Page 274 of Cross the Line
“So, Finley will be okay?” Jayden asks.
“So far, so good.” With another reassuring smile, she adds, “Dr. Phelps will give you more information when the surgery is over.”
“Will we be able to see her? When it’s done?” I need to put my eyes on our girl so badly that my chest aches with it.
“When Miss Tomes is out of recovery, yes.” I want to tell her that Finley is not a Tomes, she’s… a part of me and Jayden. She’s a Sylkes and a Morrow…
“And we’ll be able to take her home?” Jayden’s hopeful tone pulls a chuckle from the nurse.
“Miss Tomes will need to stay in the hospital until the lung has stuck to the chest wall. Dr. Phelps will be able to talk you through what comes after surgery when he’s done.”
The instant she leaves us, I turn into Jayden. Clinging onto his body like my life depends on it.
Because it does.
Because, without him and our girl, I wouldn’t have grown into the man I am today.
I know that man is rough around the edges, and he still has a lot to learn and grow. Nonetheless, I’ve never been stronger or felt more hopeful. Like, there is a big, wonderful future ahead of us, with more possibilities than we’ve ever dared dream.
Hours later, when we’re both sitting at our girl’s side—Jayden in the armchair while I’m on the footrest, leaning back into his lap where oneof his hands is playing with my damp hair that I washed in the bathroom sink with hand soap, and the other is clasped around mine, holding our girl’s hand—it finally settles in.
Years of questioning everything about myself, who I am, what I did and didn’t do. Years of shutting everyone out so they wouldn’t see the devastation left inside me, and…
“It’s over. It’s actually over,” I whisper as Fin stirs awake.
Bright blue eyes flutter open, darting wildly about the room until they find Jayden and me. They’re oddly clear; bottomless like the warmest ocean, even with the dark circles beneath them.
My heart has never beat so wildly as when they pause on mine, and a smile quivers at the corners of her mouth.
“Thank fuck it is,” Jayden rasps, wrapping his arm across my chest when we scoot closer to our girl.
“You found me,” Finley croaks, tears flooding her gorgeous eyes.
“We’re never letting you go, Angel,” I tell her at the same time as Jayden retorts, “I told you, Lucky. We’ll always find you.”
No matter what happens. Wherever we are. Everywhere we go.
We will always find a way back to each other.
Because, together, we’re not just happy and stronger. We’re whole.
CHAPTER 82
FINLEY
“Isn’t she perfect?”
The uncontrollable laugh that sputters out of me has my chest constricting tighter. It doesn’t matter how awful the pain is, though. I can’t help chuckling at the way Summer keeps asking me that same question every time she looks down at her daughter.
Persephone is the tiniest being I’ve ever seen. So teeny that she’s all but lost in her doll-sized ruffled romper and matching oversized bow turban. What kills me, though, is the knee-high socks with mini pompoms.
Everything about her is… “Yeah, so dang perfect.” And it’s killing me that I can’t hold her, even though she weighs nothing.
Last time the nurse came in here, and Summer had laid Percy down next to me on the bed, she threatened to move me to a no-visitor ward. As much as I protested the fancy private room Eli and Jayden insisted on when I was rushed back to the hospital with a pleural infection, I like that it allows me to have the visitors I want, when I want.
I’m never alone. Which is something I’ve never liked before, and ever since Ryker took me, and Presley beat the crap out of me. Since I thought he had killed me…
Being aloneterrifiesme.
