Beau acted like he had an assigned seat in the waiting room. He sat in the same chair each time we walked in. I glanced over my shoulder to see him staring at the screen on his phone, and for once, I wasn’t irritated that it was in his face; I was grateful he had something to occupy him so, in turn, he would be here to occupy me. The nurse buzzed the doors open to allow me back into the ward, and I made the trip to my dad’s room that seemed all too familiar.

For the first time since I’d gotten here on Friday, when I’d held my dad’s hand and sat next to his bed, I started talking. I had prayed, I had watched him breathe, I had paced the room, but what I’d yet to do was let him know I was here. I probably should have told him about Beau’s wedding catastrophe, or that I’d had a new liner put in the pool, or hell, even told him that I cut my hand. I didn’t do any of those things. He would have given Beau shit for getting wrapped up with a girl like Felicity in the first place, scolded me for spending too much money on a hole in the ground, and worried about whether or not I’d seen the best doctor in town to stitch me up, just before he cussed Farley’s name. He could be rather crotchety at times, and right now, I’d kill to hear any one of those lectures. I also needed to tell my dad how fucking scared I was that he wouldn’t wake up to chew me a new asshole. And that’s what I did.

“If you give up on me, old man, I swear to God, I’ll have some shit put on your headstone about your love of flowers and fairies. You’ll be the laughing stock of the cemetery. I really don’t want to have to do that, so how about you come back to me instead, yeah?”

The beeping on the heart rate monitor quickened noticeably, and I watched it, waiting for someone to come racing in, calling out codes and jumping on his bed with paddles to shock him. But the blip only lasted about a minute, and his thumb twitched in my hand. A smile crept across my lips; the old bastard was laughing at me. He was far too stubborn to die without more fanfare. This had been his trial run—go big or go home. It wasn’t big enough, so he’d go home to Roswell. God wasn’t ready for him yet. I could feel it in my gut. Now I just had to wait it out until he decided to share that secret with the rest of the world.

I left his room, pushed through the doors, and went back into the waiting room with more energy than I’d had in a week. And even though I’d been happy to see Beau glued to that tiny phone screen thirty minutes ago, it ticked me off to find him still playing on it. I couldn’t figure out what the hell he did on that thing. We had the same phone, and mine never held my interest for anywhere near that long.

“Hey, jacksack, wanna go get some coffee?”

Beau didn’t look up. His thumbs flew around the bottom of the screen, and when I peeked over the edge to see what he was doing, I realized he was texting with someone.

“Hang on,” he mumbled.

I stood there for several minutes, waiting for him to get up and follow me. He did neither.

“Do I have to carry you?”

“Masyn called.”

Those two words were almost as monumental as my dad’s rising pulse. My heart leapt into my throat, and my body tensed with anticipation. “And? What’d she say?”

“I didn’t answer it.” He didn’t even look up, just kept pecking his damn fingertips across that fucking screen. “I was in the bathroom.”

Beau’d had a good run. Twenty-two solid years. I hated having to end his life right here, but maybe since we were at a hospital, they might be able to save him when I was done with his cashmere-wearing, seersucker-loving ass.

“What the hell, Beau? We’ve been trying to get in touch with her for the better part of two days, and you couldn’t swipe right to answer while you were standing at a urinal?” Trying to keep my voice lowered took more effort than it should have.

He continued to respond to whoever kept text-bombing him, but I was about to swat the damn thing across the room. “It was number two.”

“Number two? Are you five, Beau? So you were taking a shit. Who cares? You didn’t have to grunt in her ear or strain while you talked.”

“You need to calm down before you end up on the stroke floor and I have to go back and forth between checking on you and your dad.”

Calm down. He wanted me to calm down. I was a nanosecond away from grabbing him by his scrawny neck and suspending him against a wall until he started talking. “Beau, so help me God—”

“Seriously, Lee. Chill out. Who the hell do you think I’m texting?”

“You still haven’t told me what she said.”

A nurse called out to us from across the waiting area. “Guys, I’m going to have to ask you to take that outside.”

As tempting as it was to shoot her the bird—she didn’t deserve it—I shoved my hand in my pocket to still my twitching finger. Instead, I jerked Beau out of the seat with my other hand and dragged him down the hall to the elevator bank.

He ripped his arm out of my grasp and ran his hand through his hair. “She called because she thought I was in the car driving back to Atlanta.”

“Why would she think you were in the car?”

The doors to the elevator opened and a couple stepped out. I moved against the wall, out of the way, and Beau followed. “I wasn’t supposed to leave Harden until today, remember? She thought I was still at home this weekend.”

“And she just hadn’t seen you? On a clear day, you can see from one side of Harden to the other.” It was a slight exaggeration.

