Star of His Heart - Brenda Jackson [76]
“Daddy!” Without a moment’s hesitation Syneda left Netherland’s side and went straight into her father’s outstretched arms. And there she cried the tears she had tried so hard to fight back, while he held her and gave her comfort as only a father could.
Dr. Goldstein returned half an hour later. “Mrs. Madaris?” When he saw about four ladies getting ready to respond, he clarified by saying, “Mrs. Clayton Madaris.” He smiled at Syneda. “I’ve told the nurses to let you go on in to see Clayton for a few minutes. Right now I only want him to have visitors one at a time every two hours. Once he regains consciousness, then he can have more.”
Moments later Syneda entered the small room where Clayton lay quiet, still. His face looked bruised, cut and swollen, and his body was attached to an assortment of machines. She spent the next half hour with her husband, talking to him, telling him how much she loved him and making promises she intended to keep if he regained consciousness.
“Put those promises in writing, will you?”
Syneda snatched her head up and looked at Clayton. He had spoken. And he was looking at her. Tears clouded her eyes when she took her husband’s hand in hers after buzzing for the nurse. “You can have anything you want, Madaris,” she said, smiling happily through her tears. “Anything.” The only thing she could think about was that he was no longer unconscious.
“What about a new set of golf clubs?”
The corner of Syneda’s lips tilted into a grin. “Maybe I should clarify by saying, anything within reason.”
Clayton tried to smile but it was obvious the effort was painful. “I’m still holding you to that promise of cooking more.”
Before Syneda could tell him that he must have been hearing things, the nurse arrived. “He’s awake and talking,” Syneda said, smiling to the older woman. “Please tell everyone that he’s regained consciousness.”
The woman nodded and quickly left the room.
“How about a kiss?” Clayton asked.
Syneda ran her fingertips lightly over her husband’s bruised jaw. “How can you think about kissing at a time like this? You just regained consciousness.”
“So? How can I not think about kissing? I nearly lost you and the baby.”
More tears sprang into Syneda’s eyes. She brought his hand to her lips and placed a tender kiss on his knuckles. “No, sweetheart, we nearly lost you. Don’t you ever pull a stunt like that again, Madaris. Do you hear me?”
“I hear you but I ain’t listening. I’ll do it all over again if I thought it would keep you and my baby safe.” He was silent for a moment, then said, “I need that kiss, Syneda.”
On tiptoe she leaned over the bed and gave her husband the kiss he wanted.
And that was how his brothers, sisters and parents, as well as her father, found them. They were still kissing and from the way things looked, they had no intentions of stopping anytime soon, with or without an audience.
Dex Madaris shook his head, grinning. “Why doesn’t it surprise me that the first thing Clayton wanted to do after nearly coming back from the dead was to suck face with somebody?”
“And why doesn’t it surprise me,” Justin Madaris decided to add, “that his wife was so eager to oblige him?”
Marilyn Madaris smiled happily. A weight had been lifted off her heart now that she saw her youngest son was all right. She leaned back against her husband’s strong, solid chest. “Probably because those two are so evenly matched,” she said in response to her sons’ comments. “I think we can all agree that Clayton and Syneda were made for each other.”
Jada nervously looked at the man sitting next to her in the car. It seemed that they had been driving for hours. He had taken the sock out of her mouth a hundred miles back after feeling fairly comfortable that it wouldn’t matter if she took the notion to scream her head off. They were nowhere near civilization.
“Where are you taking me, Tony?”
Momentarily taking his eyes off the road, he looked over at her with a sardonic look on his face. “Someplace where no one will ever find you. You’ve been a bad girl, Jada, a very bad girl.