LOCKE

LOCKE

Set in the days after the HGV accident, exploring how it impacted everyone who loves Nash and Cam so much. Once again, SO MANY DMs about this.

I had it in my head that the nurse would lead us to the same room I'd found my brother in last Christmas. The private post-surgical beds at the back of the building. But Nash wasn't a firefighter. The hospital staff didn't give much of a shit that he was our hero and they'd stuck him on a ward of curtained beds.

Alexei spent the night here? It seemed as unthinkable as everything else that had happened in the last twenty-four hours, but as we finally reached Nash's bed and found Alexei kicking back in a ripped plastic chair, it wasn't as weird as I'd thought it might be.

Nash was asleep, reclined on his back, face tipped slightly to one side, as if he'd been engaged with Alexei when he'd knocked out.

His bare arms were bruised.

His face cut.

His left leg cocooned in a cast.

Ow . Emotion burned my chest. I stopped at the foot of the bed, letting Orla rush forward and lay her hands on him, giving myself a fuckin' moment that Alexei acknowledged with a subtle nod, silent and still, until he noticed Orla struggling and rose to comfort her, reaching across the bed to grip her wrist. "He is all right. Ten minutes ago he was wide awake."

Orla took a shaky breath.

I moved closer—close enough that she'd feel my presence behind her. "He's going to be tired, queenie. It was a long fuckin' night."

"And he was awake for most of it." Genuine bemusement cinched Alexei's brows. "Talking about sandwiches. Is this normal for Irish men? I have not noticed it before."

Eyes damp, Orla laughed. "He ate six Greggs sausage rolls after he had his appendix out. Then he slept for a week."

Dryness bled from Alexei's gaze. "I missed the sleeping part."

"Was he in a lot of pain?"

"I do not think so. Nash is very strong, koroleva. You know this. And he is sensible when Rubi isn't around to talk him into trouble. He will do what he needs to be okay."

Orla went back to examining every inch of Nash's face, combing her fingers through his hair. I'd expected more blood to be encrusted in his blond curls, half the motorway surface to be embedded in his skin, but he was tidier than when he'd spent a day in the garage.

"Locke?"

I shifted my gaze. Alexei inclined his head to the curtains around the bed.

We stepped away, keeping Orla and Nash in our line of sight and moving to the end of the short corridor.

"You are okay?" Alexei asked me.

"Me?"

"Yes, Mishka, you . It was a stressful night."

"For everyone. Not just me."

"Everyone is not here."

Technically, almost everyone we knew was queuing up outside to see Nash, but I didn't want to waste Alexei's time arguing with him. He hadn't seen Cam yet, and it had to be killing him.

"I'm all right. Being around my brother helped. I'd have been a lot messier if he hadn't been here."

Alexei nodded. "I have not seen your brother, but Nash told me what he did for him. He is just like you, no?"

"Not really. I'm the bargain basement twin."

"You speak as if I don't know you, Mishka, but I am too tired to argue with you."

I gave Alexei a little more of my focus. Even after a nasty bout of the fuckin' bends, I'd never heard him admit to me or anyone else that he was fatigued, but as I took him in, the signs were there. Heavy eyes. Grey tinge to his already pale skin. And the way he'd propped himself against the wall. "When did you last sleep?"

Alexei ignored me, choosing to poke at his phone instead. "I would like to take Cam home. Do you think you could let him see Nash for a moment first? Maybe Rubi too, if we can persuade him to come inside?"

"You're asking me?"

"Is up to you, Locke. I am very fond of Rubi, but I would find it hard to leave my loves for his sake."

And I would have to leave, cos this hospital had rules. Two visitors per patient and only during official visiting hours. Which begged the question. "How are you here and none of these fuckers have noticed?"

Alexei shrugged, straightening off the wall. "It is a skill to make yourself invisible. I am thankful you do not need it anymore."

He walked away, his departure abrupt enough that my gaze followed him for the split second it took for everything on Nash's bed to change. And I felt that shift before I swung my head back in the right direction.

He's awake .

Almost.

