"You're my family," Grady said. "I wouldn't be anywhere else."

JAMES let himself in Mandy's apartment, sighing with relief when the door swung open without restraint. Grady's text told him it was safe. He couldn't believe it until he saw it with his own eyes.

He found Grady sitting on the couch watching Sports Center.

"Where is she?"

"She's in the shower," Grady said. "She's been in there for a long time. I think she's been thinking about stuff."

"What did she say?"

"Girl stuff," Grady said, getting to his feet. "You have your work cut out for you. The good news is, I think I softened her up. More than anything, she wants to believe you love her."

"I do love her."

"I know that," Grady said "She's just ... she's a girl."

"Is that an explanation?"

"They think differently than we do," Grady replied. "Their minds go to different places. They have different ideas. They're like aliens, man."

"Ah, good to know."

"I see you brought food."

"We're not leaving here until this is worked out," James said. "We're stuck here for the duration."

Grady patted James on the shoulder. "I cleaned her back and I covered the gauze with saran wrap so she could shower. She should be good."

"Thank you."

"You know, she's not in as much pain as you think she is," Grady said. "She's sore, don't get me wrong. What's hurting in her isn't her back, though. You've got to show her that you love her."

"I thought that's what I was doing."

"It's the alien thing," Grady said. "Showing for them is different than showing for us."

"I'm starting to figure that out."

Grady moved toward the hallway. "Lock the door behind me and reengage the chain. She won't realize anything is different until she actually sees you."

"Good idea."

Grady paused, glancing at one of the items James had left on the dining room table, an incredulous smile spreading across his face. "Is that a bouquet of stuffed sharks?"

"Bye."

"Good luck."

James knew he was going to need it.

Twelve.

James settled on the couch to wait for Mandy. He was nervous. How the most comfortable thing in his life had turned into the most worrisome thing in his life in less than ten days was a mystery.

But here he was and he wasn't going to leave until this was fixed.

He heard the shower turn off in the other room, his heart skipping a beat. It was another ten minutes before the bathroom finally opened and Mandy shuffled into the room. Her hair was damp, but she'd run a comb through it. She'd changed into a pair of flannel sleep pants and a tank top, so she was expecting a comfortable night at home a home she didn't share with him.

She looks better, James thought. The hot shower had caused her cheeks to pink up and her eyes, though red-rimmed from crying, were bright and alert.

It didn't take those beautiful blue eyes long to register the change in the room. "What are you doing here?"

"Watching TV," James replied, turning back to the television with feigned nonchalance. "What do you want to watch?"

Mandy scanned the apartment. "Where is Grady?"

"He had some place else to be," James replied. "You're stuck with me."

"You need to go," Mandy said. "I can't look at your right now. Oh, and tell Grady he's banned, too. I know he only wormed his way in here so he could let you in when I wasn't looking."

"Grady came here because I asked him to," James countered. "I needed to run a few errands, and I didn't want you alone. Plus, you needed your bandage changed. Grady said he put saran wrap over top of it to protect it from the water. I wish I had thought of that the first day when I brought you home." When this whole mess started to unravel, he added silently. "I need to get that off so the wound can breathe."

"I can take it off," Mandy said. "I don't need you to do it."

James ignored the chill in her voice as he got to his feet. "Sit in the chair and face sideways," he ordered, stepping toward her.

"You're not the boss of me," Mandy said. "I don't have to do what you tell me to do."

"Sit down," James repeated, pointing for emphasis.

Mandy chuffed out an exasperated sigh, but ultimately did as instructed. James knelt behind her, lifting the tank top she was wearing so he could get a better look at his task. He gently loosened the tape from her skin and pulled off the clear, plastic wrap with exaggerated tenderness. He then brushed a light kiss on her back next to the gauze.

Mandy shivered involuntarily as James balled up the wrap and pulled her tank top back down. James slid into the open chair at the table and fixed his dark eyes on her. "You and I need to have a talk."

"I don't want to talk," Mandy argued. "I'm so sick of talking."

"Well, we're going to do it anyway," James said. "We need to get this stuff out there and deal with it. We can't let it fester."

Mandy mumbled something James couldn't quite make out. He thought it was the word "whatever," but he couldn't be sure. Instead of sinking to her level, though, he stretched his hand across the table and captured her good hand with it. "I want you to tell me why you think I was going to break up with you."

"Ally has a big mouth."

"I want you to tell me point-by-point why you think I was getting ready to end things," James said, ignoring her attempt at changing the subject. "We're tackling this all right now. You'd better get comfortable."

"You won't even look at me," Mandy announced, immediately looking like she wished she'd kept her mouth shut.

