The next hours of Rhys' life drew out for years, or so it felt. He had only felt that way once before when he had received the call about his parents and sister and had rushed to the hospital. But he hadn't been at the car crash to witness any of those horrors as he had now done with Feyre.
The scene replayed in his mind a thousand times over as the SWAT team had run in and had arrested Amarantha. Someone had gone to Feyre and had checked her, had felt a feeble pulse, and had stabilized her head until she could be loaded into an ambulance. Rhys had ridden with her after calling Thesan, providing what information he could about Feyre's name, birth date, anything he could that might help them. No, he didn't know about allergies. No, he wasn't sure about any adverse reactions to drugs or to latex. No, he wasn't sure about any past procedures but he could assume they were few and far between with her family and after.
Then as she was whisked away from him in the hospital by Thesan himself and he had waited for hours in the waiting room. Azriel had joined him after two hours, claiming first watch after he had turned over every video he had of Feyre to the police for their investigation and gave them Amren's name for charges.
After six hours, Cassian traded out with Azriel, bringing breakfast and coffee with him.
Another two hours saw Rhys pacing the waiting area. No one had come to talk to him. Not a single person. He had asked once at the desk for an update and had been told she was still in the operation room and a note said Thesan himself would come check in when things went one way or another. It hadn't been reassuring and he couldn't take Cassian's commentary on the news playing on the television anymore.
After another hour, another face joined them and Rhys stopped himself from growling at the sight of Lucien Vanserra.
"Any news?" Lucien asked Cassian.
"Still in the O.R. with Thesan himself," Cassian replied. "You made your report?"
"Just came from the station," Lucien confirmed. "Provided them with Amarantha's every move that I could account for and everything she had personally done. Gave names and dates as much as possible. Anything to help Feyre."
"Why take her in the first place?" Rhys turned to Lucien. "You were at the hotel that morning. You took her."
"I honestly thought she was in greater danger with you. Amarantha promised she'd give her over to Tamlin but then she locked her away. Tamlin just went with it. Stayed stone faced the entire time. I don't know how he did it. I thought he truly cared about her, but perhaps he was broken," Lucien shook his head.
"Did you not notice her nail marks on the conference table or the conference room door around the lock? Or the head sized dent in the plaster at Feyre's height in the same conference room? How about did you notice he broke her wrist and told her she couldn't leave when he was killing her slowly?" Rhys demanded.
Lucien watched him, his golden biomechanical eye widening and narrowing with a quiet whir. Then he looked away. "I thought, I don't know," Lucien's eyes closed. "I thought he loved her and he'd get better once Amarantha finished with what she was doing. But Feyre left and she went to you. You're the terrible enemy and all I've ever seen is how you hurt people, how you enjoyed being with her."
"He didn't enjoy it in the least," Cassian cut in, his hazel eyes dark. If anyone could remember how broken Rhys had been, it was the man that had punched him out of jumping to his death.
"I know. Feyre told me when I went to give her an antibiotic shot for the infection setting into her broken bones," Lucien turned. "I almost lost my other eye to her, but it would have been worth it."
"So you decided to trust me," Rhys murmured. "And somehow got my phone number."
"Feyre. She gave it to me so I could call you in case she didn't make it," Lucien shifted in his seat. "She didn't know I was planning to contact you with hopefully enough evidence to get rid of the Red Bitch for good."
"It was enough to get the police moving fast," Cassian replied.
"Well, I know I'm not wanted here, but if someone could call me when she's out. I'd like to know one way or another," Lucien flicked a card out.
"Are you headed back to Tamlin?" Rhys asked.
"Unlikely. He knows by now that I just wrecked his deal with Hybern to tear you apart," Lucien shrugged.
"If you find yourself in need of a place, I'm sure we could find one for you. As repayment for getting her out and trying to take care of her in there," Rhys murmured. He didn't look at Lucien, but he heard him pause. Heard the stuttered breath. And then…
"Thank you. I'll consider it." Then Lucien was gone and Rhys was left to wait once more.
Two hours more and then Thesan finally stepped out, looking every bit as exhausted as Rhys felt. He hadn't changed out of his scrubs. There was blood, Feyre's blood on his sleeves, but Rhys pushed that thought from his mind.
"Your girl is one very lucky person, depending on how you look at it. Normal a broken neck spells out instant death," Thesan started. "But it didn't in her case. So then we look to possible paralysis. Somehow the spinal cord didn't see any damage so I have hope she might be set with a little physical therapy."
Rhys took in the information. He hadn't even considered that Feyre could be paralyzed from the neck down at worst if she did live. But it seemed like that wasn't too much of a concern.
"Why would she be considered lucky 'depending on how we look at it'," Cassian cut in.
