Selena Kitt - Letters to the Baumgarters

“Bella! Wake up!” Nico, calling me.

Choose. The figure was back, standing over me, floating above the river of pain. Choose.

“No!” I thrashed on the couch, feeling hands holding me down. “Cold,” I muttered, shivering. I thought I’d kicked my blankets off, but no, there they were, tangled around my waist. Both men were standing over me in their boxer shorts. Had I called out?

Mason’s hand on my forehead. “Oh Jesus Christ, she’s burning up.”

“Get her to the bed,” Nico ordered.

“Whose?”

“I don’t care!”

Mason carried me, the blankets dragging behind him. His bed was soft, the down comforter warm, but still I shivered. I couldn’t stop.

“Keep me warm,” I begged, reaching for Mason. He slid into bed beside me, glancing at Nico, and I called for him, too. “Please, Nico. Please.” And he came as well, snuggled behind me, both of them putting their arms around me, a cocoon.

But even the heat from their bodies didn’t help. Still, I shivered, my teeth chattering, even though they pulled the down-filled covers up to my chin, both of them smoothing my hair. I tried to sleep and I think I did, but I woke whimpering, feeling myself slipping into nothing, grasping for something to hold onto. Mason was there to hold me, Nico right behind.

“I’m so cold,” I complained, burying my face in Mason’s chest, feeling Nico’s arms around me. I slept again, this time dreaming of hell, my own private version where Satan forced me into impossible choices over and over.

“What’s wrong with me?” I woke up as Nico brought a thermometer, putting it under my tongue.

“Shhh.” He soothed, looking over at Mason. “I think it’s just a little bit of fever.”

“Little my ass.” Mason took the thermometer out as it beeped. “It’s… forty? What the hell does that mean?”

Nico paled. “We need to call the doctor. That’s about… a hundred and four degrees Fahrenheit.”

“Hello, I need to speak to Dr. Selvaggi.” Mason was on the phone before Nico even finished his sentence. “Dr. Selvaggi please,” he repeated louder. “I need to speak to Dr. Selvaggi right now!”

Even I could hear the string of Italian coming from the receiver, which I knew was completely unintelligible to Mason.

Nico grabbed the phone, speaking fluent Italian. “Dr. Selvaggi’s patient, Danielle Stuart, has a fever and I suspect she has an infection.” He paused, listening. “Forty.” He sighed in relief. “Thank you.”

Mason re-appeared with a cool cloth, resting it on my forehead. It felt good, but I was still so cold! Nico talked to the doctor as Mason wiped my face and neck with the washcloth, whispering my name, kissing my cheek.

“What did he say?” Mason asked when Nico hung up the phone.

“He’s going to prescribe antibiotics,” Nico told him, switching back to English. “But he wants to see her on Monday.”

I groaned. “No more doctors!”

“He also said we have to get her fever down.”

Mason nodded. “Do you have aspirin?”

“Bring her into the bathroom.” Nico was already heading out of the room.

“Can’t you just go get it?” Mason called.

“We need to get her into the tub.”

“What?” I protested, but Mason carried me and Nico ran the water. They undressed me like a child, fed me aspirins, and helped me to the tub.

I screamed, thrashing in the water, trying to escape.

“It’s freezing!”

“Keep her in.” Nico’s mouth was set in a grim line. “I have to get ice.”

My teeth chattered so much, the noise in my head so loud, I could barely hear Mason’s words as he grabbed my limbs, pushing me back in, something about holding still and being for my own good.

“Do we really have to do this?” Mason panted when Nico brought a bowl full of ice cubes into the bathroom.

“The doctor said to.” Nico looked at me, his face pained. “If her fever gets much higher, she may start to have seizures. It could cause brain injury.”

“Christ.” Mason winced as Nico poured the ice in and I screamed again.

“Please,” I begged them both, my eyes wild, so cold I couldn’t feel my fingers where my nails dug into Mason’s forearm. “Oh god, please, stop. Please!”

Nico’s voice was hoarse. “I have to get more.”

I sobbed, clinging to Mason, and then to Nico, when the freezer was empty of ice. They took turns soothing me, both men working to cool my feverish body as I writhed in the tub, begging for it to end.

Nico took my temperature, although I was shivering so much I could barely keep the thermometer between my chattering teeth.

“What is it?” Mason asked, his jaw tight.

Nico’s shoulders visibly relaxed. “Better. Let’s get her to bed.”

A fluffy towel and four rough hands later, I was dry. One of Mason’s t-shirts-it smelled comfortingly like him-went over my head and this time Nico carried me back to the bed.

“I’m so sorry,” Nico whispered into my ear in Italian, kissing my cheek, my temple, as he pulled the covers up to my chin. “Hang on, bella. I love you.”

“Just don’t leave me.” I put my arms around his neck and hung on.

The doorbell rang and Mason and Nico exchanged glances.

“It’s the pharmacy,” Nico said.

Mason was already heading toward the door.

And then there were more pills, two huge ones, big enough to gag a horse. I choked and spit water all down the front of me, wetting the t-shirt. Mason pulled it off and just covered me with the down-filled blanket again.

“Now what?” Mason sat next to me on the bed.

“We wait. We pray. We hope.” Nico was on my other side, his cool hand pressed against my forehead.

Mason snorted. “Isn’t there something a little more proactive we can do?”

“There’s nothing but this.” Nico spooned me, his arm around my waist.

“I’m still cold.” I opened my eyes, seeing Mason looking at us, his expression unreadable. I reached for him, feeling desperate. “Please.”

He came to bed, his breath warm on my cheek, his hand on my hip.

“Closer,” I whispered, and he obliged. They both did, enveloping me, and I finally relaxed, this time falling into a dreamless, peaceful sleep with no fire, no ice.

Dear Carrie and Doc,

I need your advice. Nico and Mason are competing for me all the time. I think they’ve decided to live together-they’re roommates now, at least for the time Mason is staying-just to drive me crazy. And to make sure they can both keep tabs on what I’m doing, of course. I feel so caught between the two of them and I don’t know what to do.

Tell me. Please tell me what to do, who to choose. I’m at a loss. I don’t trust my own compass or judgment, especially since it’s telling me that I want them both. That can’t be right. Something in me must be broken, off. I know this shouldn’t be so hard, but every time I imagine leaving one of them for the other, I become paralyzed.

And it’s not about hurting them, although I know I would hurt one if I chose the other. It’s about me. I feel as if I’m connected to both of them in a very deep, profound way, and I’m not sure I am even capable of making such a difficult choice.

But I trust you both. I love you. And I know you want what’s best for me. So I’m asking you, as your former lover and best friend, please, just tell me what to do. Whatever it is, I promise you, I swear to Nico’s God and everything that is sacred in the world, that I will do it.

Just please, tell me which one to choose.

The doctor poked and prodded and confirmed that I had indeed developed an infection. The antibiotics were working, however-my fever was gone and I felt lighter already. There was no pain, and I’d inspected the incision sites. They’d done the surgery laproscopically, just four small cuts in my abdomen that were healing nicely. I’d have some scars on my belly to go with the stretch marks from Isabella, but considering that they’d saved my uterus, somehow I didn’t mind so much.