"I look at you all the time," James said. "Most of the time I try to look at you when you're not looking back at me, though, because I don't want you to see the worry on my face. I'm not good at hiding my emotions." James had decided that honesty was the best policy here. Whether Mandy was ready to hear his brand of honesty was another story. "My emotions tell me that I almost lost you and I'm terrified. I don't want that on my face when you're looking at me, so I hide it. What else?"

"You won't touch me," Mandy said, her voice morose.

"Dr. Fitzgerald warned me that touching you was pretty much out of the question," James said. "He explained that every time you were jostled you would be in pain. Each time someone laid a finger on you, there would be pain. Every time I shifted in the bed we share I run the risk of hurting you.

"I cannot stand the thought of you ever a.s.sociating my touch with pain," James said. "I didn't like it. It's exactly the opposite of what I wanted. I figured we only had to last a week to ten days. That was not insurmountable."

"You won't even sleep next to me," Mandy grumbled.

"That's because I keep having nightmares," James said. "Every night. I have ten of them. They're all the same. I see you walk to the car. I see you stop and turn back. You're always smiling at me when the car explodes. And then, each time I manage to get to you, I find you're already dead. Then I jerk awake. I was trying to be sensitive and sleep on the other side of the bed in the hope that I wouldn't wake you. Obviously, that backfired."

Mandy's eyes were filling with tears, and James was worried she was going to start shutting down. "Tell me why you think I was going to break up with you before the party."

"Ally," Mandy growled.

"Ally was trying to help," James said. "She knew you were ... seeing things in a way that I wasn't trying to present them. So, tell me, why do you think I was going to break up with you before the party?"

"Because I asked you to go six weeks beforehand and you agreed. Then you didn't tell me until thirty minutes prior that you weren't going," Mandy shot back. "You told me that I'd ruined your fight nights with your brothers and that's what you wanted to do."

James licked his lips, keeping his face impa.s.sive as he regarded her. "I said nothing of the sort. If that's what you heard, we have another problem," James said. "I said that Grady wanted to have a fight night and we thought it was a great idea because it happened to coincide with the party a party you and Sophie were both mandated to attend. I didn't say I resented you for ending fight night.

"As for the party, I made a mistake on that one," James said. "I didn't realize how important it was to you. That was my error. If you want to be angry about that, you have a right to be angry about it. What I told you that night stands. I wouldn't hurt you for the world and I didn't mean to hurt you that night. It was a bad decision and one I'm going to be questioning for a really long time given the outcome."

Mandy was quiet as James rubbed his thumb over the top of her hand.

"Tell me the rest," James said, hoping he was getting through to her.

"You don't love me," Mandy said, her voice soft and her gaze unfocused. "You can't. My back is gross and you're disgusted by it. That's why you won't touch me. That's why you won't ... ."

"You're upset because I didn't want to have s.e.x yesterday morning," James said.

Mandy shifted her face as far away from his probing gaze as she could manage.

"Well, here's the problem with your little scenario," James said. "I did want to have s.e.x yesterday morning. That's why I climbed out of that bed like my hair was on fire. That's why I hid downstairs the rest of the day.

"I honestly didn't think you were ready," he continued. "And this goes back to the doctor's warnings about touching you. I cannot hurt you. If I thought, even for a second, that when you looked at me you remembered pain because I couldn't keep my libido in check well, I would never forgive myself."

James drew his chair closer to Mandy's, stretching her arm out and pressing her hand to the left side of his chest, directly above his beating heart. It was the same position he'd utilized to wake her in the hospital.

"Do you feel that?"

Mandy nodded mutely.

"That's yours, baby," James said, his voice cracking. "That's all yours. That belongs to you, and I'm having a really hard time understanding how you don't know that."

Mandy's resolve cracked and tears started flowing down her face. James tamped down the urge to take her into his arms and soothe everything away. He wasn't done here.

"I understand that the medication made you all wonky, and our sleeping patterns were enough to drive anyone insane," James said. "I understand that I was out of it myself, mostly from lack of sleep, but also because I was more worried about your physical needs than your emotional ones. I do not for the life of me understand how you could ever think I don't love you."

Mandy didn't answer. She was too busy sniffling and wiping tears from her eyes.

"I think my biggest problem is that you somehow seem to be a.s.sociating s.e.x with love," James said. "Because I do love you and I do love having s.e.x with you but I don't love you because I can have s.e.x with you. I love you because you're you. And, yeah, I like having s.e.x with you, baby. But, if for some reason we could never have s.e.x again, I would still love you.

"I can't help but blame myself for this," James continued. "Somehow I put too much importance on our s.e.x life and it skewed the way you look at me. You obviously think I'm some sort of animal or something."

Mandy finally reacted. "I do not."

