Lindy.
I bolt up and ignore the pain of whatever just ripped out of my skin. “Lindy,” I call out, and Juliette and Becket come into view. “Where’s Lindy. I need my wife.”
Jules runs a hand over my face. “You need to calm down, Easton. You just ripped out your IV.”
“Where’s my wife?” I ask again, frantic. “Lindy . . .” I yell.
Becks grabs my hand.
The one that’s not splinted.
What the fuck?
“We need you to calm down for a second and hear us, Easton. Take a breath.” Becks refuses to let go of me when I try to wrench free. “Breathe, kid. We need you to calm down for Lindy.”
His words break through to me.
“Why?” I look at him, fucking terrified. “Tell me she’s alive, Becks. I need her to be alive. She has to be alive.”
My eyes burn as tears I haven’t cried since my mom died gather in my eyes. “Please, Becket. Please tell me she’s alive.”
“She’s alive. She’s in surgery now,” he tells me, and I rip out what’s left of the tubes and needles attached to my body.
“Easton.” Juliette stands in front of me. “Stop. You’re hurting yourself.”
A nurse runs in as a machine beeps from somewhere in the room.
I look around like a caged fucking animal.
“Mr. Hayes. You have to sit back down.” She turns away and calls out, “Someone get me help.”
“Get out of my way and take me to my wife.” I try to push past her, not giving a shit that she’s a woman. She’s keeping me from Lindy.
“You’re not going to help your wife if you hurt yourself, son. Sit down. Let me take care of you for ten minutes, and we’ll wheel you down to the private waiting room where the rest of your family is. I’m not going to keep you from her, but I’m not going to let you bleed all over the hospital either.” She grabs a bandage and puts pressure on my unsplinted arm where my IV ripped out.
I lean back against the bed as the room starts to spin.
“Sit down, Mr. Hayes.”
Becket moves around me and eases me down on the bed. “What’s happening, Becks? Why is she in surgery?”
Becket looks to the nurse, whose badge hangs from her pocket saying her name is Helen.
She answers for Becket, “Your wife has internal bleeding. They need to find the cause of the bleed and stop it.”
“You’ll take me to her?”
“Just let me fix you up first. Now sit there and don’t move. I’m going to get you some scrubs to put on.”
Shit. I hadn’t even realized I was in a hospital gown.
The nurse leaves the room, and I close my eyes. “What happened?”
“You were in a car accident,” Jules tells me. “It was bad, but you had front and side airbags. They helped. It could have been so much worse.” Jules wipes her eyes as she cries, and a guy in navy-blue scrubs walks into the room.
“Mr. Hayes?”
“Yes.” My body locks down, preparing for the worst.
“I’m Dr. Midori, your orthopedic surgeon. You have a distal radius fracture in your right forearm, most likely from bracing during your accident. We were able to go in and repair it. You’ll be in a splint for two weeks, while the swelling goes down, then in a cast for another four weeks. Once the cast is off, you’ll be able to work with your team’s physical therapist to get you back on the ice. That should take another four to six weeks. So all in all, you’re looking at about three months before your back on the ice.”
“Doc, I don’t give a fuck about my arm. I need to get to my wife,” I tell him, ready to crawl out of this room if I have to.
Nurse Helen comes back into the room with scrubs and a wheelchair.
“Helen, do you know where Miss Kingston is?” the doctor asks her.
“Hayes,” I whisper. “She’s Mrs. Hayes now. She changed her name last week.”
Dr. Midori nods. “Do you know where Mrs. Hayes is?”
“I do. If you’d all give Mr. Hayes and me the room, I’ll help him get changed and wheel him down to the surgical floor.”
Becket clears his throat. “Is it okay if I help him instead?”
“That’s fine, but don’t let him fall. I’ll be right outside this door.” Helen walks out, and Dr. Midori stares at me.
“You aren’t leaving the hospital, right? We’d like to monitor you overnight.”
“If you can do it from my wife’s bedside, then go for it. But I swear to God, doc. If you don’t get out of my way and let me get to my wife, I’ll go right through you,” I warn him.