The nurse cleared her throat. “Err, well…” She glanced behind me to Dallas. “It’s up to you, Dallas. Doctor Jenson said that you have complete say on who goes in or out.”

Linc finally released his hold on the willowy blonde and she stood as if she hadn’t just been wrestling to free herself from the muscle-headed beast. Brushing past me as if she didn’t even see me, Dallas crossed to the door and grabbed Gabriella by the shoulders. Her eyes raked over the little Italian for a long moment. Brown eyes silently pleaded with blue until Dallas finally shook her head. “You can’t go back there if you are going to fall to pieces. He’s in a fragile state right now. Do you understand me, Gabriella? If I let you back there you can’t scream, sob, or even whimper. Understand?” She nodded mutely.

“I’m probably going to regret this…” She grasped Gabriella by the elbow and pulled her from the room with her. “I swear I’ll kick your little ass if you don’t listen to me.”

“You think someone should go with them? Make sure Dallas doesn’t actually kill the chick while behind closed doors?”

I turned my head to find Drake frowning after the two women. “Would you honestly care if she did?”

Drake shrugged. “Not really, but Angel would probably have a few things to say if I didn’t at least attempt to keep her friend from a murder rap.”

Dallas

I’d lost my fucking mind.

There just wasn’t any other excuse for why I had gone all soft and let bitch-troll Gabriella Moreitti come back with me to see my friend. Or maybe it was because I had been up for nearly twenty-four hours without much of a break physically and now emotionally.

Inside the ICU ward, I nodded my head at one of the nurses seated at the nurses’ station watching heart monitors. She gave me a grim smile and nodded to the room directly in front of her. I didn’t move immediately, though. I was having to psych myself up to go inside that small room with the glass wall overlooking the nurses’ station.

Having worked in the ER downstairs for over four months now, I had seen some pretty gruesome shit. I’ve seen everything from a man bleed out from a gunshot wound to the abdomen, to a defenseless baby with third degree burns from head to toe from where his mother had spilled scalding spaghetti water on him—a complete and tragic accident. I’d had to be strong and do my job as I rushed to help save both even though there hadn’t been anything anyone could have done for either.

Now, as I stood outside of the ICU room where a man I considered as much a close friend as Linc was to me, I found I couldn’t get my mind to kick over to nurse mode. It was stuck on friend and loved one and I was starting to tremble. Liam was so young and he had finally gotten his life on the right track. This wasn’t fair. Life wasn’t fair. I wanted to scream and shout and… Pray.

“Why have you stopped?” Gabriella demanded in a quiet voice shaking with tears. “Please, Dallas. I have to see him or I’m going to go insane.”

It was the use of my actual name instead of the usual ‘slut’ and ‘bitch’ that Gabriella had used on the few occasions we had actually been in the same room together that slapped some sense into me. I sucked in two deep breaths to steady myself and tightened my grip on her elbow. I wasn’t sure if Liam would thank me or hate me for letting his ex in to see him like this, but I wasn’t going to regret it. I knew he was in deep where Gabriella was concerned.

Over the two months that he was in rehab and I had made my weekly trips up to see him, we had shared a lot of ourselves with each other. He knew all about how crappy my life with my mother had been and I knew just about everything from his past—from the reason why Liam and Devlin really and truly hated each other, to Marissa’s illness, to how long Liam had been in love with Gabriella Moreitti.

The glass wall slid back as we neared, letting us inside. Beside me, a small, distressed mewl came from Gabriella but I couldn’t call her out on it when the same noise was coming out of me, too.

Shit. Oh, dear lord. Shit. Shit. Shit.

Tears burned my eyes and I sucked in a shuddering breath as I stepped closer to the bed. Monitors were beeping and I glanced at them for a moment to see how well he really was doing. Not great. Heart rate and blood pressure were low. Brain activity was nearly nonexistent. Oxygen levels were stable, but only because he had a tube down his throat to help him.

Almost reluctantly, I forced my eyes to skim over my friend. He didn’t look like the Liam I knew and had come to love. His face was one big bruise with cuts everywhere from the glass of the windshield he had been tossed through. Wires and IV lines stuck out from all directions; some monitoring, others keeping him hydrated and giving blood since he had lost so much before and while the surgeon had worked on him. Casts stabilized bones that still needed special attention. There was a bandage around his head from where the doctor had relieved pressure from his swelling brain and I knew he was going to be pissed when he woke up and found half his head had been shaved.

“L-L-Liam?” I glanced to where Gabriella was now standing beside the bed, her hands hovering hesitantly over Liam’s battered face. Tears streamed down her face and her lips were trembling. I would only admit this to myself, but Gabriella was a very beautiful woman. When she cried, however? Not so much. At least she wasn’t afraid to ugly-cry like that over the man she might love.

I swallowed a wave of bitchiness that burst to my lips. This wasn’t the time to vent my hatred for this chick at her. It was apparent that right then and there she really was in love with Liam Bryant. But while she might be in love with someone else, that didn’t mean that Axton’s emotions weren’t still involved with the little Italian rocker. Honestly… That was the one thing that made me hate the girl the most.

She had the one thing I knew I would never get… But still craved with everything inside of me.

I cleared my throat. “You can touch him. He most likely doesn’t feel any pain right now. Talk to him. I’m not sure if he can actually hear you or not, but don’t waste the chance. I’m not sure if you will be let in here again once Emmie gets here.”

Gabriella’s jaw clenched but she just nodded. “Liam… I’m so sorry,” she whispered, finally letting her fingers trace over his jaw and then his lips. Her hand noticeably trembled but that didn’t stop her. She didn’t seem to notice that his heart monitor changed at the sound of her voice or with each caress. “I never should have broken up with you. Maybe if…if…” She stopped and sucked in a steadying breath. “Maybe if I had fought harder for us, for you… this might not have ever happened. We could have been in California at Lee-Lee’s New Year’s party right now…” Her voice broke on Lee-Lee’s name and a fresh stream of tears flooded down her cheeks. “I love you, Liam. I love you so much.”