Love Him Breathless

  Love Him Breathless

  Book Two of On The Market

  E.M. Lindsey

  Love Him Breathless

  E.M. Lindsey

  Copyright © 2020

  All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof

  may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever

  without the express written permission of the publisher

  except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any events, places, or people portrayed in the book have been used in a manner of fiction and are not intended to represent reality. Any resemblance is purely coincidental.

  Cover by Amai Designs

  Art by Marceau

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Epilogue

  Coming Soon

  Afterword

  Also by E.M. Lindsey

  About the Author

  Whenever people agree with me, I always feel I must be wrong.

  Oscar Wilde

  Chapter One

  “Keep going, Mr. Fitzgerald.”

  His fingers squeezed the stress ball, but the pain seared through his burns, and it was enough to make him want to vomit. His words came out more grunt than speech. “I can’t. It hurts.”

  Not for the first time, Fitz wanted to punch his therapist in the mouth when the guy laughed at him. It was a gentle chuckle, full of old man voice since the guy had to be almost a hundred. “I know, son, but pain is a good sign. It means those nerves are still working.”

  His therapist looked frail, but Fitz had come to realize appearances were deceiving in the hospital. Dan looked like a pile of thin skin and fragile bones, but he managed to hold Fitz up without wavering when the pain made his knees collapse.

  Only days away from his fifteenth birthday, and Fitz was going to spend it in the burn unit of the Denver Pediatric Rehabilitation Center. Fitz mostly thought of it as actual hell, because his skin felt like it was on fire all the time. They’d taken him off the stronger pain meds by the time he was released from the ICU to the rehab center. He spent a lot of time crying after that—and he had never been the kind of person who cried. His dad hated when he did—would get angry about it—so Fitz had become an expert at choking it all back.

  When he was alone though, he did. A little. When he was lying in the bed staring at the ceiling and unable to do anything except feel all the places his skin ached—all the places which had burned away and were sort of re-growing into thick, shiny tissue under long strips of clear plastic adhered to the parts of him that hadn’t crisped off—he let the tears fall. He didn’t sob though, or make a noise. He just lay there until the sides of his pillow were wet and his chest wasn’t so tight.

  By the time either of his parents got there in the morning, he was back to himself again.

  “He’s going to have to relearn a lot of his fine motor skills,” his doctor had warned both his mom and dad at his first assessment, back when he was being pumped full of morphine and parts of him were still seared black. “And it’s going to take a while. He’ll need surgeries, skin grafts, and then we can assess his range of motion. Right now, we just want to prevent an infection.”

  “How bad can it get?” his dad demanded.

  The doctor sighed and shook his head. “Worst case scenario? Amputation.”

  Fitz knew that wasn’t the worst case. His best friend in the world had only one arm and there was nothing sad or sorry about Parker’s life. The worst case was dying, and he almost had died. If it hadn’t been for Ronan’s quick thinking, he’d have choked to death on the smoke long before the fire ate him alive. Even now, after all this time, he was still on oxygen and his voice was still a barely-there whisper. Losing his arm, he thought on days when the pain was too much to bear, might have been a blessing.

  He was high on painkillers, but not high enough to miss the way his parents looked at him with some measure of relief and disappointment. He was a good kid. How had things gone so wrong? How had he been so careless? He’d been on more Scout camping trips than he could count anymore, and this wasn’t the first time he’d gotten hurt. He’d busted his collarbone taking a dive into shallow waters when Parker dared him to during their kayak expedition, and in seventh grade he’d broken several toes on a hike when Ronan tripped him into a ditch.

  Even in elementary school, he’d come home banged up and bruised and filthy and thrilled. His mother used to joke that her little Edmund had a guardian angel watching over him. Well, the angel must have been stoned on the job the night of the fire, because all he’d done was turn over in his sleeping bag and knock over a lantern.

  Really, it was a freak accident. Ronan had gotten a note from the girl he’d been crushing on, and she said she wanted to meet by the docks. “I think she actually likes me,” he said, grabbing Fitz’s arm. “Please, dude. Please just leave the lantern on so I don’t break my damn neck trying to get back in the tent.”

  Fitz hated trying to sleep with the light on, and he knew if Paul, their Scout leader, checked on them, they’d both get in a ton of trouble. But they were in high school now, and Tiffany was a big deal. She was on the cheer team and she’d dated a senior during their first semester, and Fitz wanted that for his friend. So, they’d hung one of Fitz’s shirts by zippering it into the tent flap and made a little dome over the lantern that wouldn’t get too hot, but would block out most of the light.

  Then, Fitz listened to Ronan’s footsteps as they faded off toward the lake. He went to bed with a smile on his face, happy for his best friend, even though there were rocks poking into his back and pine needles creeping through the layer of tent tarp and padding on the floor.

