Accidentally on Porpoise (9 page)

As he drove, Emery wondered if the headache he felt was directly related to Sean’s injuries. The Moritas had just arrived at Bayfront not too long before him, FHP having only notified them of the accident minutes before they called him. Sam had explained they got his number from Sean’s cell phone, which the FHP officer who came to their house had with him. They didn’t know the extent of Sean’s injuries, only that he was still in emergency surgery and in critical condition.

When Emery ran into the ER, they directed him back to the surgical waiting room where he found the Moritas huddled together in a corner. His fear and grief mixed with gratitude that Sean’s parents had taken the time to find his number and contact him. They both stood at Emery’s approach. Helen threw her arms around Emery and burst into tears. Sam put his arms around both of them.

“How is he?” Emery asked, worried they’d tell him the worst.

“He’s still in surgery,” Sam said. “His vitals are strong, but he’s not quite out of the woods yet.” Sam detailed Sean’s injuries as they sat, Helen huddled between them and refusing to let go of either of their hands.

“How did the accident happen?” Emery asked, relieved that Sean was alive and that the Moritas had obviously gotten over what little reluctance they might have felt about him being their son’s partner.

“The trooper said there was a witness, but he was over a quarter mile behind Sean. He said it looked like another car cut Sean off and hit the brakes in front of him. Sean ran off the road and the truck flipped several times as it went off the embankment and down into the woods. The driver’s side slammed into a pine tree. It took them nearly an hour to cut him out of the cab, they said.”

They sat and waited for more news. In Emery’s heart, suspicion grew, blossomed, flourished.

A nurse came to tell them Sean was doing well, and they would be moving him to recovery soon. From there, he would go to the surgical ICU. Emery excused himself and went outside to make a call. His body tensed, trembling, rage now coursing through his veins. Sean would likely live, but with a head injury, there were no guarantees as to his long-term prognosis. As he punched in a number, he walked down the sidewalk, away from a throng of smokers gathered around an ashtray.

When his mother’s voice mail answered, he struggled and failed to keep his voice calm. “I’m at Bayfront Medical Center in St. Petersburg, waiting for my mate to get moved to ICU. You tell that fucking son of a bitch father of mine that if I find out he had anything to do with his accident, I’ll fucking kill him with my bare hands.”

He hung up and turned his phone off.

* * * *

The nurse encouraged them to go to the cafeteria and eat. It would be at least two hours before they would be allowed to see him. She assured them she would personally come to the waiting room to get them.

Emery noticed the Moritas seemed grateful to let him take charge. He gently herded them out of the waiting room and to the cafeteria. Once they had food and were seated at a table, Sam touched his wife’s hand and gently asked, “Do you want me to call Diane for you and tell her what happened?”

Helen sniffled. “No, I did before we left. She said she’d probably come up later to sit with us.”

“Okay.” He looked at Emery. “She was supposed to volunteer today.”

From the shell-shocked expression on Sam’s face, Emery didn’t press for details. They had fully adopted him as a son, leaning on him, taking for granted he already knew what they were talking about. Despite his own heart breaking over not being at Sean’s side, he would do his best to be as strong as he could for them.

They returned to the waiting room after eating. Emery had gently coaxed both of them to eat a little despite his own stomach threatening to upend. Their previous seats had been taken by another grave-looking family. He left their information with the volunteer at the desk before guiding them over to a set of chairs on the far end of the waiting room but with their backs to the door. This time, they maneuvered him to sit between them, holding both their hands. Helen leaned in, resting her head on his shoulder.

Twenty minutes later, he started when he heard a woman’s voice. “Helen?” He looked up at the same time Helen did. Two women stood there.

“Diane, Louise, oh, thank you for coming.” She stood and hugged the first woman.

Emery blinked as he stared at the other woman. “Mother?”

Louise Nadel’s eyes widened. “Emery? What are you doing here?”

“Me? What are
you
doing here?” If this was some trick of his father’s, he’d wring the man’s neck.

“Helen and I volunteer at the hospice house. I came with Diane when she told me about Helen’s son. How do you know Sam and Helen?”

Helen looked confused. “What?” Her eyes widened. “Oh, Emery, that’s why your last name sounded familiar to me when Sean introduced you to us at dinner.”

