Jackson's POV
When I reached the door to her room, I froze.
Nate was already there.
He stood at the end of her bed, gently massaging her feet through the thin hospital blanket. His anger from earlier had transformed into something tender and protective. Bella's face was barely recognisable—swollen and mottled with bruises in shades of purple and yellow, stitches running along her brow like a broken seam. Her left wrist was tubi-gripped. Each breath she took seemed to cost her effort.
She looked so small in that hospital bed. So fragile.
Nate was murmuring something I couldn't hear, his voice low and soothing. Whatever he was saying made her fingers twitch slightly—the barest acknowledgment that she heard him.
They had always had this connection, deeper than friendship. A bond forged
