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. . .
River
I parkedin front of the hospital and stepped out of my car. I wasn’t sure what the hell the old man was thinking, getting himself stuck in here for God knows how long. Booze and pills and his high-strung personality would have done the average thirty-year-old in, let alone a fifty-year-old not-so-fit dude. I’m sure his daughter was horrified by the whole thing, seeing as this all stemmed from her father’s ridiculous sex drive.
I hated hospitals, but he was my friend, and this was where I needed to be. Well, if I was being honest, Lionel Rose was more than a friend. He owned Whiskey Falls bar, and we’d grown close over the years. I considered him family at this point.
He’d suffered a stroke recently, and we’d all been devastated by the news.
I took the elevator up and didn’t miss the way the two nurses who stepped onto the elevator were checking me out as I stepped off.
The doors closed, and I made my way down the corridor and into his room.
My friend held his hand up as I approached his bed, and his lips turned up the slightest bit as I gave him one of those half-bro-kind of hugs, before taking the seat beside him.
The monitors beeped excessively, and irritation rose as I tried to ignore the sound.
The faint smell of cafeteria food mixed with the strong antiseptic scent made my stomach turn.
Hospitals were probably my least favorite place to be, which was saying a lot because I’d spent time in plenty of other hellholes in my life.
Apparently, I’d lived at a hospital for six months as a kid, not that I remembered much during that time. But for whatever reason, I associated hospitals with darkness.
Hell, maybe everyone did.
Or maybe it was my subconscious remembering those months, and the fact that I had parents the day that I’d arrived at that hospital, and I didn’t the day I’d left.
Doreen was there too, giving me an update on his condition while Lionel was trying to choke down his lunch. She was a bartender at Whiskey Falls and Lionel’s oldest friend.
“Stop being stubborn and eat this applesauce,” Doreen said. “Ruby is going to be pissed when she gets back if you haven’t finished it.”
Ruby was Lionel’s only child.
His pride and joy.
Though she’d always been a little rough around the edges, I hadn’t seen her in years. I knew that Lionel was supposed to be attending her latest graduation, as she was somewhat of a professional student at this point. Lionel bragged about her often, and I knew she was getting her doctorate in psychology. But obviously, she’d come straight home yesterday when she’d heard about her father.
“Tell River the story that we told Ruby last night so we can all keep things straight.” Lionel’s words slurred, and I tried not to let my face show my concern. The right side of his face was paralyzed, and it made it difficult for him to speak. But all in all, the doctor had said that Lionel had gotten to the hospital just in time, and he was expected to make a full recovery, but it would take some time.
“What story are we talking about?” I sat forward with my brow raised.
Doreen sighed. “He doesn’t want Ruby to know that he was taking all those…stimulants.” She cleared her throat and smirked. “The fact that her father is trying to keep up with the sexual needs of a much younger woman is something he’d rather keep to himself.”
Yes. Lionel had doubled his dose of erectile dysfunction medication for several days because the man could be a real dumbass when he wanted to be.
“What did you tell her?”
Lionel looked at Doreen, waiting for her to fill me in. “We sort of told her that he had a stroke because of the stress from the legal case with Jenna Tate.”
“What? We settled that case a few weeks ago.” I gaped at them.
She handed me a piece of paper. “He had me write out this script to read to her last night.”
I glanced down at the chicken scratch and rolled my eyes. “So, you basically blamed me for your stroke? That’s fucked up, Lionel. Even for you.”
“I didn’t blame you,” he slurred.