Both Louise and Emery said, “What?”

Emery let confusion replace his anger. He scrubbed his face with his hands. “Mother, can I talk to you for a minute? Alone?”

“Okay.” She gave Helen a hug and left the Moritas with Diane.

He led her out into the hall where they’d have a little privacy. “What the hell are you doing here, Mother?”

Her brows furrowed. “I told you. Why do you sound so angry?”

“You didn’t get my voice mail? Father didn’t send you?”

“What voice mail? What are you talking about? And how do you know Sam and Helen?”

He dropped his voice to a low whisper. “Sean is my mate.”

She blinked, her eyes widening. “What? Since when?”

“Tuesday. Long story. But Father showed up at my office on Wednesday telling me I couldn’t do it. When I told him it was already done, and that we have a mate-bond—”

“
What
?”

He continued as if she hadn’t interrupted him. “He stormed out pissed off. Then he showed up at Sean’s jobsite yesterday and offered him five hundred thousand dollars to walk away from me. And now this morning, my mate is in the hospital after a car cuts him off on the Interstate.”

Her hand had flown to her mouth. “I…I don’t understand.”

“Oh, come off it, Mother. You mean to tell me Father didn’t say anything to you?”

She shook her head. “No. I’ve barely spoken to your father the past few days. I was out of town until yesterday.” She reached out to him, tears in her eyes. “You have a mate-bond with him? Really?”

He decided to give her the benefit of the doubt. “Yes. Just like a man and a woman. We can talk to each other with our minds when we’re close by.”

Tears spilled from her eyes. Her fingers plucked at his arm. “You can?”

Something’s really wrong here.
“Yes. Why does that shock you? Because he’s a man?”

She slowly shook her head. He had to struggle to hear her next words. “Because your father and I don’t even have that.”

* * * *

Emery’s mind reeled. He couldn’t think straight. He didn’t have time to question her further, however, because the nurse who had been updating them walked into the waiting room. Emery hurried in after her. When she told them they could go to the ICU to see Sean, he gathered Sam and Helen. With his mother and Diane in tow, they all followed the nurse down the hall to ICU. After a few tense moments of conversation with the staff, Helen and Sam signed papers allowing Emery full access to Sean and his medical information as his partner, and the three of them were allowed into the ICU to see him.

Emery felt grief and rage threaten to make his head explode. Sean looked pale and thin against the bedsheets, his head bandaged, face bruised and battered, right arm in a cast, and IVs and monitor leads running from him.

His doctor stepped in behind them and closed the sliding glass door. “How is he?” Emery asked, afraid to hear the answer.

At the doctor’s quizzical look, the Moritas explained who Emery was. The doctor nodded. “Well, we have very good news for you. I know I told you initially he had a skull fracture, but it seems we were wrong about that. We took another CAT scan after surgery to check for brain swelling, and now we can’t find any sign of a skull fracture.”

A giggle threatened to erupt from Emery’s throat as the doctor continued. He barely swallowed it back. “We did another one, just to be sure. There had to have been some sort of malfunction in our equipment the first time. We’re still looking into it. So I apologize for the scare.”

Emery chewed on the inside of his lip to stifle his laughter. He knew damn well it wasn’t an equipment malfunction. It was another one of the mate myths confirmed. Dolphins mated healed faster than lone dolphins. That Sean was a human didn’t appear to matter to the Universe. He barely heard the doctor’s other comments. Sean’s spleen had been removed, and his broken right arm had a plate in it, but otherwise, it looked like Sean’s injuries weren’t nearly as bad as they initially thought.

“He may be moved out of ICU as soon as tomorrow, depending on how he heals.”

“What about the ventilator?” Emery asked.

“We should be removing that soon,” the doctor said. “There’s no reason to keep him sedated now that we know his head injury isn’t as serious as we first thought. There’s no brain swelling. He likely has a concussion, and we’ll want to keep him in here for a few days, but as long as he continues to heal, he might be going home by the middle of next week.”

Emery barely kept himself from hugging the doctor. “Thank you,” he hoarsely said.

