Page 35 of Wingwoman
“Daisy!” I exclaimed. “What happened with Daisy?”
Josh’s scowl deepened and he looked up at me from his palms. “What the hell do you mean what happened with Daisy? She left for her mechanical bull riding event.”
“Yeah, but did you two—”
A smiling nurse popped her head in, interrupting me. “You’re up,” she said, her voice calm and sweet. Then she looked over to Josh. “Told you she wouldn’t be out for long. We were monitoring her vitals the whole time.” She turned back to me and hitched a thumb over her shoulder toward Josh. “Your fiancé was so worried. I’m going to go grab Dr. Nash and hopefully get you discharged and home in time for dinner.”
My brows jumped at that and I slowly turned my head back to Josh, who was now wincing. “Fiancé?” I asked, my voice strangely calm. “Are you crazy?”
He gestured to the now closed door where the nurse left. “They were only allowing family in the room and to know the updates, I had to tell them something.” Bringing his hand down against his thigh, his palm slapped the denim hard with a satisfying clapping sound.
I gave him a fake smile. “What a thoughtful personal violation.”
“I know, I’m sorry. But I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t have your password to your phone and I had no clue who to call or how to get in touch with your father.”
“But you’reJosh Gabriel. And you just told people that you had a fiancé. What if that gets out?”
“It’s not going to get out.”
“Oh really?”
“Yeah, really.” He pointed back to the door. “That nurse is an idiot. First of all, she had no idea who I was and—”
“Andthatmakes her an idiot?”
“No. What makes her an idiot is the fact thattonsof people fall into comas and don’t wake up, even when their vitals are fine. I should pull my donations from this good-for-nothing hospital—”
“Okay, relax,” I said. The poor guy was obviously stressed and trying to do the right thing, so I guess I could cut him some slack. “You’re not pulling any donations from anywhere. The specs on that would look horrible.” I sighed and eased back down on the bed beside him, closing my eyes against the growing headache. “And you’re right about one thing. Weshouldhave each other’s emergency contacts. Especially if you’re going to make me ride any other evil hellspawn animals…”
His brow arched and he gave me that adorably signature smirk of his. “Does that mean you, Ms. Prada wearing Hope Marcoux-Evans, would consider getting back up on a horse again?”
I bit my lip. “Maybe. If we went slowly and you give me a horse that doesn’t shit for half the ride.” Bowel movements and near-death falls aside, I was actually kind of enjoying my ride. And Gypsy really was a sweet girl. I mean, I had wanted her to keep up with the group because I couldn’t hear a damn thing Daisy and Josh were talking about. But in a weird way, she reminded me of… well, me. Or at least the me that I’ll probably become as an old woman. Grumpy. Stubborn. Hell, who am I kidding? She reminded me of myselfnow.
There was a knock at the door and then an older man with graying hair entered. “Ms. Evans,” he said, smiling. “ I’m Dr. Nash. It’s good to see you up. You gave us quite the scare.” His gaze shifted to Josh quickly, then he added with a tilt of his head, “Some of us more than others. I thought your fiancé was going to try and fire every one of my nurses until they finally let him in here.”
I smiled and nodded, but even that small movement made my pounding head surge with pressure and I winced.
“Easy,” Dr. Nash said. “We’re going to send you home with some good pain management medicine. In the meantime, do you have someone who can stay with you tonight?”
“Yes,” Josh interjected before I could answer. “She can come home with me.”
“Oh, no… that’s okay. I’ll be fine once I get back to my place.”
Dr. Nash pressed his lips together. “Obviously I can’t tell you what to do after you leave here, but if you spend the night alone, it will be against my recommendation. Head injuries are serious and can take a turn very quickly. I would strongly recommend you stay with your fiancé for the night. Or if not him, someone else.”
“Hope,” Josh said gently. “You shouldn’t be alone tonight.”
I sighed. If I didn’t stay with Josh, that only left one other option: my father. That alone wouldn’t be so bad. Except these days, my father also came with Viv and all of Viv’s daughters.
I looked over to Josh who was sitting, awaiting my answer. Even though I knew it was killing him, he was more or less patient while I considered my options.
“Okay,” I finally agreed. “I’ll stay at your place.”
Josh breathed a sigh of relief as Dr. Nash scribbled something onto his clipboard. “Great. We’re just going to run a couple more tests now that you’re awake and then we’ll get you out of here soon.”
I’m pretty sure the word ‘soon’ has a different meaning entirely in the medical field. Two and a half hours later, Josh loaded me into the wheelchair as I glared at him.
“Is this really necessary?” I asked, gesturing to the wheelchair.