“She worked late on Friday and all day yesterday. She said she thought I was with my parents last night, since it was my final night in town and I wasn’t at Sadler’s.”

This was like pulling teeth. “Point, Beau. Get to it.”

“Jesus, you’re impatient today. Here, read it yourself.” He scrolled to the top of the conversation and handed me the phone.

I skimmed through the part he told me about.

Masyn: You lied to me, Beau. I’m not sure who I’m more mad at right now. You, Lee, or myself.

Beau: What’d I lie about?

Masyn: You told me he’d be careful with my heart.

Beau: You really need to call him.

Masyn: You’re kidding, right? He’s in New York. After he promised me he wasn’t going.

Beau: As I recall, you told him he should go.

I reached out and slapped my friend on the chest. “You couldn’t just tell her I wasn’t in New York?”

“Keep reading.”

Beau: Have you listened to your messages?

Masyn: I deleted them. I wasn’t interested in his excuses.

Beau: Masyn, you’re going to regret this.

Masyn: And for the record, I didn’t TELL him to go. In fact, one of the last things he said to me before we left the house Friday was that he’d be home after I got off work.

Masyn: Guess who wasn’t there?

Masyn: Guess what moron sat on his porch for an hour?

Beau: Why didn’t you just use the spare key?

Masyn: Lee wasn’t there, and THIS dumb girl baked in the sun for sixty minutes thinking he’d pull up.

Beau: You could have gone swimming while you waited. Have you seen the new liner he had put in?

This had to be a joke. Not even Beau could be this clueless.

Masyn: Are you defending him? Or avoiding telling me the truth about what’s going on?

Beau: I wouldn’t lie to you…and he doesn’t need defending.

Masyn: Men. You’ll stand together on a sinking ship instead of stepping off on to dry land.

Beau: Was that a metaphor?

Beau: You need to talk to Lee.

Masyn: I have nothing to say.

Beau: Could have fooled me…please scroll up and read all of what you didn’t have to say and rephrase that last response.

Masyn: Have you talked to him?

Beau: Yes.

Masyn: Where the hell is he?

Beau: …hold, please.

The next message was a picture of me standing in front of Beau in the waiting room moments earlier.

Masyn: He’s with YOU?

Beau: I told you that you’d regret it.

Masyn: Where are you guys?

Beau: Atlanta Memorial Hospital.

Masyn: OMG. Why? What’s wrong? Why the hell have you let me ramble on like an idiot?

Beau: So you’d feel foolish and learn to believe in him.

Beau: You need to call him.

“That’s it? She just stopped responding? Did she call you?” I yanked my phone out of my pocket. No missed calls.

“You have my phone in your hand, Lee. Has it rung?” He rolled his eyes and accentuated it with, “Sheesh.”

I tried to call her from my phone, and the damn thing went straight to voicemail. “What the hell? Did she block my number?” I snatched his cell from him again and tried from there. Same thing.

“Maybe her battery died. At least she now knows you’re not with Peyton or in New York. And now the tables have turned in your favor. Enjoy it, Lee. You may never see victory with a woman again. It’s a rare phenomenon, like a unicorn…only you have proof, in writing, of how wrong she was.” He grinned with satisfaction, like the stupid exchange he’d had with her meant something.

“I don’t give a shit about seeing victory.”

“Spoken like a man who hasn’t been beaten into submission by a lady he loves.”

“You’re an idiot. I just want to see her. I don’t want her to think I’d ever choose someone over her. This isn’t a fucking game, Beau.” I shoved the device into his chest, and when he finally took it from me, I yanked open the metal door to the stairs. It clanged shut behind me as I took two steps at a time. I didn’t have a clue where I was going. I just needed to move.

I kept trying to call her, hoping she’d plug in her phone. After countless failed attempts and having stalked around the entire perimeter of the hospital three times, I cooled off enough to deal with my other best friend. Not that I could stay mad at him any more than I could Masyn. He didn’t know how Masyn and I worked without him in the picture—and I didn’t mean in the bedroom. We didn’t communicate this way, and he was playing with her instead of telling her the truth like we were still in high school. It was a huge misunderstanding, which I’d known on Friday, but unless I could talk to her, I couldn’t fix it.

When dinner rolled around, and neither one of us had heard from her, I picked at my food in the cafeteria and looked around, wondering why there wasn’t a bar in the food court. People were stressed at hospitals—alcohol should be a given. Hell, I’d settle for an Amstel Light right now.

Beau apologized again for how he’d handled the text messages. And I finally let him off the hook. Yet even though I’d told him no less than twenty-seven times that it was okay, he couldn’t stop. Once, when we got on the elevator and rode back up to my dad’s floor, he was still yammering about how he’d messed up. I was ready for the day to end. I was going to see my dad one last time before visiting hours were over and we went back to Beau’s.

