Twenty-Two

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Samantha's POV

I couldn't even breathe; it felt like I was dreaming.

"Samantha are you okay?" Trent asked concern fIIIing his voice.

"You need to take me to the closest hospital." I said in almost a whisper.

Trent was puzzled, but he didn't question me.

I dug out my phone in the little purse that I brought, and dialed Alex's number.

"Hello?"

"Alex its Samantha. Where's Blake?" I asked urgently.

"I don't know he went out a while ago. He was supposed to be watching you." He said

"Oh my god..."

"What's wrong Samantha?" He asked urgently.

"I-I...I think he was in an accident." I said.

**

As soon as I reached the hospital, I ran out of the car without even saying anything to Trent.

I walked through the doors of the emergency room. I didn't understand how my legs were even moving; all I wanted to do was crawl up into a ball and cry. I didn't even know if it was Blake's bike for sure, but a bad feeling inside me told me it was.

I hated hospitals. I spent a lot of time in hospitals, and they were never good. The white walls and floor, the bright lights, and the sterile smell were all too familiar to me.

When I got up to the front desk I had no idea what to say. All the times I've spent in hospitals, I was the one that was being seen

What was I supposed to do?

I didn't think I would be able to handle negative news about Blake. I couldn't imagine what I would do if anything happened to him.

I walked up to the desk and took a deep breath.

"How may I help you miss?" Asked the nurse behind the counter.

"Uhm...er...I need to know if an Blake Frost is checked in here. I think he was in an accident." I said coming out shaky.

The lady behind the counter looked at me sympathetically.

"Uhm let me go check..." She said.

I was waiting there at the desk. I wasn't sure what I wanted to hear out of that lady's mouth. I was scared and nervous. My heart was beating fast, my palms sweating and my hands shaking.

"Samantha?" I heard a voice ask from down the hall.

I turned my head to see Blake standing there. I couldn't see anything else; my brain wasn't registering anything else. All I could accept was that Blake was okay. He was standing there breathing and that's all that mattered to me.

I walked up to him, tears filling my eyes to the point where I couldn't see. My knees were going weak and I couldn't even speak.

I lifted my hand up over my mouth to muffle the screams and cries that were coming out of my mouth.

"Blake! Oh my god."

"There was an accident and...I-I..I saw your bike...I t-t...thought something happened to you..." I saw in between cries.

"Don't worry Samantha; I'm fine everything's okay don't worry." He said as he put his arm around me bringing me closer to him. I wrapped my arms around him tightly and I heard him wince in pain. I couldn't understand why I hurt him.

I pulled away and wiped my eyes attempting to get clear vision.

When my eyes weren't so blurry I saw everything. Blake was standing in front of me with his right arm in a sling. He had a white bandage on the top of his forehead; there were other small cuts around his face. His eye was purple and swollen shut. But I didn't understand why he was in pain when I held him

I looked at him puzzled, then I slowly lifted the thin hospital shirt reveal his chest. His stomach was wrapped around in a thick white bandage; I could see yellow greenish bruises forming on his chest.

I could see he was trying masking the pain on his face.

I couldn't help but just cry for him. I was happy that he was okay and alive, but I still didn't want to see him in pain.

"Blake what are you doing? You need to go lay down or something!" I screamed.

"No Samantha, I need to go home." He said with a straight face.

I looked at him confused. How could he possibly think he was going home? He was clearly badly injured and it looks like the doctors weren't done with him yet.

"You can't!" I cried.

"I have to Samantha. You shouldn't even be here." He said strongly

I just looked at him confused.

"Alex!" I heard him call, looking over my shoulder.

"We need to leave, now!" Blake said.

I looked back at Alex waiting for his brother to protest but he didn't, they just looked at each other like they were communicating with their eyes, and I had no idea what they were saying.

Without saying anything Alex walked out of the hospital. Blake grabbed my arm and pulled me towards the exit. With each step he took he winced with pain. I knew something was going on that I didn't understand.

When we got outside I helped Blake into the back seat and sat beside him.

"Will someone please tell me what the hell is going on?" I asked.

I saw Alex look at Blake in the rearview mirror, they were exchanging glances.

"Stop with the damn secret communication and tell me what happened!" I screamed.

"Okay Samantha, relax." Blake said.

"I was watching you tonight when you went out on your...date." He said the word date with so much hatred and disgust.