Emery walked around the bed to Sean’s head and leaned in, pressing a gentle kiss against his cheek. Then he silently spoke to him.
“Come back to me soon, mate. You belong to me and I won’t let you go. You carry my heart and soul with you.”
Aloud, he whispered, “I love you.”

He stepped out so Sam and Helen could have a moment with him before the staff set about pulling his breathing tube. The three of them returned to the ICU waiting room, where the nurse said she’d come get them once they were ready.

Emery tried to avoid his mother’s gaze, but she grabbed his wrist. “Can we please go talk for a minute?”

He didn’t want to leave. He wanted to go back to Sean, to be there when he opened his eyes. There was a quiet corner in the back of the room. “Over there.” He pointed. He pulled his wrist free and led the way.

She glanced around and turned her back to the Moritas. “How is he?”

“He’ll live,” he growled, now more convinced than ever this was more than an accident.

“I called your father.”

“You did
what
?”

She grabbed his arm again, her fingers digging in. “Listen to me, you stubborn child. I didn’t know what was going on. He didn’t tell me. And when I flat-out asked him if he had anything to do with this, he sounded distraught. He’s on his way here.”

“He’s a liar then. He tried to bribe Sean to leave me.”

She nodded. “That’s exactly why I called him. He swears to me he didn’t do anything. That he wasn’t involved.”

“He called Sean an ‘it’ in my office. Forgive me if I’m less than convinced. He cares more about the pod and his precious family legacy than he does me or Sean.”

“Please,” she begged him. “Listen to me.” Her expression hardened. He knew that look all too well, but her next words shocked the hell out of him. “If I don’t believe him, if I think he had anything to do with this, or if I find out he had anything to do with it, I will leave him. I swear upon the oceans of the Goddess.”

Stunned, he stared at her. Eventually, he made his mouth work again. “You mean it?”

“Have you ever known me to take an oath lightly, my son?”

No. Louise Nadel was a woman of her word.

His focus right now, however, had to be on Sean. “Will you interfere with me and my mate? I know how you’ve felt about me being gay.”

Her eyes turned sad. “Son, if the Goddess has blessed you with a mate-bond that even I don’t have with my husband, then I will be the last one to question it, and the first to welcome your mate to our family.”

He closed his eyes and fought the urge to burst into tears as she hugged him tightly. “Father will likely exile me,” he whispered.

“Then he’ll be exiling us both, son. And your brother and sisters.”

Emery nervously followed Sam and Helen back into the ICU when the nurse came for them. He didn’t care who saw the tears rolling down his cheeks when they stepped into Sean’s cubicle and his eyes opened.

He looked at Emery and silently said,
“I’m not letting go of you, either.”
Followed by a tired, pained smile. He whispered, “Love you, too.”

Emery let the sob escape him. He blinked away tears as he walked over to him and tenderly kissed Sean’s lips.
“You heard me.”

Emery realized his headache was now gone. He wasn’t sure exactly when it disappeared.

“I thought I was dreaming.”
He looked at Sam and Helen on the other side of his bed. “Hi, Mom. Hi, Dad,” he whispered.

Helen and Sam both smiled widely through their tears. “You scared us, Sean,” Helen said as she leaned in to kiss his forehead.

Then she made way for Sam to lean in. “Love you, son.”

“Love you guys, too.” His eyes flicked to Emery before settling on them again. “You guys called Emery?”

His mom nodded. “Your father did after the highway patrol came to the house. They had your phone.”

He smiled. “Thanks.”

Sam squeezed his hand. “Hey, if you wanted a honeymoon, you could have asked for vacation time off. You didn’t need to go to these drastic measures.”

Moans of pain punctuated Sean’s laughter. “Ow, Dad. No jokes. Please. Besides, you’re supposed to be retired.”

“Sorry, son. Looks like it’s a good thing I’m not, you goldbricker.” He smiled at Emery. “He loves his mother’s soup. You’d think he’d just ask for it instead of doing this.”

Emery couldn’t hold back his laughter anymore. Whatever happened next, they would all face it head-on as a family.

* * * *

Joseph Nadel felt sick to his stomach as he drove up to St. Pete. He started to call Erik several times, each time afraid to complete the call.

No. He wouldn’t have.