His eyes weren't open yet, but I could tell.

I closed the distance between me and the bed in two long strides, taking my place at his other side, by his obliterated leg. I'd spent weeks surrounded by the scent of phantom blood. It wasn't all in my head anymore—it was Nash's blood. But for Orla's sake, I tempered my reaction. Made myself take a deeper breath and deal with it.

Nash moved his hand. Fingers first, flexing. His eyes were slower to rise, tongue snaking out to wet his dry lips. I had to remind myself that he wasn't waking up from a fuckin' coma. That he'd been awake and apparently talking most of the night. But man , waiting for those baby blues to crack open damn near killed me.

"Nash?" Orla's voice was barely a whisper—a throaty fuckin' whisper that usually got my blood zipping. But my heart pumped now for reasons that had nothing to do with how many times I could make her come before Nash fucked her. "Come on, honey. Wake up."

Nash swallowed, a rough sound breaching his throat. Then, finally , his eyes opened, and I just so happened to be the first thing he saw. "Locke?"

"I'm here." I found his hand. "Orls is too."

Blinking, Nash turned his head, awareness creeping in the longer his eyes were open, and I saw the moment he realised Orla was right fuckin' there. Heard the first unguarded words that fell from his mouth. "You're so pretty."

Orla laughed. "I'd say the same, sweetheart, but you kinda look like you got dragged under a lorry."

My heart stuttered.

Nash just grinned, sleepy and chill. "You don't like the clothes?"

The hospital gown. The paper bracelet around his wrist. The temporary cast swaddling his shattered leg. Goddamn, the emotion I'd walked in with snarled up my throat again, threatening the calm I'd brought with me from the sanctuary of Logan's house.

I rubbed my chest with my spare hand.

"Hey." Nash gripped my wrist, stealing my stability to sit up. "Don't cry. Everything's okay."

"I'm not fuckin' crying." I swiped at my wet face. "You two are just too damn cute."

Nash's fucked up leg lay between us. Somehow he hugged me anyway, and his solid warmth in my arms did me in.

Was I crying?

Probably.

It took me a minute to compose myself. Nash's scent was home, but I still smelled blood on his skin. Concrete. Exhaust fumes. Iodine from the surgery. "I love you. I'm so fuckin' sorry this happened."

"Oh no, you don't." Nash squeezed me tighter. "None of that. I'd have ripped the damn leg off and thrown it at God for your kids. It's just how it is."

"And I'll be grateful to you till the day I fuckin' die. I know you don't need to hear that, but I need to say it or it'll eat me alive."

Nash thumbed the tears from my cheeks, not arguing.

I held his gaze for the longest moment, my heart cracking another wound that would never heal, then I eased him back down, the ache in my chest already fading. "They give you enough pain relief?"

"Morphine pump." Nash gestured vaguely over his head. "I like it."

"What about food? You need more sandwiches?"

"Hmm?"

Orla messed with his pillow. "You don't remember terrorising Alexei all night?"

Nash frowned. Then he shrugged. "He made me a playlist to shut me up."

"He did?" Intrigued, Orla leaned closer, and whatever Nash wanted to say next was swallowed by however he felt as he stared at her.

Her hair was piled on top of her head. He swiped the band holding it together, pure happiness lighting his face as her raven waves tumbled over her shoulders and he repeated the first thought he'd had when he'd seen her just minutes ago. "You're so pretty."

More laughter. More healing.

Alexei had left his random phone behind and I watched them bend their necks over the screen, studying the downloaded music like it was the bible or some shit. Or the window to Alexei's fuckin' soul. And to them it was.

Music.

Food.

Love.

Life with these two was never boring, but I was coming to realise that maybe it was simple.

Orla wound up lying on the bed with him while I stood guard over his fucked up leg, reminding him to take more morphine before the pain caught up with the last dose, and eagle-eyed the time. We had until noon before the ward shut down for a couple of hours, but we weren't the only ones who needed to see with their own eyes that Nash was okay.

I found my phone in the depths of the jeans I'd swiped from Logan. Tapped out a message to the council group chat.

