“I’ll send a nurse in to do your stitches,” the doctor said as he scanned my chart. “No allergies? No medical history I should know?”

I shook my head. “Can we just get this done so I can get the hell out of here? I’ve been working all night.”

The doctor nodded with a smirk. “It could be thirty minutes, it could be an hour. Friday nights can be pretty damn busy, and we’re full to the brim. You aren’t the only one who needs stitches courtesy of a broken bottle.”

“The difference being I wasn’t drunk and didn’t do it to myself,” I threw back in annoyance.

Sitting here waiting for someone to come stitch me up really wasn’t the ideal way to spend my Saturday morning. I wanted to go back to the club and fucking sleep.

The doctor laughed as he headed for the door as if what I’d said was a joke. I was being fucking serious.

“I’ll get someone to you as soon as possible,” he called back over his shoulder.

I cursed under my breath, looking down at the massive bandage which covered the lower part of my stomach and hip. My jeans were undone and barely covering the parts they needed to cover, and I had no shirt on. The hospital sheets were itchy against my skin and made strange rustling noises like they were made of damn plastic as opposed to cotton or something similar.

I guess, at least, I didn’t have to wear one of those god-awful gowns that covered your front but left your ass hanging out.

Turning to the side, as gently as possible, I pulled the side table drawer open, searching for the remote to the television. I’d just grasped it in my hand when I felt movement in the air, and my body froze.

There was a soft gasp.

My breath caught in my throat, and I dared myself to look but looking would mean that I wasn’t imagining things. It would mean that the smell of her perfume was real, and I could actually hear her breathing, each breath a little longer and stronger than the last.

I’d just managed to gather the balls to look over, but before I could turn and look her in the eye, there was a delicate body thrown across mine. I coughed, the air in my lungs forced out.

I hadn’t seen her face since she walked out of the prison visitor’s room after telling me I was basically the scum of the fucking earth. And since the talk with Leo and Optimus, I knew precisely fucking why she felt that way.

Was I upset and angry? Yeah, I was.

Right now, though, it seemed like none of that mattered, and for a moment, and I fucking bathed in it. Meyah buried her face in the crook of my neck, tucking her arms around my chest and underneath my body.

I was shocked, looking down at her, the tendrils of her hair falling across my chest. My arms came around her, holding her body against mine in a way I’d only fucking dreamed of for over a month since I let her walk away. No, since I forced her out.

And here she was, hugging me tightly in a hospital bed like nothing had even happened.

“Hey,” I murmured, running my hand up and down her back, and trying to ignore the pain which was shooting through my hip. I knew I didn’t deserve the affection she was giving me, but because I was a selfish fucking asshole, I was going to take it anyway. “I’m fine, you know, it’s just a cut,” I told her softly, slightly confused at why she was acting the way she was.

She refused to move, squeezing me tighter when I tried to pull back so I could see her face.

“Meyah, what’s wrong with you?”

I was starting to get worried now, looking around, wondering if I should try and reach my cell phone and call Leo.

“Camo said you were attacked at X-Rated,” she finally muttered, lifting her face just enough for me to see the chocolate brown color of her eyes. It was smooth and creamy and mesmerized me every single time. There was worry in them this time, she was looking at me like I was on my death bed.

I frowned. “Yes and no. It was just a drunk who decided to be an asshole. Your typical night at X-Rated, except this guy decided he was going to fight his way out with a broken bottle.” The look on her face softened, and her eyes grew a little wider. “What are you even doing here? It’s seven in the morning. When did you get home?”

She licked her lips and pulled back. Reluctantly, I let her go, satisfied when she let her hands linger at my waist. “I got stuck in Dallas. My flight was meant to get in last night, but it got delayed. Uncle Leo picked me up at 5:30 a.m. this morning from the airport. We just got to the clubhouse when Camo and Levi showed up.”

“And I bet Leo was really happy about you coming to the hospital to check on me,” I muttered, knowing while her uncle was rooting for us, her family was really missing her a lot and were desperate to have more than a few fleeting moments with her.

She screwed up her nose, wiggling it like a little mouse. “I told him I was going home to see Mom and Denver.”

“Meyah,” I growled disapprovingly.

She took a step backward, a deep frown creasing her perfect brow. I missed the feel of her hands against my body, the warmth, the softness.

“Don’t,” she warned, poking her finger at me. “I’m sorry for being fucking worried about you, okay? I thought you’d really been hurt. I don’t need you to scold me like I’m a child.”

I tried to sit up in the bed, hating she’d pulled back so far, and I couldn’t reach her. I fucking despised the fact that this was how things were between us now.

She looked like she just wanted to run.

She’d given in to a moment of weakness.

But the moment was done now.

She looked me dead in the eye with confidence that surprised me. Meyah had slowly become more independent and stronger than she was even just six months ago, but there was something in her eyes which told me the time away at college had kicked it up a new level. Her independence really showing through.

She shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. I don’t know why I came here,” she responded, frowning at the wall behind my head.

