Chapter 34

Chapter Thirty-Four

Hudson

F or some, when they wake up in the hospital, it takes a moment for the realization to set in. For memories to trickle through the fragile cracks and make themselves known.

Not for me, though. The second I open my eyes, I know exactly where I am and what happened.

I sit up, ignoring the pain that feels like I'm being torn apart and the band that tightens across my chest, making it hard to breathe. But I push through it because I need to get to Starling.

I yank the tubes from my hand and the wires from my chest, ignoring the sudden blaring from the machines beside me as the door swings open and a nurse rushes in, followed by Atlas.

She fusses around me, but I don't hear a word she says; my focus is purely on Atlas.

"Tell me." I hiss out as blackness blurs my vision.

"She's fine. She's in much better shape than you are."

"I need to?—"

"You need to lie the fuck back down, because I'm not telling your wife that you're dead."

My head feels woozy, and when I look at the now quiet nurse, I realize the bitch injected something into my IV—an IV I swear I just yanked out.

I try to fight the effects of whatever she gave me, needing to see Starling with my own two eyes, but I'm fading fast.

I swing my arm out to grab her, but I'm out cold before I can.

When I wake up again, I manage to swing my legs over the side of the bed before the same nurse runs in, this time with an amused Kenzo.

"You know she's just going to keep knocking you out," Kenzo says.

"She touches me again, and I'll return the favor."

"Sir, I will strap you to the bed if necessary. You've just had surgery. You need to rest."

"What I need is my wife," I yell at her, grabbing a bedpan and swinging it like a bat.

She hits a button on the wall, and an alarm starts blaring.

Kenzo smirks and walks out as two more nurses and a doctor walk in, taking in the scene.

"If any of you touch me, I'll kill you. None of you are keeping me from my wife."

"Mr. Smith—" one of them starts as he approaches the bed, his hands held up in surrender.

"Move," Kenzo orders from behind the two standing in the doorway. They step aside, and there she is, asleep in Kenzo's arms, the hospital gown she's wearing showing the curve of her ass.

I drop the bedpan to the floor, my eyes locked on my wife.

"What are you doing? She can't be in here." The original nurse protests, but Kenzo stares her down, making her and the doctor next to her back up.

"Nothing is going to keep him in this bed but Starling. If you strap him down, he'll chew through the fucking restraints to get to her. Now, back the fuck up and let the man see his wife."

He turns to me as I ease myself gingerly across the bed.

"Lay the fuck down," he orders.

I don't argue with him because he has what I want.

Once I'm comfortable, or as comfortable as I'm going to get, he lowers her into my waiting arms and then pulls the blanket around us.

"I will have to report?—"

Kenzo turns around and takes a menacing step forward, chuckling when they all flee.

He moves to shut the door when Atlas's hand stops it. Atlas's eyes sweep the room before landing on Starling.

"Should've known I'd find her here. I nearly had a fucking heart attack when I found her room empty." He glares at Kenzo as he steps inside and closes the door behind him.

"Abbot?"

"That Lewis kid is with him. So is Trix. She flew in with me. Don't look at me like that. You know I don't like being away from her while she's pregnant. She was getting bored in the hotel room so I brought her with me to keep your boy company."

Atlas just shakes his head, looking amused.

"I filled Abbot in on what was going on. He's okay," Kenzo continues.

I blow out a deep breath and almost scream in pain.

"Yeah, maybe don't do that for a while." Kenzo grins.

I look down at Starling and tense when I see the bloody scabs around her mouth and the bruising appearing on the side of her face.

"How is she? What did the doctors say?"

"Since her next of kin was in surgery,"—Kenzo rolls his eyes at me— "we had to get her son to give permission for us to hear everything the doctors had to say."

"Her son?"

"Why, Abbot, of course. I mean, she did marry his daddy. That makes her his stepmom." Kenzo laughs, enjoying this way too much. "It's so fucked up, I love it."

"Kenzo," Atlas sighs as he sits in one of the chairs beside the bed. "The doctors gave her something to help her sleep because she just kept screaming for you."

"Talk about codependence at its finest," Kenzo sighs, like he's any fucking better.

"As you can see, the stitches from her mouth have been removed. Landon had started to do the same to her pussy, but we must have interrupted him. There's a chance of minimal scarring, at least around her mouth, but it should fade eventually."