The elevator doors opened, and before we rounded the corner, I could hear someone arguing at the nurses’ station. But since Beau wouldn’t shut up, I couldn’t make out what the conversation was about. I smacked him, not having heard anything he’d said since the doors had opened, anyhow.

“No…I’m not an immediate relative, but I grew up in his house.”

“Ma’am, I’m sorry. He’s in intensive care. Only immediate family is allowed visitation.”

“I don’t understand. What happened? How long has he been here?”

“I wish I could tell you more, but the patient’s privacy is our second concern—next to their well-being, of course, and—”

“And you think it’s in his best interest not to have people who love him at his side while he goes through…whatever he’s going through?”

The nurses’ station was down the hall and around the corner, so while we could hear what was taking place, neither Beau nor I could see who did the talking. It was difficult to make out the words over the crying and continuous inflection in her voice. The poor girl was hysterical while Nurse Ratched—she was quite the dictator—kept the same indifferent tone she had with me two nights before. Too bad the lady who was here during the day wasn’t the only person allowed to interact with people—she had way better people skills.

Beau slapped my chest and stopped walking, cocking his ear in the direction of the conversation, argument, discussion—whatever it was. “Listen.”

“No, thanks. I’ve been where that poor girl is. I don’t care to relive it, even through someone else’s experience.” I took a step forward, and he grabbed my arm.

“Shut up,” he hissed under his breath, still holding me back.

“If you’d just let me see him…” The girl was on the verge of a full-blown meltdown.

I took off down the hall, not waiting for Beau. My feet practically skid across the floor as I rounded the corner to find Masyn begging the nurse for admittance into my dad’s room. She hadn’t seen me, and I stopped dead in my tracks.

“Masyn.” My deep voice carried across the hall, startling her.

Beau came up seconds after her name passed my lips.

Her dark hair swung around in slow motion when she heard me call out. Her face was swollen, and her eyes were puffy, rimmed red from crying. She didn’t respond. She also didn’t hesitate. Masyn ran toward me and launched herself into my arms. Her legs wrapped around my waist when I picked her up, and the hold she had on my neck threatened to choke the life out of me—at least I’d die in her arms.

I tucked my face into her shoulder and inhaled everything I loved about the way she smelled. The rosemary and mint of her shampoo wrapped me up as tightly as her arms. And the warmth of her tiny frame pressed against me had never been more right. “What are you doing here?”

“I didn’t know. I’m sorry, Lee.” Her voice was muffled, and her tears dampened my shirt.

I set her down and brushed her hair out of her face. The strands stuck to her wet, tear-streaked cheeks. “Why would you think I went to New York?”

She bit her lip and shook her head. Her eyes hadn’t dried completely, and a few random tears hung from her jaw. “Peyton left, and you were gone and…I’m an idiot. I don’t know. I don’t know how to do any of this. I’ve never been in a relationship.” Masyn’s gaze dropped to her feet with her admission, as though she were ashamed or embarrassed by her inexperience.

“There was Alex—” Beau caught my death stare and promptly quit speaking. He jerked his head to the side and pointed over his shoulder with his thumb. “I’ll just be over there if you need me.”

He moved aside as a young couple tried to step around us.

Pinching her chin, I lifted her head. There was nothing she couldn’t share with me, and I never wanted her to hide. Lovingly, I met her eyes and waited.

Her shoulders sagged, but she held my gaze. “I just wish you’d told me you were leaving, then we could have avoided all of this.”

Being angry with my boss wasn’t going to help the situation, but it didn’t change how I felt nor did it soften my tone when I tried to explain. “Farley was supposed to tell you Friday. I left work when I got the phone call.”

“I didn’t see him after lunch. And he wasn’t there yesterday.”

It didn’t matter that we were standing in the middle of a hospital waiting room, I needed to touch her. I couldn’t stop myself from cupping her cheek in my hand, and my heart soared when Masyn leaned into it. “I typed out a text on our way here, but I was pretty frazzled and got distracted.” My chest deflated with the breath I let out. “I never hit send. And then I left my phone in Beau’s car.”

I dropped my hand to my side, realizing all of this sounded like excuses. Yet Masyn didn’t let me retreat. Her hands found my hips, and she pulled my waist flush to her stomach. Now wasn’t the time to get aroused, but I couldn’t help myself. Staring at her warm eyes, I had to restrain myself from capturing her mouth instead of working on my apology.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered.

She raised a hand to my cheek, lifted up onto her toes, and pressed her full, supple lips to mine. It was only a peck, yet it raised the hair on my arms when electricity ran down my spine. Masyn dropped back down, still holding my stare. If her gaze were an ocean, I’d drown in the waves.

I tried to keep any accusation from my voice when I softly asked, “Why haven’t you answered your phone?” I had more questions than I could get out at one time, but bombarding her would only make her feel like she’d done something wrong. Truthfully, neither of us had communicated well, although it started with me.

