Having Hope (The Blow Hole Boys Book 4) (23 page)

I was having a nightmare. This couldn’t really be happening. Chet wasn’t really being rushed into surgery on the verge of dying. He hadn’t really been hit by a truck and tossed twenty feet away. It wasn’t real. It couldn’t be real.

“Someone tell me what the fuck is going on!” Finn yelled at the group of nurses rushing in and out through a set of doors we weren’t allowed to enter.

An older nurse with gray hair stepped forward and placed her hand on Finn’s arm. He was crazed, his eyes wide with worry and his breathing erratic.

“Sir, please calm down. You’re scaring the other patients.” She smiled sadly. “I promise once we have an update on Mr. Rhodes, I’ll personally come out here and inform you.”

“That’s what the last nurse said an hour ago,” Zeke muttered.

He looked as bad as Finn did, his shoulders stiff as he bit at his nails. Obviously, the boys weren’t taking this well.

We’d been at the hospital for two hours, and still, we hadn’t heard anything. We didn’t know if Chet was dead or alive. We just knew the emergency workers had been doing CPR as they rushed him into the back of an ambulance.

“How you holding up?” Tiny asked, placing his large hands on my shoulders.

I hadn’t really spoken since we arrived at the hospital. I couldn’t. Every time I tried, my words would get stuck in my throat and tears would rush to my eyes.

I couldn’t lose him now. Not when we’d finally come to a conclusion on what we were doing. Not when we’d confessed our love to each other, and definitely not
when we had a child coming into the world.

I hadn’t even had my first appointment yet. I had no idea when the baby was coming. I only knew I wanted Chet there when it happened. I wanted him in my life.

Always.

Finn stood when another rush of hospital workers came rushing through the doors. They strutted past us, laughing as if my world wasn’t crumbling … as if the man I loved wasn’t possibly dead or dying somewhere in the hospital.

“I can’t believe this shit,” Finn growled, falling back into his seat.

He’d already made a call to his wife, and Zeke had called his, as well. As far as I knew, the girls were getting on planes and rushing to South Carolina, children in tow.

“It’s going to be okay, Hope,” Lena said, patting the top of my hand.

I nodded but didn’t look her way.

I was sitting in the most uncomfortable chair known to man, and I had been for two hours. I hadn’t thought to move. Instead, I sat there, staring straight ahead with my hands resting on the arm rests.

I hadn’t cried yet, even though the tears had been pressing against the back of my eyes for hours. I’d spent the last two hours choking on my emotions and feeling like my heart was beating out of my chest.

“The family of Chet Rhodes,” someone called out, and I turned to see a doctor standing at the side of the room reading over a clipboard.

Finn stood and started toward the doctor, and the guys followed. My legs tingled when I stood on shaking knees and started toward the group.

“I’m his brother,” Finn said in a tone that refused argument.

The doctor looked up at Finn from beneath his black-framed glasses and nodded even though I was sure he knew Finn wasn’t Chet’s brother. Chet didn’t have any siblings as far as I knew, and from what I’d heard Finn saying, his parents had left him hanging years before. Finn and the boys really were the closest thing Chet had to a family.

My heart squeezed in my chest just thinking about the family we were growing together.

He needed to be there for that. He needed to see his child and experience a loving family. I wanted it for myself, and I wanted it for him.

“Is he alive?” Zeke asked, not waiting for the doctor to speak.

Again, the doctor nodded. “He is, but it was touch and go. He had
a major brain bleed, and while we were trying to stop the bleeding, we removed a tumor that was partially blocking an artery …”

The doctor continued to speak, but I zoned out at the word tumor. Chet had a tumor.

Had he known he had a tumor?

I would think that if something were in his brain partially blocking an artery, he would have felt it.

“He’s on life support right now, but time will tell whether he’ll pull through and make a full recovery. We really won’t know much until the swelling around his brain goes down. He may never wake up, but if he does, there’s a chance he might be blind or have physical disabilities.”

I stayed glued to the spot even after the doctor left our side.

Chet was in intensive care on life support. He had swelling on his brain, a broken arm, broken ribs, and they’d removed two tumors. He wasn’t going to make it, and everyone around me knew it. No one was saying it, but we all knew Chet wasn’t ever going to wake up.

“Hope?” Finn’s voice broke through my thoughts.

I turned to face him, but I couldn’t speak. I knew once I said anything, the dam would break, and the tears would never stop.

I listened as Finn explained that Chet was aware of the tumors. The doctor had given him six months to live, and Chet wasn’t going to fight.

Until me.

Until the baby.

Because of me, he was scheduling surgery as soon as we got back to California.

Chet’s past actions suddenly started to make sense. His confusion in the hallway in Vegas and the sudden blindness in my room. His back and forth come and go craziness. He was pushing me away because he knew he wasn’t going to live much longer.

It all made sense.

I sat in my chair and finally let the tears escape my eyes. They rushed down my cheeks and slid from my chin. I swiped at them, embarrassed that I was crying in the middle of a group of people, but I couldn’t hold it back any longer.

Chet might never wake up, and I’d barely had the chance to tell him how much he meant to me. I’d only told him once that I loved him, and I wasn’t even sure he’d heard me.