"Then why would you think that my not wanting to have s.e.x yesterday morning was the final straw in some breakup drama you'd invented in your head?" James asked.

"Because you didn't want me," Mandy said. "You always want me. You haven't wanted me since the accident, and that changes the way I look at myself because you'll never look at me the way you used to."

James let out an exasperated sigh. "You're killing me, woman." He reached over, shifting the chair she was sitting on so she had no choice but to face him. He slipped both of his hands behind her neck, forcing her head to remain immobile as he pressed his forehead to hers. "You're always going to be the most beautiful woman in the world to me. A cut on your back doesn't change anything. Even if it never healed, it wouldn't change anything. You're having some sort of body crisis here that I'm not sure I'm equipped to deal with.

"I can only tell you one thing," James said. "I love you."

He didn't give her a chance to respond. He crushed his lips against hers, sucking whatever response had been on the tip of her tongue out with his need. He pulled away after a few seconds, shifting his lips to the side of her head. "I love you," he whispered into her ear before trailing a series of kisses across her cheek. He brought his mouth back around to hers. "I love you." He kissed her deeply, relaxing slightly when he felt her lips respond to his. He didn't stay there, though. He moved his mouth to the other side of her head so he could whisper in her ear. "I love you." He pressed a line of kisses along her tender jawline, leading his mouth back to hers for a third time. "I love you."

Mandy exhaled deeply when his mouth claimed hers for the third time. His hands were firm on her neck, not giving her a chance to escape should she try to flee. James reached his hands underneath her firm bottom, pulling her up as he got to his feet. Mandy wasn't sure what he was doing, if he was going to take her to the bedroom or the couch, but his intentions became clear when he instead lifted her up and settled her on top of the dining room table.

James' hands were at her hips, tugging the flannel sleep pants off with frenetic desire as she lifted herself off the wood surface to help him. His mouth was still on hers, his need obvious. She wasn't wearing panties underneath the pants, which was good, because James wasn't sure how much patience he had where clothes were concerned.

He unb.u.t.toned his own jeans and shoved them down. Thankfully, he'd taken his shoes off before he settled on the couch and now he could drag the jeans off the rest of the way with his feet. Once he was naked from the waist down, he shifted his hands underneath Mandy's rear, tilting her at a perpendicular angle so he could rub his length against her.

Mandy was breathing hard in his arms. A quick rub of his finger at her entrance told him she was wet and ready for him. He wished he could slow himself down, to somehow make the moment special and memorable. His need was too great right now. He'd have to go for memorable the second time around.

James positioned himself at her entrance, pushing forward as he slipped inside of her warmth. "Oh," he groaned. "Baby."

Mandy's fingers dug into the flesh around his neck, moaning at his sudden invasion. James reached up, ripping his shirt over his head with one hand as he balanced her with the other. He was purposely keeping her at an angle where he had all the power, which meant he could make sure that her back was never in any danger of being inadvertently rammed against something.

James rolled his hips in a circular motion as he pumped in and out of her. He needed to use both of his hands to keep her balanced, which meant he was going to have to stimulate her nerve center another way. The circular swing of his hips allowed his pelvis to rub against her at just the right angle which was causing her to erupt in a series of mewling sounds in the base of her throat as he slipped in and out of her.

James was close, but he fought against the ebbing tide and waited until he felt her stiffen in his arms, an o.r.g.a.s.m causing her to cry out as it washed over her. James increased his pace, following her into bliss a few seconds later.

It took him a few minutes to recapture his breath, and when James did he found that not only was he still buried inside of Mandy her arms wrapped around his shoulders as her face nuzzled into his neck but he was still hard.

Well, he'd wanted something special.

James wedged his hands beneath Mandy's rear as he lifted her up from the table. Mandy instinctively wrapped her legs around him, desperate to stay in his arms and draw in his warmth. James hoisted her up, pressing her close to his chest so he could keep himself inside of her as he walked back to the bedroom. He didn't bother to flick the light switch. The early afternoon sun was shining through the blinds in a way that cast the room into varying degrees of darkness and light.

James sat down in an upright position on the end of the bed, keeping himself buried inside of his blonde as he settled her with a thigh on either side of his waist. He lifted his left hand up behind her head so he could press her face forward, tilting it down as he sucked her bottom lip into his mouth. He wrapped his other arm around her lower waist making sure to keep it far away from her injured back, but still allowing himself the necessary relief a.s.sociated with holding her.

Mandy slipped her tongue into James' mouth, and the eldest Hardy brother welcomed it with his body and heart. They would get through this, he knew. This was just a blip. Mandy slowly started moving her body up and down on top of James, grinding her own pelvis into his to stimulate them both.