Healing Gabe (Last Hangman MC Book 3) (21 page)

“Devil in disguise? Trust me, just been through that shit. Besides, Ryan has been keeping tabs on you, just don’t tell him I said that.” I can’t help but smirk and she laughs.

“He has? My lips are sealed.” She smiles, “Thank you and I might take you up on that offer one day.” She sighs.

“Here.” I scribble mine and Ryan’s phone numbers on a piece of paper. “If you need help. Call him first, if he doesn’t answer, call me and one of us will find you.”

“Thank you.” She smiles shyly.

“My pleasure. Don’t play us though, you’ll be the one left on your own otherwise. Not a threat, just a warning.”

“Trust me, I know not to mess with you guys.”

“How do you know?” I raise my eyebrow at her and rub my face, feeling faint,
I’m gonna pass out
.

“Well considering your girlfriend and best friend were sho- are you alright?” She looks at me worried.

“Dizzy.” I try to get up, but quickly fall back into the chair.

“Were you shot too?” She starts to look over my body for any wound.

“Stabbed in the back.” I groan as she touches the spot.

“Why didn’t you say so sooner!?” she asks, freaking out.

“Kinda forgot with my woman being shot.”

“I’ll be right back.” She rushes out and a few seconds after, I lose consciousness.

I hear a beeping sound that’s annoying the shit out of me, the room is dark and I have no idea where I am or what’s happened. I try to open my eyes, but they are so heavy. I feel a hand resting on my arm. Who can it be? I know it’s not Viv.
Viv.
I hope she’s made it out of surgery alright.

“Gabriel, open your eyes. I know you’re conscious,” a faint voice says.
The nurse from earlier.
I wish I knew her name. This is frustrating. Why am I in a fucking hospital bed? I try again to open my eyes but the light is burning. “You can do it, Gabriel.”

“G-Gabe,” I say, my voice raspy.

“What?” she asks confused.

“C-call me G-Gabe.”

“Alright, Gabe. Open your eyes for me. You’re talking so you can do it.” She giggles to herself.

“Light.” I frown, well I guess I’m frowning.

“What about it?”

“Too much.”

“Sorry.” I hear her move around before she comes back to me. “You can open your eyes now.” I try hard for a few minutes and finally manage to keep them open. I look around, completely confused.

“What happened and how do you know my name?” I clear my throat, looking around the room.

“Your wallet, sorry, had to look through it and you sustained a stab wound to your shoulder and didn’t get it checked, you lost more blood than you thought and you passed out.”

I groan. “Please, don’t tell any of my friends, they’ll make fun of me,” I whine, sound like a fucking child.

“Too late Brother.” Aleck chuckles and walks towards me. “How do you feel?”

“Fuckin rough. Where’s Viv? How is she?” I look between Aleck and the nurse.

“In ICU, she’ll be there for a couple of days,” she says softly.

“I-is she going to be okay?”

“She should be, yes. She’s in good hands. The surgery was difficult, but they managed to stop the bleeding and fix any damage caused by the bullet. It didn’t touch her heart so she should be fine.” She smiles softly at me.

“Right.” I sigh and rub my face.

“She will be okay, Brother. I made it, so she can too; she’s tougher than me.” Aleck pats my arm in support.

“That she is.” I sigh. “When can I go see her?”

“We can get you in a wheelchair and take you to her now.”

“Why can’t I walk? And what’s your name? I just realized I never asked you.”

“Charlotte, and because you’re still too weak. Don’t make me be mean to you.” She glares at me.

“Alright. I’ll behave.” Aleck bursts out laughing.

“When did you ever behave?” He shakes his head.

“You’re lucky I’m not allowed up or I’d fucking kick your ass.” I glare at him which only makes him laugh more. “Dickhead.”

“Ah, you love me. Come on, I’ll bring you to her.” He smiles and helps me into the wheelchair.

“This is fucking embarrassing.” I frown.