  He closed his eyes and imagined his own secret rendezvous, but it wasn’t with Tiffany or any of her high-ponytail-wearing friends. No, his rendezvous would be taller than any of those girls, with a flat chest and heavy arms, and thick fingers. There might even be a little beard scruff as his fantasy lover leaned in and kissed him. The thought carried him to sleep.

  It was just a fluke, really. He was growing and unaware of how long his legs were. They hit the lantern, and the sleeping bag was ablaze before he woke up. The smoke was so thick, he was dizzy from lack of oxygen, and people were screaming, but the shirt jammed the zipper and no one—in all of their panicked state—could figure out how to get it open.

  Fitz was unconscious by the time Ronan got back—drawn by the flames and the smoke. He found out later Ronan could barely breathe, but he was the first one to pull out his pocketknife and slash the tent to ribbons, yanking Fitz out by what was left of his hair. It was mostly singed off, and even months later, still smelled like death.

  The burns were mostly on his neck and right arm where he’d curled on his side to protect the rest of himself. He didn’t remember doing it—at least, not more than shoving his face into the crook of his left arm before it all went dark. He woke up a week later after being taken off meds, and he swore in that moment, it would have been better if he had died.

  Before being given to Dan’s rough but friendly hands for PT, Fitz was stuck in the hospital bed with a morphine drip and bored out of his mind when he wasn’t sleeping. He missed his parents, h
e missed his sister. Mostly, he missed his friends, though it was obvious things would never be the same for them again. Ronan had come twice in the early days when Fitz was barely aware of what was going on. He’d leaned over and taken Fitz’s hand and murmured something he didn’t understand. It was clear after a while though that Ronan had cut him off. He quit coming by, and Parker was the only one from their tight-knit friend group who bothered to show up after that.

  “If they cut it off, we can be stump bros,” Parker had told him with his faint Norwegian accent, waving his own stump at him, “but mine will always be prettier.”

  “You’re a dick,” Fitz snapped, but they both smiled, and it was one of the few times Fitz did.

  He hated the hospital, and he missed not being in pain all the time. He missed real showers, and he missed being able to use his hand. He missed the way his parents used to trust him and not treat him like he was an infant.

  And he missed not doing this stupid fucking occupational therapy.

  It wasn’t even complicated—not yet. He knew at some point he’d have to use his fingers again and try to do stupid stuff like pick up bobby pins and pennies. But right now, all he had to do was lift his arm up toward the ceiling and squeeze the stress ball—and that was enough to send him to his knees in agony.

  “It’ll get easier,” Dan said, and Fitz wanted to hit him again, but he didn’t have the strength, “but we can stop now. Come on, up you get.”

  Fitz grunted as Dan hauled him to his feet, and he took a few shaking steps on his own before he regained his equilibrium. His upper thigh sustained a few burns, but not enough to keep him off his feet. Dan walked at his elbow as they called it a day and went back to his room, and Fitz hated that he was grateful for the assist onto the bed.

  Stretching out, Fitz lifted his hands so Dan could replace his blankets, and he caught sight of the compression sleeve on his arm and winced, glancing away from it. He wasn’t ready to accept it as a reality—not yet. Maybe not ever. The thought of having everyone see, of having to explain for the rest of his life, made his stomach twist.

  “Chicks dig scars,” Dan told him as he caught Fitz’s expression.

  Fitz gave him a flat look. “Do they pay you to sound like Chicken Soup for the Angsty Teenage Soul?”

  Dan’s lip quirked up in a half smile. “Your parents don’t give you enough credit.” Normally by this point, Dan would leave. It wasn’t his job to do anything except see Fitz back to his room. He had Dan for the occupational stuff, nurses for the gross stuff, and a therapist for the anger stuff, and doctors to make sure he was going to remain in the same pieces he was in now. Mostly. But for all that Dan brought pain, Fitz liked him best. He was the grandpa Fitz might have had if his parents hadn’t waited until they were thirty-five to start having kids.

  “They’re just mad because this was my fault. I’ve been a Scout since I was five. I knew better.”

  Dan hummed softly. “Yes, but nine years in Scouts doesn’t make you immune to stupid decisions.”

  Fitz didn’t answer him. He wasn’t ready to be absolved of his responsibility in what happened to him. Mostly because he knew Ronan’s absence was him trying to take the lion’s share of the blame, because he’d never been someone who was willing to divvy that up equally between them. Ronan was a person who turned self-deprecation into a fucking artform.

  “I was in the war. I ever tell you that?” Dan asked.

  “The Civil War?” Fitz mocked.

  Dan laughed. “Amongst others. Vietnam, actually. I got lost in the jungle for two weeks—nearly starved to death. Villagers helped me out after the cut on my foot turned gangrenous. I was nearly dead by the time they found me and got me home.” Dan had showed Fitz his prosthetic before, but it felt like he was seeing it for the first time now as he pulled up the leg of his scrubs. It was old and it was clunky. It attached at the thigh and had an awkward bend in the knee that made Dan walk with a heavy limp.

