I could picture my fist connecting with his jaw, imagined the bone breaking. As I started to take a step toward the prick to do just that, Jesse grabbed my arm and pulled me toward the door. “Thanks, Ax!”

Shane was already asking a nurse which room Emmie was in. “Are you a family member?”

Drake nodded his head, answering for his brother. “Yes, ma’am. Em is our sister.” The lie was something that slipped off the tip of their tongues easily. From the time Emmie had come to live with us that was what we told most people. For me, it had been a harder pill to swallow when saying those words.

The nurse didn’t question either Shane or Drake. She just glanced down at her iPad and then gave them her room number. I kept a few paces back from my friends as we rushed toward her room. I was still seething after the encounter with Axton.

A doctor was sitting beside Emmie’s bed when we entered her room. She was deathly pale and all thoughts of destroying Axton or being angry at Emmie evaporated. Gods, she looked so small lying in the hospital bed. She was covered with a blanket to her waist, and an IV with rapidly dripping fluids was attached to one of her arms. I could see the wires from what I could only guess was a heart monitor, and I felt like I was going to vomit.

So close. So fucking close! I … We had nearly lost her.

Oh, dammit all to hell. I had nearly lost her. There I had admitted it to myself.

The guys were apologizing to Emmie. We should have gotten here sooner. We should have been the ones that had taken her to the hospital in the first place. Axton was right. We hadn’t been taking good enough care of Emmie.

I turned my full attention on the doctor, determined to find out exactly what was going on with Emmie and how to make her better. My fear was that it was some kind of cancer, but we had the money to take care of her. I had seen the effects of it with Liam Bryant’s sister, Marissa, and knew that as sick as Emmie had been it could very well be the same thing.

The first question was going to be the hardest, but I manned up and asked. “What’s wrong with her?” The second question was just as important and I needed to know it more than the first, if for no other reason than to save my sanity. “Is she going to be alright?”

The doctor, a man that looked barely older than me or the others, glanced down at Emmie for a brief moment before clearing his throat. It wasn’t lost on me that he appeared to be intimidated by the four of us. I knew that we could look like scary fuckers. Truth was the doctor had every reason to be intimidated. With the exception of Emmie, we didn’t give a fuck about anything or anyone. We were bastards. And if this doctor thought about standing in our way, none of us would think twice about fucking him up.

“She came in severely dehydrated,” the doctor informed us and went on to explain that he was keeping her overnight for observations, but he had no idea what was wrong with Emmie.

Jesse went off, demanded the idiot doctor get off his ass and do some tests. When Emmie linked her fingers with his and calmed him down almost immediately, jealousy reared its head for the second time that night, and I had to look away.

The doctor suggested that we leave and I was glad that Shane was the one to speak up because I knew I would have taken the doctor’s head off if I had to do it. There was no fucking way we were leaving her now! The doctor was talking under his breath to himself when he left.

Emmie was sandwiched between two huge men as Drake and Jesse hugged her tight. I don’t know why I wasn’t jealous of Drake, or even Shane. Maybe it was because Drake had risked so much—and lost even more—to protect Emmie when we were younger. I knew he and his brother would never, ever touch Emmie.

Jesse on the other hand? Jealousy ate me up. It made me hate the man that had been my best friend for nearly my whole life. Hating Jesse left me feeling almost as empty as loving Emmie did.

“You should have seen a doctor before now,” Jesse scolded.

“It was nothing. I’m fine now.” Emmie tried to making it sound like she hadn’t almost died tonight.

Hearing her make light out of something that could have ended differently in a horrible way if Axton hadn’t been around was the last straw. All of my emotions, everything from the nervousness of singing that stupid song, to the jealousy and hurt at seeing her with Axton started to boil over.

I couldn’t hold it all in a second longer. “It isn’t nothing!” I kicked the little round rolling chair across the room, not caring that it bounced against the opposite wall. I found myself raking my fingers through my hair and pulling on the ends. “Axton said you were unconscious when he got you here. Unconscious Emmie! Don’t you understand how fucking serious this is? Has it slipped your attention that people die from dehydration?”

When she just stared up at me with her big green eyes wide with surprise I lost it on a whole new level. She looked so small in that fucking bed, so sick and still so goddamned beautiful. I turned away from her and my band brothers and took all my pain and frustration out on the wall as I punched it.

The wall was cement or some other stone. It broke the skin on my knuckles and the ache that shot through my hand and up my arm did nothing to pull my mind from the turmoil it was in now. Leaning on the wall that I had just tried to destroy, I let my tears fall.

Behind me the room was in almost complete silence, except for the constant pacing of Shane and my deep breathing.

“Nik …” Emmie’s voice was soft, gently commanding me to face her. I could no more deny her than stop breathing. Scrubbing my throbbing hand over my damp face, I turned around. Jesse and Drake were still on either side of her, but she held her arms out to me. My heart jumped. She wanted me to hold her?

My feet took me over to her before I could even comprehend that I was walking. Drake moved aside and I dropped carefully down on the edge of her hospital bed. Her arms and hands were cold as they wrapped around me and she pulled my head to her chest. “I’m okay,” she whispered in my ear, and I couldn’t keep from shuddering. I needed her reassurance and soothing touch. “I’m here.”

A sob escaped me before I could call it back, and I held onto her tight. “I’m sorry, Emmie,” I told her, silently begging her to forgive me. “I’m so sorry.”

Chapter 9

What. The. FUCK!

Sleeping in a chair beside of Emmie’s bed in her private room wasn’t the worst place I had ever fallen asleep. Still, it wasn’t anywhere close to being comfortable, and I woke with a stiff neck and a desperate need for coffee.