“Where the hell is Dad?”
5
Raelynn
Michael hissed. “Rae, we have to go.”
I held up my hand as w
e crept through the hallways of the hospital. We dodged staff, racing around corners as I tried to get to Clint’s ICU room. I sure as hell wasn’t allowing his father to chase me off like that. I didn't give a damn how he felt about my being there or what he’d said to me to try and get me to leave. He didn’t want to be here. He didn’t give a shit about his son. The only thing he cared about was his businesses. How much money he pulled in.
How hard he could sock his son in the fucking jaw.
Michael grabbed my arm. “Rae, stop.”
I ripped away from him. “If you don’t want to be here, then go. I’ll catch a ride back somehow. But I’m not leaving. Not until I know how Clint’s doing.”
“And if his father catches you sneaking about? If the doctors catch you?”
I shrugged. “What’s he going to do? Hit a girl?”
Michael’s face fell and I moved down the hallway again. Doctors had whisked them away to a room that had already been set aside for Clint after he came out of surgery. Which meant things didn’t look very good. I wanted to know how the surgery had gone. Or was going. Or whatever his status was. I’d waited for almost two hours to find the opening I needed to sneak through those metal doors. To get back to Clint. To see if I could pick up on any information I wanted. Anything to soothe my worried soul. I wanted to know exactly the kind of condition he was in. But when I saw Clint’s father pacing up and down the hallway with his cell phone stuck in his ear, I paused. Taking in the scene. How apathetic and unapologetic the man looked.
And the kicker was that it didn’t shock me one bit.
“No. No. I need you to do it the way I said for you to do it. You’re costing us money. And a great deal of it. I won’t be paying your paycheck if you don’t do as I ask!”
His father’s voice boomed down the hallway and I shook my head. I peeked back at Michael, watching his face fall. Then we hid around the corner of the empty hallways of the hospital as I tried my best to listen to what his father was saying.
“Is that man really doing work right now?” he asked.
I nodded. “Yep.”
We tucked ourselves away, hiding as a doctor came around the corner. We pressed ourselves into a dark space, and I even held my breath so no one would hear us. The doctor passed, leaving the hallways bare and empty again. We clamored right back up to the corner. Right back to where we’d been.
I watched as the doctor approached Clint’s father, and even I could see the frustration in the doctor’s shoulders as they tensed.
I watched his father hold his fucking hand up to the doctor, telling him to hush while he continued working. I wanted to strangle the man myself. I wanted to beat him into oblivion so he could know exactly how he’d made Clint feel all these years.
Then his father finally put his phone away.
“What’s going on with my son? Will he be okay?”
Michael murmured, “Like he cares.”
“Shh!” I said curtly, turning my attention back down the hallway.
“Sir, your son is going to be okay. Surgery was touch and go there for a while, but we fixed him up and he should be coming out of it at any second. This is the room he’ll recover in for a while. We wanted to go ahead and get him moved so we could hook him up to the pain medication he’ll need. Your son will be in a great deal of pain for a few hours.”
His father sighed. “How long will he have to be here? I’ve got a trip planned in a couple of days I really don’t want to cancel.”
Michael snickered. “He’s really being serious, isn’t he?”
I rolled my eyes. “If you don’t shut u—”
The doctor shook his head. “I’m not sure if he’ll be out of here in a couple of days. Three, maybe. If things go very well. But not under forty-eight hours. Your son sustained a great deal of trauma. And, there’s a criminal investigation open right now, since it’s pretty clear your son was run off the road.”
Clint’s father’s eyes fell beyond the doctor and I knew he spotted me. Even as I tried to hide behind the corner, I heard his footsteps tearing toward me. Michael grabbed my arm, pulling me down the hallway as the footsteps came around the corner. And as his voice thundered down the hallway, all eyes were on us.