Forget Me Not (Remember Me Series) (11 page)

I smiled and shook my head. I stood and leaned in over the bed, pressing my lips to Bella’s as the security officer’s wrapped their hands around my arms. She had always been a fan of romantic movies and if she woke up now I knew she would appreciate the gesture… Just like a fairytale. One kiss from her prince and she would awaken. But there was nothing. The machines continued to beep, their sounds mingling with the muttered swearing and laboured breathing of the security officers as I fought them every step of the way.

They dragged me from the room and the last view I had of Bella was as her father shut the door in my face.

“What’s the point of causing a scene?”

The taller of the two security officers asked as he huffed in a deep breath and struggled to get a better grip on my arm.

Grinning I tried to shrug but they held me far too tightly to allow any sort of real movement.

“If the only woman you had ever loved was missing for two years and when you finally found her, she was beaten so badly she ended up in a coma, would you go quietly when they tried to drag you away from her bed?”

Neither one answered me. But they both loosened their grip on my arms a little as they escorted me to the elevators. I wouldn’t be there when she woke up. Mine wouldn’t be the first face she saw. She wouldn’t know that I had never given up looking for her… How would she know that I still loved her?

The guards brought me to the front door before they dumped me out onto the sidewalk. As they turned to leave the one that had asked me why I was making a scene slapped his arm on my shoulder before walking away.

“Sorry, man.”

I watched as they walked back into the hospital, the automatic door closing with a whoosh behind them. And then I was alone. Perhaps if I had been nicer, less abrasive they would have let me stay. Maybe if I had allowed them to sit with her alone during their visit they would have just left me be. And now I wouldn’t know. Her father was a bitter guy, there was no way he wouldn’t have me blacklisted from visiting her now.

All I could do now was go home… Go home and wait for the call that said she was finally awake. If it ever came.

CHAPTER TEN

Bella

Waking up had never before been difficult, until now. It was like being stuck in a haze, half formed memories and thoughts flitted past me. It didn’t matter how hard I tried to concentrate, nothing wanted to stick around. I was lost, I wanted to go home, feel the warmth of his arms around me.

But who was he? Even those basic things seemed beyond my grasp. I knew his smile. I knew the scent of his cologne, the taste of his skin. I knew what it felt like to hold his hand in mine, to hear his voice whisper in my ear. He was a part of me, a vital part of me and without him I wasn’t sure I would have gotten through everything. But I just couldn’t remember his name.

There were times when it flitted by. Each time I made a grab for it I missed letting it slip through my fingers like the passing sands of time. I couldn’t tell if the fog inside my head was getting worse or better. There were times when it seemed to want to suffocate me, stuffing itself down my throat, choking the air from my lungs. Only his voice kept me here, wherever here was.

He never left my side, of that I was certain and I wasn’t certain of much. He was with me, like an invisible presence, protecting me, guiding me back to him. All I had to do was follow the sound of his voice. I needed to remember his name. Part of me wondered if perhaps that was the key to escaping this limbo I found myself in. If I remembered his name then maybe I would be released. Free to go back to him. Free to feel the hard press of his lips against mine once more.

There were other memories here too. Not everything was happy, and I didn’t want to remember some of the half formed thoughts that crept up on me. Yet they were the ones that came back first. Pain, terror, the cold press of steel against my skin, I remembered it all like I was back there with him, with Christopher. Why was it so easy to remember his name? It was like some sort of sick joke. I could remember the horrors of where I’d been but not the name of the one man who held my heart. It wasn’t fair.

And then he was gone.

It was like having someone switch off the sun. He was the only thing standing between me and the nightmares that threatened to eat me alive. It was his voice, his touch that kept me from drifting away like a ballon filled with helium.

I cried for him. I didn’t know if it was a physical reaction or if it was still all trapped inside my head. I felt the loss of him and it shattered me inside. 

“Aidan.”

The word left my mouth. My eyes still felt like they were being held down with lead weights but I was just happy to be aware of my body at all. For too long it had been like a foreign entity, something I wasn’t really connected to, that I didn’t really impact.

“Sweetie, we’re here.”

A woman’s voice. It was wrong. Where was Aidan? It wasn’t his hand that took mine, it wasn’t his lips that pressed against my clammy forehead.

“Aidan.” My voice was stronger this time. I struggled to open my eyes and focus on the room around me. People stood around my bed, but they were blurred. I tried harder to focus in on them, tried harder to pick them out and put a face on them.

“Who is she looking for?”

The woman’s voice whispered and I turned towards the sound of her words. My head throbbed and every word she spoke felt more like a shout.

“I think she’s looking for that man that was here…”

A man’s voice, my father’s voice. It had to be serious if they were here.

“Bella, can you hear me, it’s Sarah?”

She gripped my hand in hers, her finger pressing against the needle that connected me to the drip. I winced, sucking a deep breath in through my teeth. I wanted to shake her off, tell her to move her hand from mine, that she was hurting me. But the only sound that left my lips was a half strangled whimper.

Of course they took this as a good sign, a sign that I was responding to them. I wanted to be happy that they were there with me, I really did. Part of me felt guilty that I wasn’t happy about it. But all I really wanted was him, was Aidan. Why wasn’t he here with me? Why hadn’t he come for me? I’d been so sure that he was with me, that he had kept me safe, kept me with him… And now that I was awake he wasn’t here at all.

Tears slipped from the corners of my eyes, running down my face to soak into my hair. I started to lift my hand to brush the damp trickles from my cheeks but someone grabbed it. My mother held my other hand and babbled about being so happy I was awake, that I was alive.

“Aidan.”

This time I forced the word to leave my lips clearer. There could be no mistaking it now, they couldn’t keep brushing it aside and I wouldn’t let them. Opening my eyes I blinked several times in the hopes that it would clear my vision and it slowly but surely it did.