If he woke up, I’d tell him. I’d express my feelings for him so loudly that when I was done, he’d have no doubts in his mind about how I felt about him.

I loved him.

I needed him.

Our baby needed him.

He had to wake up. 

And if he did, and he had any issues whatsoever, I’d take care of him.

*****

A week went by, and I spent every second I could at his bedside. I ate when I could, and I slept slumped over the side of his bed. I got to know the nurses, and they got to know me, finding out at some point that I was expecting. From that point on, they brought me treats and became more like friends.

The rest of the Bad Intentions tour was canceled, and the girls came and visited me as much as they could until it was time for them to fly back to California. I missed them, but I understood that they couldn’t stick around Charleston forever.

Constance stayed behind with Tiny, and every day around lunchtime, they would show up to relieve me so that I could go eat. I wanted someone there at all times in case he woke up, which meant if no one came in, I didn’t leave.

Finn’s wife, Faith, came, and so did Patience, Zeke’s wife, but they didn’t stay long. As far as Finn and Zeke were concerned, they stayed more than anyone else, coming in at all hours since they’d gotten rooms at the closest hotel. The boys loved Chet. They were his family, and I’d be forever grateful to them for being there when I felt like I was seconds away from cracking.

“You need to go eat some dinner,” Finn said, making me jerk. I hadn’t expected anyone so late. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.”

He sat in the chair across the room and stretched out his long legs.

“Any changes?” he asked.

I shook my head.

There hadn’t been any changes from the beginning. It was the same thing all day, every day. The same slow beeping of his heart monitor … the same in and out of the respirator. It was starting to get to me. I was slowly breaking down, even though I knew I needed to be strong for him.

“He’s going to make it out of this, Hope. If you could’ve seen the look on his face when he told me he was going to be a father.” He chuckled sadly to himself. “All I know is there’s no way in hell Chet’s going to miss the birth of his child. He just needs time. His body needs time. Just have faith.”

“I really hope you’re right.” My voice cracked from being unused. “I just got him, Finn. I can’t lose him.”

Finn nodded. “I know, but you won’t. He’s not going anywhere.”

I smiled warmly at Finn, feeling a brotherly connection with him that I’d never experienced with anyone before.

“Go eat. You’re growing a baby in there, girl.” He smiled.

“Okay,” I agreed, standing and stretching my back.

Hospital cafeteria food wasn’t as terrible as everyone claimed. I’d eaten it breakfast, lunch, and dinner for a week. Still, I was getting tired of the same walls.

The same route to eat.

The same everything.

I wanted to run across the street to one of the fast food places, but I was too afraid to leave the hospital.

What if in the few minutes that I was gone he woke up? At least, when I went to the cafeteria, I was still close by. Across the street wasn’t close by. I couldn’t do it.

Another week passed, and Faith and Patience, Finn and Zeke’s wives, took the kids and left for California. It was hard taking care of babies from a hotel room, and even though I knew Finn and Zeke hated to see them go, they stayed behind for Chet.

The guys visited constantly. Friends of Chet’s and Finn’s mom showed up in the waiting room area but weren’t allowed to come inside his room.

Over the weeks, his room filled with flowers of all kinds, their smell filling the room and making the place feel more like home. I watched as they died and were replaced with more.

Fans.

Friends.

Friends who were like family.

Gifts and flowers came from all over the world.

I only wished he could see how loved he was.

I used Finn’s hotel room to shower when I needed to, but it was the only time I left the hospital. And the showers were so fast I never felt completely clean.

The nurses set up a cot in Chet’s room for me, but I still found myself slumped over the side of his bed, only being able to sleep as long as my hand was touching his. After a while, the sounds of his heart monitor and the in and out of his respirator lulled me to sleep.

It was life.

It would be life as long as Chet was in that bed unresponsive.

The doctors weren’t hopeful, but they let us know that anything was possible.

Still, we stood by his side, and we waited. It was all we could do.

*****

Three weeks. That was how long I sat at Chet’s bedside. That was how long I lived out of a suitcase, showering in Finn’s room and eating cafeteria food. Three weeks of lying by his side and hoping with all that I was that he would wake up.

It was the middle of the day, but I’d been so tired from the way I was living and being pregnant that I found I could sleep just about any time of the day as long as I had the blinds in Chet’s room pulled closed.

I considered going to lie down on the cot the nurses had brought in for me, but I didn’t. Instead, I slumped over Chet’s arm, pressing my face against his warm skin, and slowly, I drifted off to sleep.

I didn’t know how long I slept, but I woke to someone softly stroking my hair. I smiled in my sleep, feeling happy for the first time in weeks. But it wasn’t until a single finger moved over my cheek that I realized Finn or Zeke would never touch me so intimately … They would never touch my skin with so much affection.

I sat up, pain shifting down my stiff back, and my eyes connected with Chet’s. He was sitting up, his breathing tube removed, and a weak smile on his face. I wasn’t sure if I was dreaming, but it seemed so real.

His feeble smile.

His glazed eyes.

The fragileness of his fingers as he touched me once again.