"She had multiple breaks and injuries I had to address. It's why we had to take so long. If she wakes and isn't paralyzed, she will be in pain, a lot of it, for a long time. She was malnourished in her time she was trapped, and there was a mild infection but it appears there was something worse before that. So perhaps Amarantha didn't want her to die of infection quickly, as horrible as it sounds."
"So, now what?" Rhys asked softly. "How do we proceed from here?"
"Feyre goes into the intensive care unit for the night, at least one night, until she is fully stable. Then she moves to a room," Thesan explained. "When we feel comfortable with her going home, you can take her."
"She needs a private room. And I don't know if she has insurance, but I'll pay her bills," Rhys promised.
"She'll have one. She's being treated as if she were high profile because of her connection to you," Thesan promised.
"She is high profile. She's a majority shareholder of Nox Industries," Rhys pointed out.
Thesan's eyes went wide at that bit of news Rhys hadn't shared with anyone beyond his inner circle. Then he nodded. "Of course, I'll make sure she's completely taken care of."
"When can I see her?" Rhys demanded.
"In an hour when she's settled into a bed. I'd suggest letting a nurse show you to an open room to steal a shower and a pair of scrubs. It will go over better in the ICU," Thesan promised.
"I'll go report back to the others," Cassian promised Rhys. "And someone will bring an overnight bag for you."
"My laptop too. I believe I'll be working from here for the foreseeable future," Rhys turned to look at his brother who only nodded.
"If Feyre wakes when I'm not here, tell her I expect to see her at her desk soon. The elevator has worked far too many days in a row." Cassian's voice came out a bit choked and Rhys was almost surprised his brother had made the connection between Feyre and his faulty ID cards but wasn't plotting revenge. Rather he seemed to be upset it had stopped.
"Of course," Rhys promised. Then he followed Thesan to the nurses' station and let the nurses lead him away from the waiting room.
It wasn't until he was dressed in a full set of scrubs and shown into a private room in the ICU that Rhys really let any of the terror of the last twelve hours catch up with him. Feyre was on the bed before him, bandaged and with wires and tubes connecting her to various machines.
He could hear a soft beeping coming from one and looking up to see it monitoring her slow heart rate and another monitoring a steady brain activity. When he had looked over the entire amount of damage he could see above the covers and what each monitor did, he looked to her face. Her beautiful face that looked so dead. Even in her sleep she had expression. But now she was waxy where her skin wasn't bruised, and her mouth was set into a straight line. No hint of a smirk or a frown as he often saw in her sleep. Nothing but the monitors to tell him she was alive.
Slowly, Rhys sank into the chair next to Feyre's bed. He reached for her hand, careful of the IVs in place on the back of it, and tried to give it a squeeze. She didn't squeeze back. Whether it was because she was too far away in her unconscious state to register it was him holding her hand, or she couldn't feel it at all from paralysis, he didn't know. But the pain that struck him deep in his heart left him sobbing against the side of the bed. She was an artist and there was a chance she would never paint again.
Rhys woke and slept on and off against the side of Feyre's bed, only leaving to use the restroom and to eat when the nurses gave him one too many glances that told him they were about to call someone about him. He doubted he slept more than half an hour at a time, but he doubted it would be more than that until Feyre woke.
Mor came with his overnight bag packed far too full and his laptop so he could work from the hospital. He gave it a valiant effort to read emails and reply and to look through reports, but his mind stayed focused on the soft beeping of the monitors, searching for any sign of change, good or bad.
The next morning, they were moved to a private room that would rival some hotel rooms. Feyre held a larger hospital bed, proof they didn't plan on having to move her any time soon. It gave her space to spread out if needed. She had a desk that could pull over her bed as a table and swivel away when unneeded. For everyone else in the room there was a large, comfortable couch built into the wall alongside several very large windows with a cityscape view, though they were high enough up that no noise from the streets below filtered in. A table with four chairs occupied one area of the room with a large television set to watch anything Feyre or he might desire on current television or hundreds of movies to order. And there was a bathroom, built with a deep tub, a rain shower, and plenty of space for someone to help Feyre maneuver if she ever made it inside.
Rhys set up his work station next to Feyre in an armchair he didn't plan on moving from the spot next to the bed. His family made sure he was kept company as they cycled through during each day and usually brought food to make sure he didn't starve while he barely left Feyre's side. Thesan stopped in often too, checking on Feyre's bandages that were to be changed every few days and the progress of her stitches and casts.
Feyre slept for three straight days and Thesan assured him it was likely for the best. She was sleeping through the worst of the pain. Instead of a ten on the pain scale, she would wake and maybe feel an eight. It didn't sound much better but it was something. So Rhys waited, listening and waiting for warning signs about things that didn't seem to come.