“He’s not here, sweetheart, but we are, your family is here with you.”

My dad stood behind my mother, his hand on her shoulder as he stared down at me. Although his words sounded nice, there was nothing behind them, no real emotion. Of course my mother displayed enough emotion for the both of them. She was crying, tears cascading down her face faster than she could dab at them with her scrunched up tissue.

Sarah was the only one that I could see any real emotion in. Her fingers were still digging into the IV line that the doctors had given me but her eyes were filled with love. It was the first time my sister had ever really shown emotion towards me. She didn’t cry, she wasn’t the crying type but I knew as she held my hand that she loved me.

Coughing I winced as I struggled to sit up. My mother’s strong grip pressed me back down onto the bed.

“Don’t move sweetie, you’re safe here. We’ll get a doctor to come and look you over.”

She had clearly watched far too many medical dramas down through the years. I struggled against her hold, my lungs burned and for a few seconds it felt as though I was going to suffocate. There was something wrong with my lungs but I had no idea what it was. All I knew was that I was struggling to breathe and my body told me to get upright.

I swatted at her arms as she continued to pin me to the bed. My wheezing breaths growing shallower as my airways struggled. In an instant I was back in Christopher’s clutches, his hands tight around my throat as he strangled the life from me.Each time he took me to the brink before releasing me, allowing the air to race back into my struggling body before he started again.

Panic flared inside me and I lashed out, my hand catching my mother’s face. I didn’t mean to do it but I couldn’t breathe. I fought to sit upright as she fell backwards into my father’s arms, her shocked cry and subsequent sobbing drowned out by the rushing sound in my ears.

Sarah was the only one that seemed to understand the urgency. Wrapping her arms around my shoulders she hoisted me upright. The IV line ripping from my hand in the struggle but I didn’t feel it.

She pulled me to the edge of the bed, and swung an oxygen mask up to my face, pressing it over my nose and mouth. I fought to suck in deep breaths but it my lungs burned and my throat felt as though it had simply closed down. The room took on a white glow around the edges and I could feel myself slipping as I was slowly starved of oxygen.

Where was he? Where was Aidan? He should have been here, I was so sure that he had been here with me. Waking up to find him missing filled me with bitter disappointment. It tasted like ashes on my tongue and I wanted to scream with frustration.

The room exploded with activity, doctor’s in white coats and nurses pushing my family out of the way as they tried to assess what was happening to me. I struggled to tell them, I needed them to understand that I couldn’t breathe, that there was no air making its way down my throat.

“She’s obviously suffering some relapse of trauma.”

My mother’s voice rang out in the room.

“She wouldn’t hit me if she had known it was me. It’s all his fault, she was looking for him before she…” Her voice dissolved into sobs.

One of the doctors slid a needle into my arm, the pain nothing more than a mild irritation. And then I was falling, the white glow around the edges of my vision eating me until there was nothing left.

“Aidan!” I screamed his name, my body constricting as though held by tight bands of steel. If he loved me, he would hear me… If he loved me he would come.

CHAPTER ELEVEN

Aidan

Waiting to hear news on Bella was like being slowly tortured. Every time I rang the hospital they refused to give me any news on her condition. Going down to the hospital was out of the question. Her father had placed me on the black list and the moment the security guards spotted me I was immediately told to leave. I had nothing to do but sit and wait. Wait for them to give in and let me see her.

The cell phone buzzed, the number on the caller id not one that I recognised. Pressing it to my ear I waited for the call to connect.

“Aidan, it’s Sarah.”

“How is she?”

I wasn’t interested in exchanging pleasantries, all I cared about was Bella. All I wanted to know was how she was doing. She was the only thing that mattered.

“She woke up.”

“I’m coming down there.”

“Aidan, wait let me finish. She woke up, she asked for you a few times and then she ran into some complications…”

My skin ran cold, as my stomach dropped out through my shoes and into the floor. There had to be a mistake, there couldn’t be a complication. Bella was fine, she was stable when I left her side… They had to be wrong.

“What sort of complications…”

My mouth ran dry and my palms were sweating, it made it hard to hold the phone steady.

“They think one of her lungs might have collapsed. They weren’t sure until she woke up but she can’t breathe on her own…”

“I want to see her.”

Sarah sighed. “Look my parents don’t even know that I’m contacting you. And the only reason I am is because she asked for you when she woke up. But if you come down here my father will have you removed.”

“So what do you expect me to do? I can’t let her go through this on her own, you have to let me see her… I wasn’t there when she woke up the first time. You can’t keep me away from her now.”

“My parents go for something to eat at seven, if you can get down here for that time I will let you in to see her. I can’t promise it will work but I’ll do my best.”

I paused. I wasn’t going to get another chance, it was the best opportunity that I had and it was one I couldn’t miss out on.

“Fine, seven, I’ll be there. And Sarah.”

“Yeah?”

“Thanks for this.”

“Don’t thank me yet.”

She hung up and I was left staring at the cell phone. Emotions swirled within me and without thinking I stood. The small table opposite the bed was the first thing to go, I flipped it easily, my boots making short work of the weak wood. I ripped through the apartment like a tornado, destroying everything I could get my hands on. Until finally I collapsed inside the door, silent sobs shaking my body as the reality of the situation overwhelmed me.

The phone call could have been so different. All I could wish for was that I would get to Bella before something else happened. I wouldn’t be too late, not this time.

By the time seven rolled around I was more than ready to see her. The hours in between were like being trapped in a nightmare. I waited outside the hospital for Sarah to come and get me.

I watched as she waved goodbye to Bella’s parents before turning to head back inside. Following her I quickly caught up to her and grabbed her arm. She spun around, fear flickering into her eyes for a moment before she realised who I was.