, and could use about a gallon of coffee. I’d do it again in a heartbeat, though.

“Come on, sweets. I’m starved,” Teagan tries for the dozenth time to talk me into going down to the cafeteria.

“Just bring me something back,” I tell him.

He runs his hand through his hair and shakes his head, “No can do. They won’t let us bring it back up here, so just come with me.”

I open my cranky mouth to tell him where he can stick it when Goose interrupts, “Babe, go on. Get breakfast and some coffee before you murder us all.”

Teagan snickers, but we all know it’s true. Leaning down, I press a good, long kiss on him that has him shooting me a sloppy smile. It doesn’t feel right leaving him alone, but he’s already dozing back off before we’re even out the door.

We make it all the way to the elevator before we see the first reporter. They’re probably camped out all over to be the first to get the inside scoop on how Goose is doing. Teagan tows us inside as soon as the door opens, and a man in a long wool coat steps out. I look up to find T staring at the man’s back in confusion.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

His brows are drawn down as he shakes his head, “I don’t know. I just got the weirdest feeling that I knew that guy.”

---