“Being in a wheelchair?” Charlotte looks at me, clearly judging me.

“No, this stupid gown is! My ass is hanging out!” I pull on it and it almost comes undone.

“Fuck’s sake Brother, don’t fucking moon me.” Aleck laughs from behind me and I wanna slap him on the head so fucking badly, but my shoulder hurts and I can’t reach him.

“Easy you two.” Charlotte giggles and leads the way to the ICU.

Once we get to the ICU, we’re told to put on special sterile outfits and I’m happy to see that pants are included in the ensemble. Aleck helps me get changed before wheeling me to Viv’s bed.

She already looks small on a normal day but on this big hospital bed, she looks fucking tiny. She is paler than usual and all the tubes and machines she’s hooked up to are making me feel uneasy and fucking worried.

It took me long enough to admit it to myself and to Viv. I am not letting her go anywhere. She has to pull through, not just for our sakes but so Annie and Jared don’t fucking win. It would be the final straw to know that even when done, they still have the power to separate us.

A lot of people would be fucking crushed if she doesn’t make it, Ayden and Ant, the club, my sister too. She really took a shine to Viv. After Annie, I never brought women home anymore, but whenever I was out with the flavor of the day and we happened to see Nic, she would give me a disapproving look and look disgusted at the woman, which often resulted in me having a massive case of blue balls because they thought I was a fucking cheat. Nic would always give her opinion, they were never nice, but I couldn’t blame her, I used to bring home the sluttiest women I could find.

I hold Viv’s small, pale hand in mine. I smile at the contrast. My hands are rough, huge and tanned in comparison to hers. She’s not cold as I thought she would be. That must be a good sign. I can’t even begin to imagine the turmoil she’s going through in her subconscious.

I’m still can’t wrap my head around Annie faking her death as a way to get out from under Viv’s shadow, when in reality, Viv was the one who felt insecure.

What I gathered from tonight is that Annie used me and never actually loved me. She only wanted to fucking hurt her sister and get her revenge. It’s fucking twisted, that’s not the Annie I remember, I can’t believe it was all a fucking act. I’ve been mourning for twelve years for nothing. I’m such a fucking fool.

All those years lost for nothing. It’s time that we can never get back and I don’t know how long I’ll have with my woman. I feel tears form in my eyes and I feel like I’m turning into a fucking woman but I don’t care. She means the world to me. She’s my saving grace.

I feel my hand twitch. I guess all this overthinking things isn’t good for me. I feel it twitch a couple more times and I finally look up and see it’s Viv’s hand squeezing mine. Aleck rushes to get a nurse. I hope this is good. I need her to start this new chapter of my life, of our lives together.

A couple of nurses come over and move me out of the way, they all stand around her blocking my view. A doctor comes over and checks her over. I hear the beeping sound of her heart monitor go crazy and fear for the worse. They talk to her in hushed voices but I can’t make out what they are saying.
This is fucking pissing me off!

After what seems like forever, Charlotte comes over to me and wheels me back to Viv.

“What happened?” I turn my head to look at her but wince.
Fucking stitches.

“Don’t move too much, you’re going to rip open your stitches. She’s waking up and she was struggling with the tube. The doctor has taken it out now,” she whispers.

I nod. “Thank you.” I move closer to the edge of the chair and hold Viv’s hand again. “Hey my beautiful Angel.” I smile softly at her.

“H-hey.” Her voice is raspy but it feels so fucking good to hear her again. I bite back a sob that’s threatening to escape my lips.

“I was so scared I’d lost you again.” I whisper, getting up slowly and leaning over her, softly brushing my lips over hers.

“I’m a tough cookie.” She smiles weakly.

“You’re my tough cookie.” I smile back, sitting on the bed next to her.

“Am I?” she rasps.

“Yes, you are.” I squeeze her hand gently.

“Final-fucking-ly!” She grins up at me.