He pulled over at the southern Skyway Bridge rest area and, with trembling fingers, finally made the call.

He didn’t like the smug sound of Erik’s voice when he answered. “Hello, sir. How are you?”

“Tell me you didn’t do anything,” he whispered, even though he was alone in his car. “Tell me you didn’t do this.”

“Do what, sir?”

Joseph was no fool. He heard the false tone in Erik’s voice. “Tell me you didn’t cause the accident, dammit!”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

If Erik had been standing in front of him, Joseph knew from Erik’s tone of voice that he’d have a grin on his face. “If his mate dies because of what you did, there won’t be anywhere for you to hide. I’ll see to it myself.”

“Wh–What?” Erik’s tone had changed from confident to questioning.

“You heard me.”

“But…but you said there would only be one other option.”

Horror filled Joseph’s heart. “Yes,
exiling
my son! What did you do? I never said anything about hurting anyone!”

“But you…but you said—”

“I said it was an option for me alone. And I meant it! Only I have the ability to exile a member of our pod!” He hung up on Erik, his pulse racing. What had he set into motion? He’d never dreamed…never thought…

Now he understood the anger in his wife’s voice. Had he just lost not only his son, but his entire family? No one would forgive him if they thought he was behind Sean’s accident. He wouldn’t blame them, either.

He sped back onto the highway to get to Bayfront.

* * * *

They were only allowed a half hour with Sean before they had to leave. They could come back in a couple of hours.

Emery wanted to stay with him, but at least his mate was safe.

His mate would live.

Back in the waiting room, Emery’s mother hugged him. “I love you, son,” she whispered in his ear. “I will stand beside you and your mate, I swear it.”

He hugged her more tightly. “Thanks, Mom.”

She walked over to Helen and hugged her, then Sam. “I guess this makes us in-laws, huh?” she joked.

Helen nodded, glancing at Emery. “Emery told us he didn’t think you and your husband would accept their relationship.”

Louise sighed. “My husband, unfortunately, is a very stubborn man. Frankly, I don’t give a rat’s ass what my husband thinks. I’m done letting him speak my mind for me. If my son is happy, then that’s all I care about. I’m ashamed to admit I let my husband’s views be my own for far too many years simply because it was the easy way to maintain peace at home.”

By the time the man arrived not too long after, he faced the angry faces of his wife and son, as well as the Moritas and Diane, who had been filled in on the basics.

“Is he going to be okay?” Joseph asked.

Emery stood, his fists clenched. He wouldn’t tolerate his father ranting here, especially in front of Sean’s parents. “He will.”

His father walked over to him and in a low voice said, “I swear upon the oceans of the Goddess I didn’t order this done. I am afraid, however, I indirectly caused this.”

“Excuse us,” Emery said to everyone. He grabbed his father’s arm and dragged him out into the hall. “What are you talking about?”

He ran a hand through his hair. “Erik Chait. He’s somehow responsible. He heard me talking about another option. I meant exiling you. My guess is he assumed I meant getting rid of your mate, but, son, I swear it, I do, I didn’t know he was going to do this!”

Emery’s gut ran cold. “How do I know you’re not lying to me?”

He shook his head. “The pod be damned! I’ll pass on Alpha to you and exile myself if you’ll believe me.”

Shocked, Emery stared at him for a long moment. “You’re telling the truth?”

His father nodded.

He leaned against the wall and tried to digest that. He wanted to kill Erik with his bare hands. He’d also never seen his father this obviously distraught before. If he was willing to walk away from the pod…

He stared at the floor. “I will not give him up. He is my mate. If you want to exile me, fine. But I won’t give him up.”

His father’s hand gently clasped Emery’s shoulder. “You really can talk to him mentally?” he softly asked.

Emery nodded without looking up.

His father didn’t speak. When Emery finally looked, he saw the tears in his father’s eyes. “When he is healed,” his father whispered, “I will be first to welcome him to the full moon swim as your mate.”

Emery let his father hug him as he closed his eyes and breathed a sigh of relief. Joseph Nadel wasn’t an easy man to sway. But one of the things he’d always respected about his father, despite their differences, was his ability to admit when he was wrong.

“I love you, Dad.”

“I love you, too, son.”