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The paramedic checks his pupils. “You were also hit in the face. Did you lose consciousness?”
“I don’t think so.” Nash blinks against the light before turning his head toward me. “Xavier?”
“He’s okay. You got Adrian away from him.”
His fingers loosen slightly around mine, and he settles back against the stretcher. Of everything that happened in that ballroom, Xavier is what he needed to ask me about.
The paramedic checks his blood pressure again, and this time I watch his face instead of the monitor. Whatever he sees makes him reach for another bag of fluids, but he tells us we’re almost at the hospital before I can ask.
The ambulance hits a rough section of road, jolting the stretcher hard enough that Nash’s whole body goes rigid. His fingers clamp around mine as a broken sound catches in his throat, and I move closer while the paramedic steadies him and checks the dressing again.
“Fucking hurts.”
“I’m sorry, mo sholas.” I wipe the sweat from his forehead with my thumb. His face has gone pale enough that the bruising along his jaw looks darker now, and when the paramedic starts talking to him again, it takes Nash longer to answer.
He turns his hand beneath mine until our fingers lock together. “I’m tired, Daddy.”
“We’re almost there. Keep talking to me until we are.”
I keep Nash talking while I sit beside him with his hand wrapped in mine. His answers are getting slower, but every few seconds his attention comes back to me, as if he’s checking that I’m still there.
After one of those times, his fingers tighten weakly around mine. “You’re scared.”
There’s no reason to lie to him. He can see it, and right now I don’t have enough control left to hide it, even if I wanted to. “More than I’ve ever been.”
The teasing smile I expect never comes. Nash looks at me for a long moment before admitting quietly, “Me too, Daddy.”
I bring his hand to my mouth and press my lips against his knuckles. “I love you, mo sholas.”
“Love you, Daddy.”
His fingers go slack in mine.
“Nash?”
The paramedic is moving before I finish saying his name. He leans over Nash and calls to him while his partner reaches for the monitor. Nash doesn’t respond when the first man presses hard against his shoulder, and the change inside the ambulance is immediate as both paramedics start talking over each other while working around him.
“What’s happening?”
“His pressure dropped. Sir, I need you to move back.”
I’m forced to release Nash’s hand when one of them reaches across me. The monitor starts alarming, and the paramedic at his side lowers the stretcher flat while the other adjusts the IV and opens the fluids wider.
“Nash.” I lean forward until a hand against my chest stops me. “Nash, open your eyes.”
The ambulance takes a hard turn, throwing me against the restraint as the paramedic reaches for the radio and tells the hospital Nash is now unresponsive. They’re less than two minutes out, but two minutes is too fucking long when Nash is lying three feet away from me and no longer answering anyone.
One of the paramedics puts an oxygen mask over his face and keeps calling his name while checking his pulse. I watch Nash’s chest until I see it rise beneath his ruined shirt.
He’s breathing.
That’s the only thing keeping me in the seat.
The ambulance slows sharply, and the back doors open almost as soon as it stops. The trauma team is already waiting, and the paramedics are telling them Nash lost consciousness less than two minutes ago as they pull the stretcher out.
I’m behind them as soon as they let me move. They rush Nash through the entrance while one of the paramedics continues giving the trauma team his blood pressure, estimated blood loss and everything they did on the way here. I stay as close as I can until a nurse steps in front of me at a set of doors.
“Sir, you have to wait here.”