“I’m a bit slow, what can I say.” I shrug.

“That you are. Why do you have a drip?” She looks over my shoulder at the stand that’s connected to my wheelchair.

I don’t even bother bullshitting her, before I even open my mouth, she’s glaring at me. “I was stabbed and didn’t get it checked fast enough, I lost some blood and lost consciousness.” I shrug softly.

“He passed out like a fucking pussy.” Aleck chimes in from behind me and he’s fucking lucky I’m with my woman and injured.

“Aww poor baby.” She grins squeezing my hands.

“Great, my best friend and my woman teaming up against me.” I sigh and shake my head.

“You love us.” Viv grins.

“You, yes, him? Still debating.”

“I’m wounded Brother.” He chuckles clutching his chest.

“Bite me.” I glare at him and his chuckle turns into a full on laugh.

I turn back to Viv and focus on her, the world around us fades away. Unfortunately for me, she doesn’t stay awake for very long. The nurses tell me it’s perfectly normal, that her body heals better when she’s asleep so the more rest she gets, the quicker she’ll get out of here. So for once in my life I sit down and I listen to them, resting my head on our joined hands.

CHAPTER 25

Viv

I’ve been in the hospital for close to a week and I hate it. Not just because I’m stuck in a bed and am not allowed to get up yet, but because Gabe is driving me up the fucking wall. I appreciate the fact that he’s been watching over me, but he’s worse than a momma bear. Seriously. Whenever I make one little sound he asks me if I’m okay or if I need anything, it was cute at first, now I wanna fucking bitch slap him.

I’m not blaming him though. He had to witness some crazy fucked up shit, see the wife of his friend die, even if he’s too chicken shit to admit that Sanders is his friend. H got stabbed and watched me take a bullet, it might also have something to do with the fact that my heart stopped for a few seconds the other day after surgery. I don’t know exactly what happened, but I’ve been okay ever since.

I’m not allowed a lot of visits yet, which totally sucks. Gabe has constantly stayed with me and isn’t allowing himself to catch a break. In moments like these, I wish my parents were still around. They would force him to go home and get some rest. Bloody stubborn twat, but I love him so fucking much.

I smile watching him sleep, sprawled in the chair next to my hospital bed. I don’t get how he can be comfortable on that chair; it looks tiny. Or he’s just massive, I don’t know. I so wish I could get a sharpie and draw on his face. There are a couple of problems, I don’t have a sharpie, I can’t get up and most importantly, he looks too peaceful for me to wake him up in such a way.

I don’t know how long I’ve spent watching him sleep. “It’s rude to stare.” I yelp.

“Don’t you dare scare me like that again!” I half yell.

“You were staring.” He shrugs his right shoulder and sits up rubbing his eyes.

“Well, you were sleeping and looked so peaceful, it’s a rare occasion, I wanted to make sure I’d remember it until the next one comes around.” I smile sheepishly.

“Nutter.” He chuckles.

“I’m rubbing off on you! You’re picking up on my British slang. I like that.” I grin and hold his hand as he sits closer to me.

“Knew you would.” He kisses my knuckles and my palm. “How do you feel?”

“Besides going crazy? I’m better, still sore as hell, but better. You?”

“Never better when I see those amazing purple eyes smiling back at me.” He kisses my hand. “There’s something I gotta tell you.” He sighs.

“Yes?” I look up at him, he looks nervous and unsure of himself, this is a first.

“Are you okay?”

“Yes.” He sighs. “I wrote you something while the doctors weren’t sure if you’d make it when your heart stopped the day after the surgery.” He frowns.

“I’m alright now, Love.”

“Thank fuck for that otherwise this would be awkward!” I giggle. “It’s not funny, those were the longest twenty three seconds of my life.” He sighs and buries his face into his hands.

“I’m sorry.” I stroke his hair.

“I know you didn’t make your heart stop beating on purpose. Unless you’re really evil.”