"After a while I saw a car was following me. So I followed them, in order to lead them away from you. That's when I was chasing the pickup truck through the streets we got into an accident." Adrian continued.

"Who was following me?" I asked.

"Must be one of Connor's men." Alex said, keeping his eyes on the road.

"Connor?" I asked questioningly.

"The gang leader that's after us." Blake said.

"Oh,"

"Yeah. I don't think the guy in the truck got out of the wreck as lucky as I did. But I do know that the hospital was going to be filled with members of that gang, which was why I couldn't stay there." Blake said.

"But you're really hurt Blake!" I cried. I didn't care who was after me, I just didn't want Blake to be in pain.

He looked at me with a smile, and gently cupped my cheek with his good hand.

"A good thing came out of this." He said.

"What's that?" I asked sarcastically. I knew nothing good came out of this at all.

"I realized how much you really do love me." He said with a knowing smirk.

My face dropped, how could he even be talking about love when he was sitting here injured.

But I knew what he was saying was true. Experiencing this did make me realize how much I actually loved and needed Blake. Even though it was going to be hard for me to trust Blake, I wasnt going to let that get in the way of an amazing thing. I know now that we should be together, we need to be together. Still there were bigger and important things at the moment.

"How could you even be thinking about that right now!" I said which made his smirk wider and brighter.

"You didn't even deny it. Babe it's all I could think about." He said.

"We have bigger problems little bro, and you could do this lovey dovey thing when im not here." Alex said.

I just rolled my eyes and let out a sigh.

When we finally pulled up to the house I helped Blake out with Alex, and assisted him into the house.

I sat him on the couch in his living room, and looked over his bruised and scratched up face.

"Im going to go upstairs and try to get a hold of Alei while you and Sam confess your love for each other." Alex said with a chuckle then went upstairs.

"What am I going to do with you Blake Frost?" I said as I shook my head.

"Love me forever Samantha Dela Vega." He said with a smile.

"You're sitting here With a broken arm, 3 badly bruised ribs, and cuts and bruises all over your body, but you're talking about love. What is wrong With you?" I said sitting next to him.

"You loving me is all that matters. I was having some doubts before; I didn't think I was going to be able to get you back. But when I saw you in the hospital crying for me I knew I was wrong." He said with a smile.

"Blake your right. I love you, and want to be with you. But I don't know if I can trust you. I don't know so many things about you and you have to understand it's hard for me..." I said.

"I understand, but I promise you over time you'll know. But what do you propose we do?" He asked.

"Let's just be friend for now, and slowly make our way up to a relationship." I said nervously.

He seemed to be thinking this over for a moment, and then he cupped my cheek with his good hand.

"Friends that don't date other people?" He asked bringing me a little bit closer to him.

"Yup." I said.

"Friends that hang out a lot, and sometimes go on dates?" He asked bringing me more closely to him.

"Yup." I said with a smirk.

"Friends that kiss and say I love you?" he asked bring me closer to him, so that my nose was touching his.

Before I even got to answer, his lips crashed into mine. As our lips touched, a warm tingly sensation went through my body. I missed this feeling so much.

He ended the kiss to quickly pulling himself away, taking all the warm wonderful feelings with him.

"If moving slowly is what it takes to be with you then that's what I'll do." He said with a smile.

I rolled my eyes, trying to hide the smile that he put on my lips.

"Come on Blake lets go upstairs and play doctor." I said with a wink reaching out to him to help him up.

He got up to eagerly resulting in another wince of pain.

I just shook my head and rolled my eyes. Little did he know that I was actually playing doctor. If he wasn't going to go to a hospital and get help, I'll do my best to take care of him.

****

Blake's POV

I remembered being pissed that Alexa and Alex were busy and couldn't watch over Samantha tonight. I got over it though, until I saw who she was with and what she was doing. She was on a day with that guy, Trent.

Ugh, I hated him. Of course the only reason that I disliked him was because of Samantha. I was pretty sure if Samantha had nothing to do with him he would be an alright guy, but that wasn't the case.

I was on my bike across the street from the ice cream parlor. I had to clench my fists tightly around my handlebars to keep myself from running over to them and knocking him out.

Every time I would see her laugh an ache would go through my chest, knowing that he was the one making her smile. I haven't made her laugh like that in a long time, and that killed me.

