“So am I,” she whispered back. “She’s never been out this long.”
He pulled away from her, feeling even more frantic now. “How long has she been out?”
Roni wiped her tears, and he wiped his own with the back of his hand. “She was unconscious when they arrived, and she still was when I called. She’s been there for over two hours now.”
Abel sat up, throwing his head back against the seat, glad that it was so dark in the car. The tears ran freely down the side of his face, and he was certain of one thing. Never—not in all the fights he’d been in or even the ones Hector had ever been in, which made him more nervous than his own—had he been so terrified in his life.
***
Being told that Nellie was in the ICU was an even bigger blow, but Abel held it together. Somewhere on the drive from Vegas to Henderson, he’d gone numb. Nellie had not only listed Roni as one of her emergency contacts but family according to her insurance, so she was the only one allowed to go in to see her. But Roni fought tooth and nail to get Abel in there with her. Abel wasn’t sure if he should be grateful for it now because he thought he might be sick as they walked through the ICU ward.
Roni brought her hands to her scrunched face and began to fall apart as soon as they got to the door of Nellie’s room and saw her hooked up to all those tubes. The nurse in there, checking her monitors, motioned to let them know they could come in. Once again, he was ever so grateful to have Roni there with him, because he felt ready to fall apart. She took his hand as they walked up to the side of Nellie’s bed.
Instantly, everything inside him went from agonized to on fire. “Why does she have a black eye?” he asked the nurse in an all-too-demanding voice, but he didn’t give a shit.
The entire side of her cheek was swollen, and in all his years of boxing, he knew a shiner when he saw one. If someone in McKinley’s camp had done anything to her, Abel would be in jail for sure before the night was over, because someone would be paying dearly.
The nurse pressed her lips together then looked at Nellie’s chart and nodded. “She was checking in at the hotel when she passed out.” Wincing, she looked up at Abel. “Her face hit the counter on the way down.”
“Oh my God!” Roni gasped.
“But nothing is broken in her face.” The nurse assured them as if that would make them feel better. “It’s just badly bruised, and there is some swelling.”
“She’s never been out this long,” Roni said to the nurse. “Do they know what’s wrong?”
Abel stared at Nellie, feeling numb again. His beautiful girl looked so helpless now, all bruised swollen and full of tubes. He hated that he hadn’t been there for her. It almost hurt that she hadn’t had enough faith that he’d believe she had nothing to do with the obviously staged scandal that she’d been dragged into.
The nurse told them that the doctor would be in to explain exactly what they were doing and to give them an early prognosis. Just like when he’d gotten that vibe from the guys before the fight that they weren’t telling him something, he got the distinct feeling from the nervous way she looked at him that she knew more than she was saying.
“In the commotion at the hotel, no one noticed a few things fell out of Nellie’s purse. Among them was her phone. They had someone bring it in about a half hour ago.” The nurse opened the drawer next to Nellie’s bed and pulled it out. “Since you’d already been contacted, we turned it off. It kept ringing.”
The nurse handed it to Roni as Abel sat back. “I’ve notified her parents already,” Roni whispered. Abel glanced at the phone when he heard it start up. Roni hit the screen a few times. “All our calls when we were looking for her, and . . . Hmm . . .” Abel noticed an odd change in Roni’s tone as she sat up, but he didn’t look up at her. He was staring at Nellie again. “Sam’s been calling too.”
That didn’t just get his attention. Abel was immediately glaring at the phone, his insides warming instantly. “When did he call last?”
“A couple of hours ago.”
That asshole still had the nerve to be calling her? Did he want to taunt her now? Or were they trying to keep the bullshit story going for the media?
As if she’d read his mind, Roni clicked on the side of Nellie’s phone, making the screen go black. She reached over and squeezed his leg, shaking her head. She obviously didn’t want him getting worked up over this now, but it was too late. After everything Sam and his fucking brothers had caused, he thought calling her was still going to fly? The very thought had him on his feet because he couldn’t sit anymore. He walked out into the hallway and paced. His emotions were being pulled in every direction. Part of him felt like a wild caged animal just waiting for someone to come close enough so he could tear a limb off. Yet another part of him felt so tormented that he’d just as soon curl up in a corner and cry like a child.
He paced until he saw Roni walk out of the room. Turning to her, afraid of what she might be coming to tell him, he held his breath. She shook her head. “I’m just going to go update everyone out in the waiting room that nothing’s changed.”
Abel nodded, a bit relieved, but at the same time let down that it wasn’t good news. Not wanting Nellie to be alone for even a few minutes, he walked back in her room and stood at the side of her bed. His entire chest ached to see her like this. He closed his eyes, trying desperately to keep it together. As soon as he opened his eyes, a blinking light near where he’d been sitting earlier, got his attention. The screen on Nellie’s phone lit up, and with it once again, so did his insides.
Walking toward it, he could see that Roni must’ve left the phone on silent, because it wasn’t even buzzing. But there was no doubt a call was coming in, and as he got closer, his suspicion about who it might be was confirmed. The three letters flashed on the screen just below the green incoming call indicator: Sam.