He pauses as I process what he's saying. A bullet was too fucking quick for Landon. If I'd had the chance, I would have kept him alive until he was nothing but a rotting sack of shit.

"He carved the number fourteen on the inside of her upper thigh. That'll scar, especially since there was already some scarring there, and so will the knife wound in her shoulder. There is a chance of muscle or nerve damage, but right now they aren't sure. But other than some rope burns around her ankle, some bumps and bruises, and a mild concussion, she's fine. Physically, at least. I can't say what the fuck her head's like."

"She'll be okay. I'll make sure of it, even if I have to climb inside her head and fight all her demons for her."

"I don't doubt that for a second. Kenzo's tossed Landon's place and taken anything electronic; the same goes for his office at the law firm. I don't know if he had anything on there that could incriminate you, but I wasn't taking the risk. We had no choice but to bring the police in. It's standard procedure when a firearm is involved, you know that."

"How much do they know?"

"Enough. We had any record of the numbers carved into Starling and Abbot's skin removed and covered with dressings so nobody sees them. I don't want them linked to the other cases. The police aren't any closer to finding the serial killer they were looking for, and now they never will be. With any luck, they'll assume he's been caught or has died. We're playing it off as jealous rage. Landon had a mental breakdown when he found out you married Starling so soon after his mother died. Seeing Starling's mouth stitched shut and you with a literal knife wound in you back, nobody's going to claim anything other than self-defense."

"If it was my bullet that killed him."

"It was. He was already going down when I fired. Not that they're going to find him."

Everyone's quiet for a minute, even Kenzo, as I take it all in.

"You gonna be okay? It's gotta be rough knowing you killed your son, no matter the reason," Kenzo asks, as blunt as ever.

"He touched Starling, made her bleed, fucking terrorized her. I was never going to let him live after that."

Kenzo nods. "Good. What about Abbot?"

I look down at Starling and feel my jealousy warring with my need to make her happy. I know she's pissed at me for ruining her chances of college. I know I've hurt her; that's the whole fucking reason she left and got hurt. But even knowing that, I won't take it back. Especially not now. The thought of her being away from me makes me lose what's left of my mind. It's not fucking happening.

She might hate me forever for taking her future from her, so the least I can do is let her hold on to a little bit of her past.

"She loves him, and he loves her. If I take him from her, she'll take herself from me. I can't risk it. Not again."

"If it helps, what they have isn't the same as what you have," Atlas says, and Kenzo nods. "If they wanted to be together, they would have found a way around you. They could have run far away and lived out their lives together."

"They might love each other, but something was missing for both of them. It's not that hard to see that for Abbot, the relationship was missing dick, and for Kitten, it was missing you."

"That was pretty profound for an asshole."

"Thank you. I'm here all week."

"Hudson?" Starling's whisper has me jerking my head to look at her.

"Welcome back, Birdie."

Her eyes fill with tears, and I curse as I tug her against me, biting my lip as white-hot pain spears through me.

"I'm okay."

She lifts her head and reaches up to cup my face.

"I spent all afternoon thinking of ways to kill you, and then you were dying, and I—" her voice breaks with a sob.

I kiss her forehead and hold her.

"I'm not going anywhere, Birdie. It would take more than death to keep me from you. I love you."

She sucks in a breath, tears in her eyes. "I love you too."

I give her the softest, barely there kiss, not wanting to cause her any more pain but needing to seal our declarations.

Pulling back, she turns her head to look at Atlas and Kenzo.

"Thank you."

"You don't have to thank us, Kitten. It's all part of the badass package we offer," Kenzo says, winking at her.

She shakes her head before looking at me. "Abbot?"

"He's okay. He's recovering down the hall with Trix, Kenzo's better half."

"Wait, Kenzo has a girlfriend? Did you pay her?"

Atlas laughs.

"I didn't need to pay her, thank you very much. My woman is smart. She knows quality when she sees it." Kenzo crosses his arms across his chest.

"No, but seriously, how much did you give her?"

I grin, my eyes drifting closed even as my grip on her tightens.

I listen to her banter with Atlas and Kenzo and feel something ease inside me.

It might take me a while to let her out of my sight, but I knew we'd be okay, and none of it would be because of me. It would be because of my beautifully broken wife, the strongest woman I know.

She's already proven she knows how to dance with monsters and survive. Like fuck will she let Landon be the reason she crumbles now.