My body flared with heat, and I ignored the way my injury screamed at me to lay the fuck down. Instead, I sat up and swung my legs over the side of the bed and slipped down onto my feet. “You gonna run away again?”

I saw the instant my words hit her, like a hot poker.

They got just the reaction I was expecting, that I wanted.

I was trying to light that fire, see it burn, have her let loose and just get everything out there. This wasn’t exactly the place I imagined doing it, but I was so fucking done waiting.

“Excuse me?” she questioned, a deep frown in her brow.

I held out my arms. “That’s what you do, isn’t it? I thought we were stronger than that.”

She scoffed loudly and took a menacing step forward. The fire was burning, starting to rage, and she was fucking beautiful. “You thought? Obviously, you didn’t see things the way I saw them. It’s pretty obvious you just thought we were fucking, but here I was thinking we had some kind of relationship where we actually gave a shit about each other, and where we didn’t jump into bed with other people.”

I took her challenge and closed the distance again, getting right into her space. The adrenaline was beginning to flow, the pain leaving my body and being replaced with something stronger.

Meyah didn’t move, she didn’t squirm. She lifted her chin a little higher, the defiance going straight to my fucking cock and making it rock hard. “Since when do you use the term ‘fucking?’” I growled, tilting my head to the side, wondering where the Meyah had gone that I’d had to coerce into telling me she wanted me to fuck her. And now she’s just throwing the word around. “Who the hell are you hanging out with at this fucking fancy college you’re at?”

“So, I’m not allowed to swear now? I’m not allowed to speak like an adult, or call it what it is? We fucked, Ham. How about that?” she challenged, folding her arms across her chest, trying to keep some kind of space between us. She was holding a strong front, but the closer I got, the easier I could see the nervous way she swallowed and the subtle bounce from one foot to the other.

My heart was racing.

“I’ve given you space, let you have your time, but you’re gonna listen to me right now,” I warned, instantly seeing the way the dark tone in my voice affected her body. How she sucked in a sharp little breath and pulled her bottom lip nervously between her teeth. “You are mine.”

I was done fucking around.

Now that I was out, we were going to sort this shit because something needed to change.

I wanted her with me, and the only reason I hadn’t flown to fucking Arizona to get her already was because the court had limited my travel for a month until a few things to do with the case were finalized.

“You gave up your right to claim me when you screwed around with Jess,” she protested, looking down her nose at me defiantly.

“I didn’t screw Jess,” I finally announced as I took another step toward her. That one truth feeling like the world had lifted off my shoulders.

She didn’t move, the both of us frozen on the spot in this standoff.

Meyah was trying to process what I’d just said. Probably arguing with herself in her head, going over the events of that day, wondering if she’d spent the last three months crying and cursing me and feeling like her heart had been shredded into pieces, when I didn’t even do the crime.

“You’re lying,” she finally rasped. “I saw you.”

“No, you didn’t,” I argued, my voice softening. “You never actually saw me, did you?”

She squeezed her eyes shut tightly and shook her head.

I knew she was reliving the moment she thought it was me, grinding and moaning in bed with Jess. It probably felt like a knife to her heart, and a memory that she’d fought to destroy and evict from her brain.

I reached out to her, ready to have her back in my arms, and have all this bullshit done and behind us, but the moment I touched her skin, she slapped my hand away like it was poisonous.

“Don’t!” Raising her hand, she pushed her hair back from her face, gripping a handful of it in her hand. She looked like she was in pain, like she was going to tear her hair out of her head.

I saw the moment the confusion was replaced with anger, and she came at me, her eyes flashing and her hands shoving my chest. I stumbled back, and she rushed forward again. “You let me go through hell. I spent the last few months wondering what the hell was wrong with me, Ham. I spent months wondering why the fuck I wasn’t good enough for you.” She was screaming now, something I knew she’d been waiting to do, but that I don’t think she ever imagined would turn out like this. Just when I thought this would be the moment she’d leap into my arms, said thank God that’s over, and we moved on, instead, all I saw was hurt. More fucking hurt, and it stripped another layer off my soul.

“Why? Why would you do that to me?”

“To protect you,” I fired back. My hand shot out, wrapping around the back of her neck, fingers threading through her hair. She tried to pull away, but I wouldn’t let her. We were going to hash this shit out, and we were going to do it as soon as possible because I needed her. “You saw me, didn’t you? You think I really wanted you to see me broken and bruised? Barely able to fucking move because one of those assholes had taken to my ribs with a steel-capped boot. You think I wanted you to see me like that? You think I wanted those assholes coming after you when they needed to find new ways to break me down?”

The fire remained in her eyes as she stared me down, huffing in and out of her nose as she fought to control the tears. “That was my choice, wasn’t it? Since when do you get to make those kinds of decisions for me?”

I tugged her closer, pressing my forehead against hers. “Since you agreed to be mine.”