Without the slightest hesitation, he picked up the phone and answered. For the sake of not blowing up in Nellie’s hospital room, he did his best to remain calm. “What do you want, Sam?”
He walked out of the room and was glad to see Roni on her way back to Nellie’s room. She saw him on the phone, but didn’t seem to realize that it was Nellie’s phone he was on. She didn’t comment. She just smiled faintly before walking past him and into Nellie’s room.
The silence on the other end went on a bit long until he finally heard Sam’s voice. “Is this Ayala?”
“It is. What do you want?” Abel’s hands were already fisting, but he wouldn’t give this guy the satisfaction of hearing him lose it, so he did his best to remain calm.
“I want to apologize to Nellie,” Sam said, clearing his throat. “I won’t lie. My intentions going into this were every bit as despicable as I’m sure you both are thinking. It was all about getting to you with no regard for her feelings. But halfway through it, as I got to know her, I had a change of heart. Nellie . . . She’s different. I connected with her in a way I never expected.”
Abel gripped the phone, breathing deeply. Unbelievably, what Sam was saying now, as unexpected as it was, was worse than what he had expected.
“She’s one of the sweetest and sincerest women I’ve ever met, and she’s—”
“Mine,” Abel informed him very firmly, his calm beginning to unravel as he walked further away from Nellie’s room in case Sam said anything that might make him lose it. “She’s mine, Sam. So you listen very closely because you only get this warning once. I have not and will not waste even an ounce of energy entertaining the bullshit stories you and your brothers are trying to—”
“But that’s just it. I didn’t—”
“I don’t give a shit about your change of heart, asshole!”
Abel pushed the door into the waiting room before he got kicked out of the ICU, because he was done staying calm. If this conversation were taking place in person, Sam would already be on the ground. His friends all looked up at him as he stormed through the waiting room and out the exit.
“And I don’t giv
e a fuck what kind of connection you think you had with her. She’s with me now. You hear that? You blew whatever chance you might’ve had with her, and now it’s me you’re gonna have to go through if you want to so have so much as a conversation with her. It’s not happening.”
“I know I blew it,” Sam said, exhaling loudly as if Abel could even for a second feel any sympathy for the guy. “I just want to apologize to her because—”
“Did you hear what I just said,” Abel demanded loudly. Then through his teeth he reiterated,” It’s. Not. Happening.”
“Okay.” To Abel’s surprise that was Sam’s only defeated response. But even more surprising was what followed. “Then let me apologize to you. It was a shitty thing to do, and at first, I genuinely agreed with my brother and his publicist that this all came with the territory and was part of the game. I was all for it. In hindsight and after the way things went down, I won’t ever be a part of anything like that again. I truly am sorry.”
Abel took a breath and brought his hand to his forehead. He didn’t want to hate Sam, and he knew all about overzealous publicists with only one thing in mind. But knowing Sam and his brothers may very well be responsible for Nellie being in the ICU right now, it was all he felt for him—he loathed them all. But he didn’t want to be a total dick about it since the guy was apologizing and did sound sincere. Now that he’d made only thing that mattered clear to this guy, he just wanted to get off the phone and get back to Nellie.
“As long as neither of us ever hears from you again, we’re straight.”
Sam agreed without further argument, and Abel cut the call there. He rushed back to Nellie’s room only to find everything exactly as it was. The waiting was torture. Roni had already walked out once to update everyone again that they still knew nothing.
Finally, an older balding doctor walked in and gave them the grim prognosis. “The good news is she wasn’t alone when she went into respiratory arrest. The attendant at the hotel she was checking in at called the paramedics immediately. There’s a tiny window of five to six minutes in which the brain can be without oxygen before damage begins. The medics arrived in less than four and started administrating rescue procedures.”
Looking down at his chart, the doctor paused for a moment before continuing. Abel was already choked up just from hearing the words respiratory arrest and brain damage. Roni was sniffing and wiping tears away again.
“Are you the father?” the doctor glanced up from his chart.
Abel stared at him, confused. “Whose father?”
The doctor pressed his lips together, frowning since both Roni and Abel were staring at him, dumbfounded. “Perhaps she hadn’t told anyone yet. She’s a few weeks along in her pregnancy.”
Exchanging glances, both Abel and Roni shook their heads. “No,” Roni brought her hand to her mouth and glanced back at Nellie’s lifeless body. “We didn’t know, but, yes, he would be the father.”
Speechless, Abel was utterly speechless. He knew he should be happy, but this only terrified him more.
“The bad news is that she had to be put into a medically induced coma to force air into the lungs. How long her body will require the tubes to flow oxygen into her lungs is not something we can predict, and they won’t be removed until she comes out of it—if she comes out.”
The doctor looked up at them, and Abel had to sit down before he passed out. Those last four words had made him dizzy.
“Now I say if only because I have to make you aware that there is that possibility. She could come out of this in a few hours, a few days, or weeks maybe, but there is that small possibility that she may not ever. If she does, it won’t be until she’s further along that we can do tests to see if the baby suffered any damage from this or not.”
