Jesus, fuck, he was worried about my business?
Ignoring Jake’s hands as he checked Ash over, I dropped my face down to Ash’s and said, “I don’t give a shit about the business, baby. Please, just tell me you’re okay.” I knew it was a stupid thing to say considering he clearly wasn’t, but I just needed to know this was the worst of it.
Ash seemed to understand what I was asking. “He twisted my arm and hit me once. I think he kicked me, too, but that’s it. I had to get out of there, Aiden. I had to find you. I’m not letting go, Aiden. I’m not letting go.” He managed to choke out the words between sobs.
I was dimly aware of Lucky returning and giving a backpack to Jake, but I forced everything else away as I gently pressed a kiss to Ash’s lips. “Me neither, baby. Never letting go again.”
Ash let out a harsh breath and nodded, then his free arm was wrapping around my neck. I held onto him as best I could. I knew I needed to let Jake examine him, but I just needed a few seconds to assure myself that he was really here.
As bad as things were, if it was a dream, I didn’t want to wake up.
Because I finally had my Ash back and it was exactly as I’d said. I wasn’t ever letting him go again.
Jake helped get us to the mountain hospital and navigate getting Ash’s medical records released to the local doctors. He stayed with us and continued explaining everything to Ash with a calm voice as the doctors and nurses managed to cast his broken arm. Once they set him up in a hospital room with IV fluids and pain medicine, his body finally seemed to relax enough to sleep.
Jake had left an hour earlier and told me he’d be back first thing in the morning to check on us. I thanked him profusely for his help before settling into the bedside chair next to Ash for the night. I sat on the opposite side of the bed from his injured arm and lightly stroked the fingers of his IV hand. After a while, I picked up the remote and turned the TV on, making sure to quickly mute it in order to let Ash sleep.
I must have dozed off for a little while because I came awake to the sound of Ash’s groggy voice asking me to turn up the volume.
“You okay?” I asked, lifting my head up from where it rested on the edge of the bed. His face was still mottled with bruises, but he looked a little bit better than when I’d first caught sight of him in the lodge lobby. It was still fully dark outside, and I guessed it was the wee hours of the morning.
“Aiden, turn up the volume, quick,” he repeated.
I did as he asked and turned to see what he was watching. There on the screen was my college roommate, Joey Hamill, doing a sit-down interview with Sienna. The same Sienna who’d been dating Bomber Flynn.
“What?” I murmured.
The sound of her annoying voice grated on me.
“Not that there’s anything wrong with it, Joe. I mean, I’m as open-minded as the next person. It’s just that I’d like to have known I was dating a gay man, you know?”
Disbelief tore through me as it hit me what I was watching. Sienna was outing NFL superstar Bomber Flynn on national television.
I snapped my head back to see what Ash’s reaction was. His mouth was open in surprise, but there was also a twinkle in his eyes.
After grabbing my phone out of my pocket to check the time, I glanced back up at the TV. At that late hour, it was most likely a replay of an earlier interview from the evening before.
“Why me, Joe? Why did Bomber choose to break my heart like that?”
I shot Ash a glance. He was staring wide-eyed at the TV like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.
Joey was speaking now.
“What went through your mind when you found out he was possibly bisexual? How did you find out?”
Points to Joey for correcting her ignorant assumption that Bomber was gay.
“Well, that’s the funny part. Not so funny really, but you know what I mean. The news reports said he’d helped his cousin after the guy got beat up. I was so upset for that poor kid. But then my friend Eric told me that man was Bomber’s boyfriend. That they’d been together for years. And you know the first thing I thought of? Now why in the world would a famous guy like Bomber date his cousin when he could have anyone he wanted? It just doesn’t make sense.”
I couldn’t contain my laugh. I noticed Ash giggling too, and I turned to smile at him. He gestured to the bed next to him, and I wasted no time in crawling under the blankets beside him.