I was too wrapped up in my own thoughts to notice the black pickup truck that was following Samantha.

When Samantha and Trent got in the car and drove off, I stared intently at the truck waiting to follow his path. When he started up the car and began driving off in the direction of Trent's car I followed behind him.

He stopped outside Kingways Park, I didn't see Samantha around so I thought I must have made a mistake, but then I heard the beautiful sound of her laugh.

The driver must have noticed me because he sped away from the park. I wasn't going to let him get away that easy.

I quickly started up my motorcycle and chased after him.

I loved the feeling of going over the speed limit on my bike, especially while chasing the guy. Normally people would try to avoid situations like these and would be scared, not me. I was an adrenaline junkie; it was things like this that made me love life.

I knew we were both running red lights, I didn't think much of it. Until I saw the white van crash right into the pickup truck. It was only a few seconds later that I blacked out.

When I woke up I could hear the loud beeping besides me, each time it beeped my head throbbed painfully.

I had no idea where I was or why I was here. But after a few seconds of opening my eyes pain surged through my body. My whole body hurt but the most severe pain was located at my ribs. Every time I would breath a sharp pain would go through my chest.

I couldn't move my right arm; it was wrapped in something hard and heavy.

I looked around at the white bright room realizing I was in the hospital.

I was confused after that; it took me awhile to remember what had happened. But as soon as I remembered the events that took place a few hours ago I knew I had to leave.

I wasn't sure what had happened to the driver in the pickup truck, but I wasn't going to wait around and fmd out.

I knew the driver had to be affiliated with Connor's gang, and if he was hurt which I'm sure he was; a lot of members were going to be in this hospital.

I let out a deep breath and I gathered up all the strength I had in me to get up out of the bed.

With each step I took pain went through my body so intensely I wasn't sure that I was going to be able to make it out of the hospital.

But once I heard her loud cries I couldn't care less about the unbearable pain.

She was down the hall standing at the front counter. She was crying hysterically, breathing in pants. For a moment I forgot everything, the pain, my past, and the crazy gang members that were probably surrounding the hospital.

In those few second of watching her cry I understood something that I didn't before, she loved me. She loved and cared for me more than anything and no matter I knew we were going to be together.

When I called out to her she looked up puzzled, I knew she wasn't expecting to be hearing my voice.

She came over to me and wrapped her arms around me tightly, I did my best to comfort her but it was hard to hold back the groan of pain.

She looked at me worriedly and I gave her my best reassuring smile, by the look on her face I knew she didn't believe it.

Soon I was brought back to reality, I knew how incredibly dangerous it was too be here, especially with Samantha.

As I was trying to tell Samantha that we needed to leave I saw my brother come up behind her, I looked at him seriously communicating with my eyes trying to tell him that we needed to leave. I knew he understood when he walked out of the hospital.

In the car I started to realize everything that happened. Before Samantha even knew if I was hurt for sure, she came to the hospital worried.

The moment I saw Samantha crying in the hospital a lot of things made sense. I knew she denied loving me because she was afraid to get hurt, and I always assumed that, but now I knew it was true. I didn't understand why she would love me, not thinking that anyone could love me, but then I knew she had her own reasons for loving me.

When I told Samantha my discovery she was wondering how I could be thinking about that at a time like this. Normally I would agree, when you just recently get in a car accident because you crashed into the car that was following you kind of not really girlfriend you shouldn't be thinking about love. I couldn't

help it though. For the first time I was absolutely positive about how Samantha felt about me and I just couldn't help but smile brightly at the thought.

When I got home and Samantha told me she wanted to take it slow, I was just a little bit disappointed. I knew I should just be thankful that I'm getting another chance, but all I could think about was how I wanted to rip her clothes off and make love to her on my couch.

I did my best to rid myself of the idea; Iwasn't going to ruin this opportunity. It didn't really help though when Samantha looked at me with a smirk and said she wanted to play doctor.

I didn't care about all the pain and aches in my body, because the image of me and Samantha playing 'doctor' consumed me. I got up quickly from the couch and grabbed Samantha by the hand pulling her towards the stairs, ignoring the protesting aches and pains in my body.

She changed me and I changed her. The player who thought any girl could easily fall for him learned his lesson, and the girl that always had her guard up and was afraid to love took a risk.

It was kind of romantic and sweet, if you took out all the gang violence.

Man, this girl was changing me.