Ball & Chain (Cut & Run 8)

Nick tried to swallow against the lump in his throat and couldn’t. He shook his head, at a loss. He stared into Kelly’s eyes for long moments before finally attempting to speak. “How about . . . marry me?”

Kelly smiled and wiped at his eyes. “Okay.”

Kelly bent to kiss him, his lips barely grazing Nick’s. Then he kissed him harder, stopping only to sniffle and wipe his cheeks again, using Nick’s hospital gown to do it. He rested his head on Nick’s shoulder, and Nick wrapped a clumsy arm around his neck.

“I love you, Nick,” Kelly whispered. “No matter what those words meant before, we know what they mean now. They’re ours now. Just ours.”

Nick whispered the words in Kelly’s ear, feeling a new weight to them. Instead of a sense of panic like he’d half expected, he felt nothing but calm. He could marry Kelly tomorrow and never look back, never regret the decision. He and Kelly could spend their lives together—as boyfriends, as husbands, as partners-in-crime, as any damn thing they wanted—and there wasn’t a thing about that prospect that made him nervous. He buried his nose in Kelly’s messy hair and closed his eyes, unable to keep them open any longer with Kelly’s scent engulfing him and lulling him to sleep.

Kelly kissed him gently one more time, then placed something in Nick’s hand and positioned his thumb over a button. “Rest, babe. Here’s your morphine drip. Enjoy it for me. I’m going to go get food with the others, okay?”

Nick managed a smile, and Kelly kissed him once more, but he still couldn’t drag his eyes open as Kelly left the room.

Marry me. It made him smile as he drifted off to sleep.

He floated in and out of awareness for a while. He wasn’t really in pain, but it wasn’t a restful sleep either. The beeps and shuffling footsteps and whispered words of the hospital were soothing in a way, and eventually even the steady breathing of his father in the next bed after they moved him into the room was something that eased Nick’s mind.

He wasn’t sure what it was that disturbed him, but his eyes were open before he realized he was awake. A male nurse stood next to his bed, checking his vitals and messing with the machines. Nick looked him up and down, moving nothing but his eyes to do it. Then, for some reason, his mind began casting around for something, anything, that could be used as a weapon.

He tossed his head like he was suffering through a restless sleep and then rolled, edging toward the table where Ty’s heavy crystal vase of joke cookies sat. A hand shot out and gripped his wrist, wrenching his arm until he whimpered. Another hand landed on his incision, making him cry out and curl into a protective ball. He grabbed at the man’s arm, trying to push it away, trying to get away from the agony.

He glared up into the eyes of the nurse, recognition dawning as he tried to gasp for air.

“Almost got the drop on me, O’Flaherty,” Liam Bell drawled. “Impressive.”

The bed on the other side of the curtain creaked as Nick’s father moved. “What’s going on over there?”

Liam glanced over his shoulder, letting up on the pressure on Nick’s arm and incision. He reached out to the screaming machines and silenced them somehow, then pulled the green mask down his chin. A smirk curled his lips.

Nick pressed his hand to his incision, feeling blood seeping through the stitches. He curled up and rocked, unable to stop himself. “What are you doing here?” he gritted out.

“I heard you were under the weather,” Liam said, his tone entirely conversational. He pulled up a chair and sat, then gently took Nick’s hand in his, cradling the morphine clicker in Nick’s palm. He wrapped Nick’s fingers around it and pressed his thumb against Nick’s, making him push the button a few times. “Let’s just up this a little, shall we? Can’t have you in pain.”

“You okay over there, boy?” Nick’s dad asked.

“Dad, it’s fine,” Nick managed. “It’s fine. Go back to sleep.”

Liam rolled his eyes and stood. “I’ll be right back.” He yanked the curtain aside, standing in the middle of the room to look down at Brian O’Flaherty’s bed. “You have some f**king nerve, don’t you?” he said as he examined the equipment around Brian’s bed.

“Who the hell are you?”

“Just a friend of your son’s, don’t mind me,” Liam murmured distractedly.

“Bell, leave him alone,” Nick tried to say, though his voice was weak and his words were slurring and panicked. He tried to reach the call button, which had been moved out of the way to make room for the box of zombie shells.

Liam plucked Brian’s IV line between two of his fingers, then pulled a syringe from his pocket. He whistled as he injected whatever was in it into the IV.

“Liam!” Nick shouted. He reached for his own IV to yank it out, intending to get out of bed, but his movements were sluggish and his mind was growing foggier. He couldn’t manage it. His hand landed on the shotgun shells, prepared to hurl the box at Liam’s head.

“Relax, he’ll be fine. He’ll just go to sleep.” Liam tossed the syringe in a receptacle and then leaned over Brian. “I ever see you with a drink in your hand again, I’ll put a hole through your f**king skull. Understand? You don’t deserve this man as a son.”

Nick saw the anger and fear in his father’s eyes before the medicine Liam had injected him with put him to sleep.

“Wanker,” Liam added. He pulled the curtain closed again and sat down beside Nick. He batted Nick’s hands away from the heavy box of shells, then from the IV line and the nurse’s call button. His movements were extremely gentle considering he’d just jabbed the heel of his palm into Nick’s incision several minutes before. He patted Nick’s chest. “All right, then.”

Nick groaned and tried to shove him away, but couldn’t. “Why can’t you just slink off to somewhere and die like you were supposed to?”

“Well, that’s not very nice.”

“What the f**k are you doing here?”

“I knew now would be the best time to see you, since when you’re healthy you tend to punch first and discuss after you’ve tied me to something that’s not very fun.”

Nick grunted.

“To get right down to it, I need your help.”

“Go f**k yourself,” Nick growled. He tossed his head and writhed on the bed, fighting through the pain.