“Of course not.” I brush my fingers over his lips since I can’t sit up to kiss him. “About that letter?”

“Yeah, it explains how I feel about you, since you know I suck at doing it orally.”

“I’d say you’re pretty good with your tongue.” I grin innocently.

“Here I’m trying to be all romantic and you are making fucking sex jokes. What have you done to my girlfriend?”

“Not even sorry.” I grin innocently.

“Oh, I’m aware. Wanna read it?” he asks nervously.

“Please.” I smile and wait for him to give it to me. He pulls a folded envelope from his back pocket and hands it to me.

“Thanks.” I smile and unfold it. He’s bouncing his legs nervously as I start reading.

My beautiful Vivian,

I don’t know how else to do this, I’m not good with words. Well that’s not true, I’m good with words, well, just not good at arranging them in the right way to explain how I feel. Us together always scared me. The thought of it has always scared me, even though I had a perfect example of what true happiness could be like with my parents. After their death, I closed off and focused on making sure Nic would be happy. My own happiness left me the day they died.

Life has never been easy for either of us. We both lost a lot. Our parents, our innocence, our childhood. We were forced into worlds we weren’t destined to grow up in. It changed and shaped us in how we were around others. I never felt like I could be my true self with anyone before, except with you. I know you’ll never judge me. You’re the only person I can let see me upset or hurting, not because I’m afraid the guys won’t understand, but we’re the same, we suffered at the hands of the same evil. One look and you read me like a book.

Our lives are similar yet so different. After Nic and I lost our parents, we still had each other, no one tried to rule our lives, we were able to make our own decisions. You didn’t have such luck and if there was one thing I could change, it would be the abuse you’ve suffered because of Trent and Jared. Based on what I heard a couple of days ago, you’ve witnessed things no one should
ever
witness, especially a kid. I don’t know how you managed to stay sane all of these years, but I admire your strength. You are the strongest and most compassionate woman I’ve ever met.

You mean the world to me and having to watch over your unconscious body is killing me. I wish I could take away all that pain and hurt, but I can’t and I feel so fucking helpless.

I always knew I loved you, I just couldn’t admit it. Not because I wasn’t sure about my feelings, but because I didn’t know if you would share those feelings. I didn’t want you to reject me. I knew you were
it
for me from the very first time I laid my eyes on you. All those years, you were the only one on my mind. You weren’t in my life but you were always in my heart. One look, and you’d ruined me for any other woman. I never wanted anyone else after seeing you. I should have claimed you that night.

Looking back on what happened so many years ago, I still wonder how I never saw that Annie wasn’t into me. At the time, I thought she was being genuine.You warned me about her once and I didn’t listen to you, I’d yelled at you. You were right but I was too scared that if I ended things with her, I would never see you ever again and I couldn’t have that, so I stayed with her. Not telling you how I felt is the biggest fucking mistake of my life, I was in love with the right sister but dating the wrong one.

I’m still fucking stunned by these past couple of days. After this letter, I don’t want to mention her ever again. The reason why I never wanted to say I love you, is because the day I said it to her was the day she was taken away from us, or so we thought. After that, those words lost all their meaning. I said them because she expected me to say them. Thinking back on it, she had planned it all along. She kept asking me to tell her I loved her, but I never felt like they were meant for her. They were always meant for you. That messed with my head a lot. I didn’t know what to do or believe and I often felt that had I never told her, none of this would have happened. I swore to myself that I’d never say those words again. I couldn’t say those words to anyone, even if I had wanted to, they were only meant for you.

Believe it or not, we came back to New Orleans on the same day this year. I had spent a couple of months alone in Grand Isle, needed to be away from everything and everyone. I don’t believe in signs, but something brought us back here on the same day, pretty fucking sweet coincidence.

