Chapter 43
CHAPTER 43
I sat huddled on the bed in the emergency room. A police officer asked me if they could take some evidence. They swabbed my hands and my nails. A female officer asked if I needed a rape kit. I violently shook my head.
They asked Jackson to talk to the police in another room. A female doctor came in.
“How are you doing?”
“My face hurts.”
She flashed her penlight in my eyes and then lay me back and palpitated my stomach. I winced.
“Is that tender?”
“I don’t remember him punching me in the stomach.”
“We're going to do a urine test for blood in the urine, okay? So you need to pee in a little cup, but I promise you if it comes back negative, you can go home. I don’t think you have a concussion.”
“Okay.”
I feared that Jackson had murdered the other guy and would get arrested.
“Is the man who assaulted me going to die? ”
She took a deep breath. “No, the person who worked him over did an excellent job of pulverizing him to the point that he will be drinking out of a straw for the next few months, but he won’t die.”
I let out a harsh breath. The relief was so intense that stars swam before my eyes.
“Hey,” she reached over and squeezed my arm. “They say that the man is suspected of hurting a lot of women. He’s going to go to jail for a long time. You don’t have to worry about him, okay?”
She handed me a cup, directed me to the washroom and told me to hang tight.
In the washroom, I studied my face. My nose trailed crusty blood. My upper lip was swollen. My cheekbones had started to swell and bruise. I sported bruises on my neck where he had choked me. I peed in the cup, left it in the little window box, and then washed my face and my hands.
I walked back to my bed and shut the curtains. I took off my hospital gown. My bra and shirt had disappeared as evidence, so I pulled Jackson’s hoodie back over my body. It hung down to my knees. It smelled faintly of him. I put my knees up on the bed and lay my head on my knees. I needed to go home.
Jackson’s voice sounded from outside the curtain. He came in. Our eyes met.
I worked my throat. His sympathetic look made me want to burst into tears.
“Thank you for saving me,” I said in a tiny voice.
“I should have killed that asshole,” he walked over to the bed. I moved my feet, and he sat down on the side. He picked up my hand. I looked at his knuckles. They were swollen and bloody.
“Your hands, Jackson!”
He shrugged and stared at me. “Do you want me to call Matt?”
The only person I wanted to be around right now was Jackson. “No.”
We stared at each other. I tried, but I couldn’t read the expression in his eyes .
The words tumbled out of my mouth, “I wasn’t paying attention. I didn’t have my phone. I didn’t even see him. I was in my own little world. One minute I was daydreaming and then the next minute he attacked me. All my defenses, all my training was useless.”
He squeezed my hand. “Emily, you are 5-foot-nothing, and you barely weigh 100 pounds. The guy outweighed you by at least a hundred pounds. Only a bullet between his eyes could have stopped him.”
“You stopped him.”
He swallowed. “I saw Chloe running towards me and then I heard you scream. I swear my heart stopped. When I saw that asshole on you, I fucking lost my mind.”
He stared straight ahead. I could see the rage and frustration on his face. “If you hadn’t stopped me I would've killed him.”
I looked at his huge hand, holding mine. “They say that he hurt a lot of women.”
“Emily.”
I looked up into his green eyes. “Please tell me what he’s done.”
He fought to control his emotions. “They say they have tied his fingerprints to the rape and murder of nine women.”
I had a flash of that man and the cold rage in his eyes. When that man attacked me, I knew he would kill me.
“He strangled them.”
“Yes.”
“Will you please hold me?”
He moved down the bed and then lifted me against his chest. I shut my eyes and clung to him. How was I going to live without this man? I had absolutely no idea. I felt Jackson’s big arms wrap around me. This was the one place that I felt safe.
I shut my eyes. I wanted to go home.
Voices sounded outside the curtain. Two men talked quietly in front of my curtain.
“Hey, Doug, what are you here for?”
“Domestic gone bad. You? ”
“Paperwork on an attempted assault. You'll never guess who they caught.”
“Who?”
“The throat slayer.”
I stiffened and raised my head. Alert and listening.
“No shit! Some lady finally have a 45 in her purse?”
“No, get this. Some woman is attacked. Her dog runs back to her place, and her friend goes looking for her. The guy is a fucking Navy SEAL.”
“You're shitting me.”
“So this SEAL fucking destroys this guy. The girl says she saw him only hitting her assailant’s face, but both his arms were broken, fifteen bones broken in his hands, nine of his ribs. His nose was broken in eight places. His jaw was broken in six places. There was nothing left of his face. Then Navy SEAL guy carries the woman back to her place, and he dragged this guy behind him like the piece of garbage he is. Doctors said his pants were down and they'll be picking gravel out of his dick for weeks.”
“No shit.” The guy laughed.
“The Navy SEAL dude? Had a couple scrapes on his knuckles.”
“Any charges against him?”
“Not even close. The chief of police came down and shook his hand. Thanked him for his civic duty.”
“How’s the girl?”
“She got lucky. No rape. Just beat up. We’re going to Ducky’s later to celebrate. If I can find the SEAL dude, I'm going to invite him.”
“Count me in. See you later.”
“You bet.”
I turned and looked up at Jackson. Green eyes looked down at me. I struggled to articulate my thoughts. The curtain whipped open, and the doctor observed the two of us lying on the bed together with Jackson’s arms wrapped around me.
“So are you the boyfriend? ”
He shook his head.
“I have to talk to your friend here for a moment, and then you can take her home.”
Jackson lifted me up, sat me on the bed and with one last look at me, disappeared around the corner. She watched him walk away, and then she shut the curtains.
“We got your urine sample back. No blood in the urine,” she pushed her glasses off her face.
I nodded. “Okay.”
“But we do have high levels of hCG,” she looked at me like I should know what this meant.
I shrugged.
“Human chorionic gonadotropin, also known as hCG, is a hormone produced by the placenta after implantation.”
My mouth parted. Thinking. “Placenta?”
“You’re pregnant.”
I felt dizzy. She caught me and helped me place my head between my legs. Her soft hand rubbed my back. “I take it this is a shock.”
I stared at the floor between my legs. “There must be some mistake.”
“We ran the test twice. They were both definitive. I take it this isn’t planned?”
I sat up and blinked. “I’m supposed to get married in four weeks, and my fiancé thinks I'm a virgin.”
Her mouth parted. “Okay. That’s a complication.”
“How pregnant am I?”
“When was your last period?”
I thought back. “About six weeks ago?”
“The first day of pregnancy is counted from the first day of your last period. So that would make you approximately six weeks pregnant.”
I shook my head. “But I had a light period two weeks ago. ”
“That was probably just some spotting. That’s a fairly common occurrence.”
I concentrated on breathing. “Is the baby okay?”
“Some abdominal pain is normal. Your organs are shifting, your uterus is expanding, and all those ligaments are stretching,” she said. “I suspected you were pregnant, but I wanted to rule out other things in light of your attack. If you experience any bleeding, come back.”
I couldn’t wrap my brain around this. I was pregnant. With Jackson’s baby. Jackson, the guy who was emphatic that he didn’t want children.
“So is the guy I just kicked out of here the dad?”
I stared at her. “How did you know?”
“Lucky guess,” she said wryly.
I dropped my face into my hands. “Oh, my God.”
She rubbed my back again. “Listen. You’ve had an insane day. Go home, get some rest. Drink plenty of water. No alcohol or drugs. As soon as you can, get in to see your regular doctor. And you should go on some prenatal vitamins as soon as possible.”