Rhys woke in the dim lighting of the hospital room, noting that it was still late at night or far too early in the morning. They only dimmed the lights in the room when they had deemed it time to sleep. So he had taken up his position against the side of Feyre's bed, his hand holding hers. But something had woken him. A gentle touch at the side of his hand that still rested on the bed jolted through him. He looked down at his hand to see Feyre's fingers no longer in his own, but alongside of his hand, twitching slightly as her arm moved a fraction of an inch at a time. She wasn't paralyzed in her arms, he realized. She could move them. She could twitch her fingers. She would be able to paint again.
Slowly he dragged his eyes up to her face, expecting her to still be sound asleep but his violet eyes met her blue gray and wave after wave of emotion crashed over him. Feyre was awake. She was awake and moving her arm and her fingers. Not much, but he didn't expect that. After all she had endured the Mother and the Cauldron had given him some sort of miracle in seeing her alive and relatively unharmed.
"Feyre," he breathed out her name. Her mouth twitched slightly at that into a shadow of the smirk he adored on her face. "I want you to know how much I love you. There have been so many times I've wanted to say it and then I almost didn't get the chance." He reached for her hand once more and pressed a kiss against the back of it.
"I- lo-ve you… too," Feyre rasped out.
"You don't have to talk yet," he promised. "You're in pain. I'm very much aware of that. You will be for a while." He stole a moment to savor as Feyre's fingers contracted around his in a slight pressure back. "Wiggle your fingers for me." She did. "And can you do the same with your toes?" He looked down to see the covers twitching and couldn't help the smile that overcame his face.
"Would you take back your declaration if I couldn't?" Feyre rasped out.
"No," he promised her. "I will always love you. Even if you couldn't do more than tell me off with that wicked mouth of yours." He earned a smirk in reply that quickly turned into a wince. "I'll see what we can do for the pain."
He stood and went to find a nurse, who quickly chastised him for not being asleep when he didn't sleep much as it was as she chased him back into the room.
"I told you Miss Archeron will wake when she wakes and you can stop bothering us," the nurse scolded him.
"Actually," Rhys beamed at the nurse. "Feyre is awake and she seems to be in pain." He gave a pointed nod to the bed where Feyre's eyes were trained on them, though her neck was still braced to keep it from moving.
"Oh," the nurse gasped out. "Oh!" She announced after a moment. "Miss Archeron, you're awake."
Rhys almost laughed but didn't as the nurse seemed to realize she was truly awake. Just like Rhys had asked Feyre to do, she had Feyre wiggle her fingers and then her toes. Touched each of them and asked if the touch could be felt. When Feyre passed every test, the nurse promised to bring something for pain.
"You haven't been sleeping?" She murmured out to him when the nurse was gone.
"Not much," he admitted. "I've been far too worried about you." He took his place up in his chair and reached for her hand once more. "I can't wait to get you home where I can hold you all night."
"I miss sleeping with you," she whispered back. "But I suppose it will be a while."
"Soon, Darling. Then I don't know if I'm ever going to let you go," he stood to press a kiss to her mouth.
"Feyre, it's good to see you awake," Thesan's voice came from the door to break them apart. "I hear you're in some pain."
Thesan talked Feyre and Rhys through the drug he was about to put in her IV and then happily chatted with her about the good news of her healing body while the pain medicine took effect and lulled Feyre back to sleep.
"This is only for night," Thesan promised Rhys. "There will be other medications that doesn't make her sleep so easily tomorrow, though she might sleep anyway. A healing body takes a lot of energy from a person."
"When I take her home," Rhys started, unsure of how to ask what he wanted. But he figured it was best to just blurt it out and wait to be told no. "Can she sleep in our bed again or should I have her sleep on her own?"
"Let's see where her neck injury is before she goes and other broken bones before we talk about what restrictions we need in place," Thesan promised. "I was about to head home for the night. I'll check in tomorrow morning."
"It is tomorrow morning," Rhys pointed out as he saw the clock on the wall told him it was 2 AM.
"The wonders of being the CEO," Thesan chuckled. "My husband doesn't necessarily enjoy that I'm here this late either."
"Have a good night, Thesan. And thank your husband for putting up with your hours for me. I appreciate you being on hand for Feyre," Rhys bowed his head. Thesan simply gave him a smile and left.
Rhys waited a moment before he settled back into his chair, took up Feyre's hand once more, and rested his head against the side of the bed. He found he could breathe easier now. Feyre had beaten all odds. Amarantha breaking her neck hadn't killed her instantly and hadn't paralyzed her. He'd be remembering that with every prayer to the Mother he would ever think of for the rest of his life.