She moved in a flash, pulling back, her palm connecting with my cheek and causing it to sting. It blurred my vision for a moment before I was finally able to take a deep breath and focus on her face. Tears streamed down over her cheeks, dripping off her chin and onto the black T-shirt she had on.

“I told you one day that I was all in. That I wouldn’t pick and choose when I wanted you, and when I didn’t. That I would just take you whatever way I could fucking have you because it didn’t matter. As long as we were together.”

The pain in her eyes tore at my chest like a sharp knife just cutting away slowly with each teardrop that slipped down her face.

“You destroyed me. You made me feel worthless. You made the people I love lie to me and exclude me. Why? Because you thought I’d think less of you for not fighting back? Because you thought I would be scared of all-talk-and-no-balls Kent?” She lifted her hands and wiped at her cheeks, leaving them red and rosy. “Do you even know me at all?”

A deep growl resonated in my throat. “You think you were the only one hurt here, Meyah? You broke your fucking promise.”

Her brow pulled together instantly telling me she had no idea what I was talking about. I took a step forward, my face red, my body aching, but ready to let her know what I’d kept in all this time.

“You told me if you were ever second-guessing things, or felt like you couldn’t do it, that you would come to me. That we would work something out. Like you said, together. Instead, you ran. You couldn’t wait to get the fuck away from the club and me.”

“I was upset.”

I forced her to step back pressing her against the wall. “And I wasn’t? Do you know what it felt like to have the woman I love see a flash of something and instantly think the worst of me? For you to so easily believe I could do something so fucking hurtful.”

“Why didn’t you come after me? You should have told me!”

I slammed the palm on the wall beside her head. “I shouldn’t fucking have to!”

So there it was.

We’d laid all our shit on the table.

I knew I’d hurt her.

But now she knew what her actions had done to me.

If there was any way that we could fix what had happened between us, it would be now.

I ran my fingers through my hair. She watched me, her lip trembling. “You know me, Meyah. Stop pretending like you don’t know the kind of man I am. Stop convincing yourself I don’t love you when I have proved time after fucking time I would lay down my shit for you in a second,” I whispered, reaching out to her again and hoping she wouldn’t push me away.

I hooked my hand around her neck and pulled her in, slowly and gently. Our lips found each other and crashed together sending sparks and fireworks into the air around us. It was the only thing I could think of doing because the truth was, at the time, I thought it was the right thing to do. I thought I was protecting her. But I was starting to realize perhaps everyone else had been right. I’d pushed her away, maybe even too far this time.

I screwed it up.

I wanted Meyah back because she was the final piece of my puzzle.

I had the club, I had my brother and sister. All that was left was the perfect Old Lady to stand beside me, to have my back, and be the good in a world where there were times it seemed there was none.

That was Meyah.

There was no doubt, no question in my mind.

It had always been Meyah, but she was right. I’d never given her the chance to prove that.

My stomach was screaming at me to lay the hell down. I knew I was bleeding well through the bandage and could feel the stupid gown sticking to my side. But I continued to swallow every moan that came from her mouth, her hands clinging to my neck like I was her lifeline.

I trailed my lips along her jaw, tugging her head to the side, so I had unobstructed access to her neck.

“Stop,” she protested breathlessly, but her body screamed something completely different.

Moving down her throat, I delighted in the way she swallowed nervously at my touch and fought the urge to push her to her knees, wondering how it would feel if she swallowed like that with my cock down her throat.

“Damn it,” I cursed when she pushed her body forward, her hips with a mind of their own, pressing into mine.

The problem being, she was pressed directly against my open wound.

“Fuck!” I moved my hands, placing them on her hips and gently pushing her back.

She gasped, releasing me instantly, her hands covering her mouth. “Oh my God,” she whispered, looking down at her shirt and noticing the blood had transferred to her top. “Oh, shit.”

“Hello,” an overly happy nurse called from the doorway as she wheeled in the things she would need to stitch me up. “Oh dear, you need to lay down.”

Meyah slowly began to back away. I gritted my teeth, wanting to follow her, but knowing it wouldn’t do either of us any good right now.

“I need to get home before they send out a search party,” she said before running her tongue across her lips and ducking out the door.

The nurse watched on as I continued to glare at the doorway long after Meyah had disappeared.

This wasn’t going to be as easy as I’d imagined.

I knew it wasn’t going to be all sunshine and rainbows. That it wasn’t just going to be a case of apologize, make up, everything be okay. But I’d also been too naive about everything.

I’d done more damage than I ever wanted to. Caused more pain and problems than needed because I was an idiot and a selfish, fucking asshole who was scared of letting his Old Lady see him broken, and who didn’t trust his family to do their part to protect her when I couldn’t.

I’d tried to keep that part from her, but Leo had been right all along.

An Old Lady will see you at your worst, at your fucking breaking point, and she will stand beside you anyway. She will help you stand. She will fight for you if she needs to.

But I never gave Meyah that chance.

I was going to have to fight for her.

And I wouldn’t give up until I won.