Locke: orla's not leaving him. whoever comes next is one at a time

My phone blew up with responses. Off his nut on opiates, Nash didn't notice.

Orla did. "Who's that?"

"Everyone we've ever fuckin' met."

I flashed her the screen. She fixed me with a tired glare. "You're not leaving him either."

"Hmm?" Nash jerked his head up. "What? Don't go."

I rubbed his shoulder through the soft hospital gown. "I'm not going anywhere right now. But Cam needs to see you before Saint and Alexei take him home. For his sake, not business."

Nash was enjoying his morphine buzz, but no high in the world would ever get the better of his colossal empathy for everyone lucky enough that he loved them.

The subtext reached him. He took a slow breath and nodded. "What about Rubes?"

"Same, but he's still a bit angsty over the whole thing. Lo said he can get some sleep at the house while the boys are at school."

"Where's River?"

"He went back this morning to open the garage."

Nash's brow furrowed, logistics clicking through his tired brain. Then something else. An emotion that descended into a deeper frown. "I'm sorry your brother's meeting us like this."

"Like what? Like a fuckin' family pulling together in a crisis?"

"Like we're nothing but drama."

"It's my drama. My family caused this."

Nash opened his mouth.

Orla intervened. "Shut the fuck up. Both of you."

Blunt, but effective. Nash hid his grin in her silky hair. I went back to texting the entire fuckin' world. Getting cramp in my thumbs until I got fed up with that shit and dumped my phone on the table by Nash's head.

It buzzed again immediately. "Fuck's sake."

But my irritation was short-lived as I read the incoming text from Folk.

Folk: I have Willow's car. River's going to fix up a couple of dents before I drop it at Kara's

Nash-shaped dents.

Cam.

I swallowed the balled-up emotions clogging my throat again. I wasn't sad that I hadn't seen Willow's car. Or the bikes. Or the fuckin' lorry some wanking pisshead had driven into my family. My imagination had it covered.

Locke : what about the windscreen?

Folk: Not a scratch

Locke: how the fuck?

Folk: Willow's car didn't get hit by a lorry

Fuckin'-A. I signed off with Folk and gave Willow the good news, all the while resisting the urge to crush my phone in my fist. None of this shit was bad, but it reinforced a reality that was tough to live with. For Nash to not be bloodied and broken on this bed, I had to swap him for Willow. I had to be thankful that Nash had nearly died instead of her. How fucked up was that?

Soft lips grazed my cheek, long nails tickling the nape of my neck.

Orla .

"Everything you said to my brother last night, say it to yourself."

She spoke quietly enough, her breath feathering my ear, that Nash didn't hear. But he felt her move and his heavy eyes flashed open. "What's wrong?"

It was on the tip of my tongue to lie, but he deserved better than that. So I told him everything, and he listened, of course. I was lucky enough to have more brothers than fingers, but Nash was so much more than that. He was my light in the fuckin' dark and with his hazy smile engraved on my heart, right next to Orla's wicked smirk, taking my own advice didn't choke me as much.

Still wasn't okay with him nearly dying, but watching him doze, eat, and play with Orla's hair was a good distraction while I kept an eye on the time.

Half-eleven rolled around.

Joints clicking, I unfolded myself from the chair and leaned down to kiss a sleeping Nash, fluctuating between ignoring the neatly taped split in his eyebrow and staring at it with morbid fascination. My brother closed that wound . "I'm gonna go get Cam."

Orla was on the bed with Nash, curled into his good side, cheek on his chest.

She moved to sit up.

I stayed her. "You're here until they kick you out. Then I'll take you for lunch before afternoon visiting hours."

Her glorious smirk warmed her face. "Like…a date?"

"Yeah. At Burger King. I'm a real fuckin' catch."

"Do you think they'll let us take him home after…" She trailed off as my face answered the question. "They'll keep him in another night?"

"‘Fraid so. But we can stay with Lo, if you don't mind the sofa."

"Honey, I'd sleep at Burger King to be close to him."

I kissed her, taking a second to press my forehead to hers. "You and me both, queenie.