Leaning over his legs with his elbows on his knees, Abel dropped his face into his hands, unable to hold it in anymore and cried. Instantly, Roni was at his side, rubbing his back. “She’s gonna be okay, Abel,” Roni cried. “She has to be.”
That bad feeling he’d felt was back again, and for as much as he tried to stay positive like his mom had urged, he felt completely broken now. Something else his mom had been known to say on more than one occasion came to him. “You can’t have it all.”
His mother had insisted that no one had it all. You might have a lot more of something in your life than others, but there is always something you have a lot less of. God never gives everyone everything. He knew it was too much to ask for. He was being greedy, but Abel now felt the overwhelming need to have both Nellie and his baby make it. Already, he was bargaining with God. He’d gladly trade all his fame and money—his title—everything if Nellie would just get better and they’d both come out of this unharmed. Then that other saying his mother also said often slammed into him once again. The most important things in life can’t be bought.
The only choice he had now was to pray, so he did, harder than he’d ever prayed in his life.
Chapter 21
“Have you decided?”
Nellie still couldn’t see who was asking, but she’d gotten used to it. “I think I have.”
There were parts of her life in that other world that were blurry. Some were very clear: she had no children, she was no longer married, and she lived alone. But there were other things equally as clear: her parents, Roni, Gus. They all loved her, but none of them needed her to come back. Her parents had each other. Roni had Noah and Jack now. Gus had his grandparents and Courtney. Yet there was a nagging feeling in her gut. As peaceful and wonderful as it was here, something told her she needed to go back. She’d begun to once already, but the pain in her chest was like fire in that other world, so she’d quickly run back to the peaceful painless world she’d been strolling in for who knew how long.
“I think . . . I’m going to . . . stay here.”
“But your baby.”
“I don’t have a baby.”
The voice changed again. She’d heard it before. It sounded so pained that it hurt her heart.
“You’re having my baby, our baby, Nellie. Please come back.”
Suddenly recognizing the voice, her heart ached even more profoundly, awakening the memory of the only other time when her heart had felt this kind of unbearable pain: Not when she’d found out about Rick and Courtney’s betrayal. Not when both her grandparents were killed in a car accident a few years ago. Not even the fire she’d felt in her chest when she’d almost gone back to that other world. A visual came to her out of nowhere, a visual of a man hitting the floor so devastatingly hard that his head bounced. It hurt more than any pain she’d ever experienced in her life because it was her fault he’d gone down, and she needed to get to him now. He was hurting too, and only she could help him.
In the next instant, the pain in her heart was drowned out by the burning in her chest, a burning that got worse with every breath she took as her entire body now bathed in the torturous pain. She couldn’t go back to that peaceful place anymore. She had to come back, and now she knew why. There was no question in her mind that this pain was worth it, even if it was spreading. The pain was in her head now too. It was in her throat like scorching lava and seared through every vein in her body. If she had the strength to scream, she’d do it until her voice ran out.
Chapter 22
“Come back to me, baby,” Abel begged, squeezing Nellie’s hand.
Nellie had only been out for two days, but it felt like a lifetime to Abel. The doctors had warned him that the longer she stayed comatose the chances of her coming out of it and the baby’s chance of survival, even if Nellie did come out of it, decreased dramatically. She’d given him hope yesterday when she’d begun to react to Abel begging her to come back, but then she gasped and fell right back into it. Ever since then, Abel had refused to leave her side for longer than a few minutes at a time.
Hector had even flown their mom out to be by his side yesterday, because he’d been so concerned. It’d been one of the few times Abel had stepped out of the room
since he’d seen some life in her. “You need to eat something, Abel.”
“I’m not hungry, Mom.”
“Hector says you haven’t eaten anything since yesterday. He’s very worried about you. Worried about what you’ll do if she . . .”
The very suggestion, even if unsaid, had pissed him off. He didn’t even want to think it. He wasn’t giving up hope, especially seeing that she’d made an effort to come back. Convinced now that even she didn’t know she was pregnant or she would’ve said something to him, he was certain that the effort she’d made to come back was for him and their baby because he’d been whispering it in her ear nonstop.
Her parents and Roni had all sat with her for hours, and none had gotten even the slightest reaction from her. Abel had now become a permanent fixture by her side and would stay there until she opened her eyes.
With his head down as he held her hand, he prayed hard, forcing himself to not do it angrily—bitterly.
“Abel?”
His heart nearly stopped and he jerked his head up. Her voice was hoarse and frail, and her face scrunched, looking as agonized as he’d felt this whole time. “Don’t talk, baby.”
Glancing up at a stunned-faced Hector who was on his feet suddenly, Abel stood now too. “Get the nurse!”
Hector rushed out of the room as Abel soothed Nellie’s hair, completely choked up. “You came back to me,” he whispered, the tears already running down his face as he kissed her hand over and over. “You came back to me.”
~*~
Roni told Nellie that she’d never look at Abel the same way again. Days after coming back to him, as Abel liked to say she did, they were in her hospital room, packing up Nellie’s things, and Roni was talking about it again.