Page 20 of Protecting Salvation

Chapter5

The secondshe opened her eyes she knew she was in his arms, his scent washing over her and keeping the panic his words had caused at bay. They were still in the kitchen so she knew it had been a split second. “A brain tumour?”

Her eyes found his worried ones as he lifted her and carried her to the couch, sitting with her in his lap, and wrapping his big arms around her. His forehead pressed against her shoulder as he sucked in a deep breath. “Jesus, sugar, you scared the crap out of me. Don’t do that again.”

“I’m sorry, but I wasn’t the one who dropped a tumour bomb.”

She felt his body move as a chuckle went through him, and he lifted his head. “Oh, I’m sorry, little Miss I’m-a-farmer’s-daughter-I-can-take-it.”

“Well, yeah, but that was when I thought you had something embarrassing like an ingrown toenail or butt acne.”

“You think I might have butt acne? Is that a thing? Because I can assure you, my butt is fine. In fact, it’s so fine it should be on billboards and my feet are a work of art.”

Peyton snorted. “The butt I’ll accept because all the evidence does suggest that you have a very nice butt, but no man’s feet are a work of art.”

“You been checking out my butt, sugar?”

Peyton didn’t even try and deny it, rolling her eyes instead. “Don’t be modest. You own a mirror. You know what you look like.”

“I think you’re trying to make me blush.”

Peyton lifted her hand and stroked his face, a knot forming in her throat as his words hit her again. “A brain tumour?” Her eyes stung and she looked at the ceiling to try and stop the tears as she swallowed.

His hand was gentle as he used two fingers to tilt her chin down so he could look at her. “Don’t cry, Pey.”

“I can’t help it. Do you have a diagnosis?”

He nodded and leaned into the couch with a sigh, and she followed, snuggling her body into his lap and trying to ignore the hard length under her butt cheek.

“Yes. It’s called a Craniopharyngioma. It causes headaches, low blood pressure, and eventually can lead to blindness, but at the moment I only get bouts of blurred vision.”

Her hand traced a pattern on his t-shirt as he spoke and he lifted his hand to cover hers and held on. “Can they operate?”

He blew out a breath and it ruffled the ends of her hair. “It’s complicated. Yes, technically, it’s operable, but it would involve a craniotomy. Which is risky in my case.”

“Yes, but surely the benefits outweigh the risks?”

“Maybe, but it’s not quite as simple as that.”

He paused and she waited for him to gather his thoughts, hoping that just by listening and being here she could be of some help.

“I have a very rare blood group, so rare that they call it golden blood. It makes everything trickier because if I bleed, I could literally bleed to death.”

Peyton held on tighter, wishing that was all it took to fix this very complex issue for him. “Because of my job I don’t exist on any databases, so finding a donor is nigh on impossible.”

She had so many questions whirring around in her brain, but she supposed the simplest was, “How rare?”

“Only fifty in the world, maybe less now. I don’t keep up with the numbers. It’s called golden blood because anyone can receive blood from me no matter their type so it was said to be worth its weight in gold. Basically what golden blood means is that it’s Rh null and lacks all sixty-one proteins found in most cases. Which means if I need blood, I can only get it from someone else who is Rh null as well.”

Peyton was far from stupid so she understood the basics of what he was saying but all the different blood types could be confusing. What this meant was in any given situation where there was a chance of him getting hurt, his chances of dying increased exponentially over other people. Her heart pounded at how many times he’d risked his life for others and it again proved to her just what a good man he was.

“I see, that does make things tricky. Have you spoken to Dr Decker?”

“That’s where I was just before Bein called. She wanted to do a few tests to see if she could help, but honestly, I don’t want to get my hopes up. I’ve been living with this thing in my head for a year trying to figure a way out and I can’t.”

God, this man. “Does anyone else know?”

“They know now. I told them a few weeks back after I passed out and frightened the shit out of them.”