Her brow drew in, and her nose crinkled. “Before today?”

“No, I pretty well got that message. Why didn’t you answer after you talked to Beau.”

She stepped back a hair to pull her cell out of her back pocket and placed what was left of it in the palm of my hand. It was painfully obvious why she hadn’t been able to receive any calls. The damn thing was almost flat, the guts spilling from the side, and the screen demolished…and dark.

“Do I want to know what happened to it?”

Masyn shook her head and pursed her lips. “Probably not.”

“Why don’t you tell me anyhow?” My tone was playful, as was the expression I tried to give her. With my brows arched, I cocked my head, waiting.

Jesus, she was sinfully hot. From her dark hair to her smoldering eyes, her plump lips to her elegant neck, head to toe, Masyn Porter drove me wild in the best possible ways.

“I was driving while I was texting Beau.” She held up a hand to halt any interruption I might try to interject. “Voice to text, not typing. And I accidentally dropped it out of the window at a red light. When I backed up to get it, I kind of ran over it.”

I chuckled under my breath. It wasn’t funny, nevertheless, I could envision Masyn stopped at a light in Harden and backing over her phone. There was no piece of that puzzle I couldn’t envision, including the expressions on her face. “And what was your plan if you got here and couldn’t find us?” Not that it mattered, she had found us.

Her thin shoulders raised a couple inches and then fell. “I didn’t even know why you were here, but I realized if you were okay and Beau was fine, the only other person you knew in Atlanta was George. And if he was here in the hospital, you’d be back.” Masyn licked her lips, and all I could think about was having them wrapped around parts of my anatomy.

The whoosh of the double doors opening reminded me of where we currently stood and squashed the wet dream forming in my mind. “That’s an awfully big risk to take—wait. How’d you get here?”

Her forehead wrinkled when her nose scrunched. “I drove,” she said as though my question were asinine.

“Your car?”

Her face relaxed, and she rolled her eyes. “Oh my God, don’t start. I haven’t seen you in over two days, and your dad is in the hospital. We don’t need to talk about my car.” She grabbed my hand, putting her back to me, and tugged me across the waiting room and out of the flow of traffic.

I continued to talk even though she couldn’t see me. “It’s not safe. That vehicle isn’t reliable enough to make a three-hour trip.”

She faced me when we reached a bank of chairs, and then smirked and lifted up on her toes to kiss my lips. “That’s why I stopped by your house and got your truck.” Masyn was proud of herself for having warded off my objections before I ever had them.

If it were anyone else, I’d take them out and hang them up by their toes, but Masyn could take everything I owned, and as long as I got her at the end of the day, it didn’t matter. Just having her here for the last five minutes had rejuvenated me.

She sat in the seats I’d spent the last two, mind-numbing days in, and I took up residence next to her. Her breath brushed against my skin, and the heat of her body so close for the taking teased me. Masyn was a distraction I loved to have—especially given our current location—I just couldn’t let my desire get out of control. Being thrown out of the hospital wouldn’t do my dad or me any good.

I leaned back to put a few inches between us and hopefully a little cold air to calm my racing thoughts. “So, you used the spare key to go inside and heist my truck, just not to get out of the sun when you were mad at me?” I didn’t know why I found that so humorous other than being able to picture her pouting on Friday versus her victory today.

She shrugged, refusing to answer the question. “Can I see your dad?” She hadn’t asked what happened. Masyn didn’t care. Her only concern was his well-being, not the details of what brought him here.

My dad was important to me and, therefore, important to her. He’d always loved her, and I think, in a lot of ways, she reminded him of my mom. My old man was gruff, but he had a soft spot for Masyn Porter.

I hated to give up my time with him, but if she wanted to go back to see my dad, I wouldn’t deny her. “Yeah, let’s go talk to the nurse.”

“You mean the she-devil at the desk? No, thank you. She’s scary…and mean.”

I stood and offered Masyn my hand to help her up. Reluctantly, she took it, trusting me and stood. “She’s both. She’s also the only person who can push the button to unlock the doors. She’s the gatekeeper of the CICU.” I pointed to the motorized entrance to the right of the nurses’ station. “And after she barks at you once, she’ll leave you alone. You should be safe now that she’s proven whose turf this is.”

The nurse gave Masyn a visitor’s tag and told her my dad’s room number. Masyn held my hand, and before she let go, I tugged her against my chest to press my lips to her forehead. “Thank you for coming, sweetheart.” I pulled back in order to stare into her eyes when I said three words. “I love you.” It was a vow, even if she didn’t realize it.

Masyn tilted her head up, her lips hovering near mine, and spoke the words I most enjoyed hearing, “I love you, too.”