Page 91 of Love It or List It
Then, because he couldn’t send Joe home with Will without checking on him, he opened the truck’s passenger-side door.
Joe was dozing, his breath shallow, eyes closed.In the cab light, Austin could make out a faint sheen of sweat on his brow.When Austin brushed his fingers over his forehead, he was burning up.Definitely sick.“Hey, sweet thing.”
Joe groaned and cracked open one eye.“’Stin?”
“Yeah, it’s me.”He pressed a kiss to Joe’s forehead, because he couldn’t resist.Will, who was climbing into the driver’s seat, huffed and rolled his eyes.
“Pretty sure Greg said it was a cold and that Joe wasn’t dying,” he said with the smug assurance of a teen.
“’Ill?”
At first Austin thought Joe was protesting the fatality of his illness, until he noticed the way Joe was tilting toward the driver’s seat.He snorted.
“Yes, Joe, Will is here too.He’s the one who’s going to take your feverish ass home while I go stockpile drugs.”
“Drugs?”
“Not the fun kind,” Austin said regretfully.“Go back to sleep, sweet thing.You might as well catch some Zs while your son drives.”
Will snorted again and started the truck.
“Drive safe,” Austin said with one last stroke of Joe’s hair.
“Aw, man, and here I was planning on drag racing down E.C.Row.”
Will must have driven exceptionally carefully, or maybe he just hit all the red lights, because he was still attempting to coax Joe out of the truck when Austin pulled up with a bag full of NyQuil, Tylenol, Halls, ginger ale, and juice.
He might have gone a bit overboard, not knowing which comforts or brands Joe would want.
“Oh thank God,” Will said when Austin hurried up.“I can’t get him on his feet, and he’s too big to carry.”Will might be almost as tall as Joe, but he was rail-thin with the stretched-out look of a teen who’d been through a recent growth spurt.
Austin nodded at his car.“Why don’t you get the stuff into the house while I see if I can talk this lump into moving.Just, uh, maybe don’t go back to your homework before confirming I don’t need help dragging him in?”
Will huffed and abandoned Austin to his charge.
“Joe,” he murmured, and Joe groaned.“There you are.I need you to get up onto your feet and into the house, sweet thing.Once you’re up and in, I’ll tuck you into bed, but I need you to walk for me.”
Joe groaned but managed to help Austin get him upright.Austin slung his arm over his shoulders and pressed another kiss to his burning forehead.“Good boy.”
Joe gave a pitiful whimper but did his best to drag his feet up the stairs to the side door.
“He’s alive,” Will said as he opened the door for them.Despite his sarcastic words, his face was a picture of relief.
“Mostly,” Austin joked back.“I’m going to get him straight into bed and dope him up with NyQuil.”
Will nodded and locked the door behind them.“I left the stuff in the kitchen.”He fidgeted with the hem of his sweater, looking like a too-young stereotype of a handwringing parent.
“Perfect.Thank you.You can go back to your homework.I’ll yell if I need anything.”He tried to smile reassuringly, though it might have come out strained given that Joe was leaning more and more heavily against him.
“Right.Okay.”Will nodded again, then with one last look at Joe, loped up the stairs to his room.
Getting Joe undressed and into bed wasn’t nearly as fun as it had been on previous occasions, and not just because his flushed, burning cheeks and fever-glazed eyes weren’t sexy.Joe alternated between helpfully unhelpful—trying to take off his own clothes and getting in Austin’s way—and directly unhelpful—deciding he needed to go to the bathroom for a pee when Austin had only succeeded in getting one and a half boots off his feet.
But eventually he had Joe drugged up and cocooned in his bed with three kittens around him, purring contentedly as they snuggled up to their own personal space heater.Austin wondered how long the situation would last before Joe kicked off all his blankets in a feverish haze, but he wasn’t about to chase the cats away if they were bringing comfort.
He did, however, keep Pepa from the room, as she was too wide-awake and hungry to be a nursemaid.
A few hours later, Austin was cuddled up with Pepa on the couch and reading when Joe shuffled out of his room.His hair was a riot of bedhead and his face was still flushed, but he had left the blankets behind, which boded well for his fever.