I was both fucking happy and fucking miserable to see you again. For so many years, I hated you, as much as it pains me to admit, but I did. Not for the reason you’re probably thinking of. I was ready to make Trent pay for what he did. I was ready to fucking end him. I had never taken anyone’s life, but I was ready. I had so much rage inside of me that I didn’t care about what I was going to do.

We arrived, you were the last fucking person I expected to see. I thought you were long gone but there you were, looking broken but as beautiful as ever. I fucking choked when I saw you and couldn’t get past the fact that you were still here. That’s the other reason why I hated you; I couldn’t understand why you hadn’t ran away. By the time we were done in that warehouse, I wanted to ask you to stay, to be with me, but then you did leave and for good. I was so fucking angry and I let my inferno of rage burn for so many fucking years.

It took me so long to get over that night, but I never got over you leaving without saying goodbye. Thinking back on it, I’m not sure I wanted you to say goodbye, a part of me needed the goodbye so I could get closure and move on but a greater part of me couldn’t handle the thought of it. A goodbye meant that we would never be. I needed to hold onto that tiny sliver of hope that you would come back to New Orleans and to me.

I still don’t know the real reason why you came back, and selfishly I hope I’m a tiny part of that reason at least. I’m so fucking thrilled that you did come back, I finally get the woman I’ve always loved and wanted .

I know things will be fucking chaos at times but I promise you one thing, I’ll never, ever let anything happen to you ever again. I’ll protect you forever and will cherish every single moment we get to spend together.

I don’t know what you want in life, if you want marriage, kids, to move away from here, whatever you want, you’ll get it. I don’t give a fuck about the cost or if it kills me, you want it, it’s yours.

I love you with every single fibre of my being. It’s time to live for us.

Gabe

It takes me a few minutes after finishing reading to be able to speak. “I just want to be happy with you. I don’t care if we get married, have kids, pets or not. All I need is you, Gabe. You make me happy. Whatever comes our way, I’ll embrace it and love it with all that I have.” I look up at him. He looks surprised, happy and shocked.

“I promise yo-”

I cut him off. “I don’t need your promises, I need your love. That’s all I’ve ever needed and that’s all I’ll ever need.”

“You’ve always had it, Viv. You stole it from me the moment I met you.” I nod. “The thoughts of Annie and I being together still haunting you?”

“Yes and no. It’s weird but it feels like I finally have closure. She was always the favorite, the sweet and innocent one. I thought that was what you loved and wanted in your life. Men seem to love that, bu-”

“At one point, I thought I was in love with her, I wasn’t. I made myself think I was in love with her because I couldn’t have you. I did like her innocence, but I liked your sassiness and brutal honesty more. You were the wild one out of the two of you and I loved that. I always looked forward to seeing you.”

I nod. “I realized something when we were held captive, she had the same insecurities as me. She wanted to be able to speak her mind like I did, and I wanted to be the one who could keep her mouth shut and never get into trouble; the perfect child. She had started to change after our parents died but it was a slow transition, I wish I had seen it sooner. I still can’t believe what she did just to make us pay.”

“You and me both.” He sighs.

“I regret all the shit that happened because I stood up to Jared, but I don’t regret meeting you, standing up for you and loving you.”

“I know.” I smirk softly.

“Cocky much?”

“Can’t deny the truth.” I shrug and kiss his cheek.

“I don’t know how to do this, Viv…”

“Do what?” I look at him confused.

“This…us…being a couple, I’m not good at this.”

“That’s not true.” I stroke his cheek.

“Yes, it is.”

“No, it isn’t, you’ve been doing the couple thing ever since we got together the first time.”

“That wasn’t being together in a relationship, we were just messing around.”

“It’s the same thing, any interaction you have with someone is a relationship of a certain nature. Just depends how you want to define said relationship.”

“Bu-”

“No buts, kiss me, Gabe.” And he does, he kisses the shit out of me. It’s the be all and end all of kisses we’ve ever shared. Twelve years of want and need poured into one single kiss. It’s the type of kiss that makes you forget your own name.