  “Is this where you tell me that I should feel lucky I didn’t lose my arm? Because my friend Parker has a fake arm and he beat the shit out of Craig Silvestri last year before the guy even got to throw a punch. He’s a lot cooler than most people with two arms.”

  Dan chuckled, that low, raspy sound like his breath had to fight its way out of his chest. “By the time you’re my age, they’ll probably be able to grow limbs in a lab. Losing a limb isn’t the end of the world just like those scars aren’t. Just like that pain you feel isn’t.”

  Sometimes Fitz wondered if the pain was going to last forever, but already, parts of him were numb. He couldn’t feel his fingers anymore. His nerves were destroyed, but he wasn’t going to lose them, like it was some kind of consolation prize.

  “Do you ever think that sometimes things like this happen because you’re…not right?” Fitz’s parents were kind, but they were strict. They were regulars at the Cherry Creek Baptist Church every Sunday, and his mom went every Wednesday night for Bible study. They said they’d love him no matter what, because Jesus loved him no matter what. But did it count if he liked boys?

  Dan gave him a lingering stare, then patted his thighs before pushing to his feet. “Sometimes bad things happen, Edmund.”

  He hated when he was first-named. “To good people?” he finished.

  Dan laughed again and shook his head. “To people. Bad things just happen. It doesn’t matter what those things are, it just matters how we choose to live afterward.”

  Fitz waited until Dan was almost at the door before he called out after him, “Why aren’t you a therapist if you got so much advice?”

  Dan didn’t answer. He just turned his head a little and smiled.

  When he was alone, Fitz stared up at the ceiling and let his breath fall from his chest in a heavy sigh. He didn’t cry though—not this time. He wanted to hit Dan again for saying something so stupid, but mostly because what Dan meant by those words had burrowed deep in his chest. Maybe his sin wasn’t liking boys or not paying close enough attention to regulations and rules.

  Maybe, his biggest sin was not being himself enough.

  It didn’t take long for Fitz to recover, once he was allowed to go home. He still had to drive down the hill for therapy, but he got to finish out his last years of high school with Parker by his side, and after a while, people just stopped asking about his scars. He couldn’t play sports anymore, but he took up swimming, and he dated a little, and he considered his future.

  He ended up at the community college in the end—to get his EMT certification and join the fire department. Life was just different after high school. It was clear Ronan had written off their friendship, and Parker had gotten into medical school a thousand miles away which likely meant he was never coming back to their small town. He’d never been a man of big dreams—he just wanted something soft, something simple, and Cherry Creek was it for him. Maybe he wasn’t the kind of man who was destined for grand, passionate love affairs, but he was okay with that too. There was a sort of comfort in reliable loneliness—if he was the only one in his life, there was no one else to let him down.

  Then, the winter he turned twenty-three, a tall, gorgeous man rolled into town with his older brothers who were setting up shop with a law office and some real estate. His name was Chance Garcia, and he had rich brown eyes and a contagious laugh, and he seemed to actually like Fitz.

  It was just friendly at first. Until it wasn’t. Until Chance pressed him against the wall of the alley behind the Cherry Creek Tavern and kissed him. Fitz had kissed back with a nervous desperation because he wasn’t the kind of guy who expected someone to just jump on him. He wasn’t unattractive, but he wasn’t delusional about the fact that his scars made him different.

  Chance wasn’t like other people. Chance stared at him without staring. Chance smiled at him and laughed at his dumb jokes and liked to fuck him late at night over his brother’s desk, leaving come stains on real estate listings.

  And it was good. It was good for a long time. It was
perfect, until Fitz opened his fat mouth. “I think I’m in love with you.”

  Chance hadn’t laughed at him, hadn’t reeled back in disgust. He just touched Fitz’s cheek and sighed. “That’s not going to work out well for either of us.”

  And it didn’t. Chance broke up with him the next week, and Fitz moped for a month. In mid-December they ran into each other at the winter fair—Chance with two cups of hot chocolate like an apology and a kiss on his lips.

  “We can’t be together,” Chance told him as Fitz dropped to his knees behind the fire truck. No one was around, but anyone could walk in, and that made it a little thrilling. Chance dug his fingers into Fitz’s long hair, gripping it by the bun. “I can’t be with you the way you want me to.”

  “I still love you anyway,” Fitz had told him—and it didn’t feel like a lie, but it tripped off his tongue like it was one. He didn’t second guess it though, because he never second guessed himself. He was willing to just take whatever Chance had to give then, which at that moment was his throbbing dick.

  Fitz swallowed it down and sucked until Chance gave a muffled shout against his fist and came.

  They fucked a lot after that, but they were never together again. Years passed, and it was fine, and Fitz thought maybe life was just going to stay that way forever—but that was his own fault. It was small town mentality, getting stuck in a loop. He felt like he’d been sucker-punched when Chance had taken him down to one of the lake cabins, fucked him raw and bare, and then told him he was leaving.