Page 31 of Further To Fall

“A little.”

She was lying through her teeth. I kept a hold on her hand, hating that there was nothing else I could do for her at the moment, nothing I could do to take her pain away. I would gladly take a hundred hits to the head to ease her suffering. Where was the fucking doctor already?

I heard the door swing open, and a man entered who looked like he was in his fifties and was wearing a white lab coat. “Hello, Miss McCarthy. I’m Dr. Baines. It sounds like you had quite the scare. How are you feeling?”

“Not too bad,” Carter croaked.

“I know your throat has got to be hurting you pretty badly, but I’m going to need to ask you a few questions. As soon as I’m done, we’ll get some pain meds in that IV, and you’ll feel a lot better. Did you ever lose consciousness?”

I felt Carter’s hand twitch in mine. “Not really.”

The doctor looked up from the chart he was holding. “Did your vision go black?”

“It started to,” she said so softly I could barely hear her answer.

Dr. Baines made a note. “Did you hit your head?”

Carter briefly closed her eyes. “He hit my head against my car.”

The rage inside me felt like it was boiling my blood. It took everything I had not to destroy the hospital room around me. The only thing holding me back was the fear in Carter’s eyes, I didn’t want to do anything that would frighten her further. I took a deep breath and made sure I wasn’t gripping her hand too tightly.

The doctor clicked his pen, placing it back into his pocket and removing a penlight. “I’m going to look in your eyes to check for a concussion and then examine your throat.” He moved quickly through his inspection. When he probed the swollen side of Carter’s face and the back of her head, she winced, sharply sucking in air.

“Careful,” I barked at the doctor.

“He’s just doing his job,” Carter said, squeezing my hand. “Sorry.”

“Not a problem. You’ve got a bit of a goose egg on the back of your head, but all in all, you are very lucky. You don’t have a concussion, and I don’t feel any broken facial bones, but I want to get an x-ray just in case. Your neck and throat will be sore for the next week or so. I’m going to write you a prescription for an anti-inflammatory and a painkiller, they should help. If you have any worsening pain or blurry vision after you’ve been discharged, I want you to come back immediately. Do you have someone who can stay with you tonight?”

“I’ll be staying with her tonight and can drive her back to the hospital if anything gets worse.”

The doctor smiled kindly. “Great, I’ll just inject this fast-acting painkiller into Miss McCarthy’s IV, write up her prescriptions, and order that x-ray.”

Just moments after the doctor had left, the door flew open, and Liam and Ford rushed inside. They screeched to a halt when they saw Carter, face swollen, neck bruised. “What the hell happened?” Liam said through clenched teeth.

“A parent of one of Carter’s students attacked her in the parking lot this morning.” Just saying those words brought my simmering rage back to a boil. “She’s going to be fine, and he’s in jail, but her throat and head have her in a lot of pain, so she’s not going to be doing much talking, got it?” Carter turned towards me and stuck out her tongue. Clearly, the pain meds had started to kick in. I squeezed her hand. “I’ll be right back, you guys. Stay with her.”

I didn’t look back at Carter as I made my way to the door and out into the hallway. My sneakers squeaked against the linoleum in an annoying rhythm until I reached the end of the hall. Sucking in a deep breath, I leaned my forehead against the wall, pressing my fingertips into the cool surface, battling my desire to pound a hole into it.

A hand landed on my shoulder. Turning my head to the side, Ford filled my vision. “Hey, you okay, man?”

I pushed off the wall. “Not really. Shit, Ford, I’ve never been so fucking scared in my life.”

“You care about her.”

“Of course, I fucking care about her,” I spat. “She’s my best fucking friend.”

Ford paused, seeming to choose his words carefully. “You ever think it’s more than that? I’ve seen the way you look at her, how you treat her. And I know she’s in love with you, it’s written all over her.”

I pushed at Ford’s chest, harshly but not aiming to hurt. I just needed him and his words away from me. “Don’t tell me that. I’m not in a place where I can be in a relationship. I need to be focused on my career. Fuck! I don’t even know if I’lleverwant that again.”

Panic began to take a firm hold on my pounding heart. Images flashed through my mind at a rapid pace. Carter cooking me dinner. Carter nibbling on the corner of her lip as she tried to figure out who the killer was on whatever true crime show we were watching or listening to. Carter beaming up at me as my arm was lifted in victory at my last fight. Carter tucked perfectly under my arm as I held her on the couch.

Fuck. Carter had snuck through my defenses with her disarming innocence, and now I knew she was too close.

Ford smoothed out his shirt. “Well, time is ticking by, and I just hope you don’t miss out on the best thing that may ever happen to you.” With that, he turned and walked back towards Carter’s room.

I just stood there, clenching and unclenching my fists, listening to the blood roaring in my ears. I could not deal with all the shit raining down on me right now. Taking a few more deep breaths, I straightened my spine and made my way back to Carter, the girl who had my insides twisted up in knots that might never unravel.

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