Chapter 40
Chapter Forty
Isla
I’ve been sitting in the hospital waiting room for so long, my body doesn’t feel like mine anymore.
Time moves differently here. Slow, thick, and distorted. Like the walls are swallowing every second whole.
Mom has been in the ICU since yesterday afternoon.
She’s stable.
For now.
I came close to losing her. So, so close.
When I realized she wasn’t waking up, I called 911. They came quickly, but every minute I waited felt like years had passed.
The paramedics had to resuscitate her.
I keep replaying that moment in my head.
Her body still.
Her chest unmoving.
Then the jolt.
Then nothing.
Then the second jolt.
I’ll never forget the beeping sound on the machine when her heart started beating again. That precious moment that many don’t get gave me back the hope I thought I’d lost.
She was rushed here straightaway.
They only let me see her twice. Both visits were short. Ten minutes each time.
Seeing my mother so small in that bed, swallowed by tubes and wires, was like watching the strongest person I know disappear inch by inch.
I’ve been waiting for hours since the last visit.
I’ve played the waiting game since.
Waiting for answers.
Waiting for the next round of tests.
Waiting for someone to tell me what to do when every part of me feels like it’s
shutting down.
I wrap my arms around myself, trying to hold everything together.
Trying not to fall apart.
I’m alone at the worst possible time. Mia is in St. Lucia. And the person I want the most…
He isn’t here.
In my panic, I left my cellphone at the house. I managed to call Mia from one of the hospital phones, but the line was terrible, so the call was brief.
I didn’t call Knox because of everything else that’s happening. I wanted to handle it all on my own, but now… I’m starting to realize that might’ve been a mistake.
Dr. Blakely, Mom’s long-time physician, steps out of the double doors. My heart jumps into my throat at the sight of him.
He spots me and starts walking over, but I’m already up and moving toward him.
“Hi, Isla.” His voice is gentle, but that only makes the panic crawl higher up my throat.
“Hi,” I manage. “How is she?”
He gives me the kind of look people save for bad news. I already hate everything that means.
“We’ve reviewed your mother’s scans,” he says. “The collapse was caused by a ruptured artery. The damage is severe. We discussed surgery yesterday as a possibility, but after all the tests we’ve run, I believe surgery is her only chance to pull through.”
“Only… chance?” My voice trembles on the edge of a breath.
“I’m afraid so. Your mother’s heart has been under strain for years.
She has severe coronary artery disease—multiple blockages that have been progressing quietly.
Over time, that kind of stress weakens the heart and the surrounding arteries.
Yesterday, one of the arteries connected to her aorta tore from the pressure.
It caused the cardiac arrest. She needs emergency surgery. ”
“Oh my God. When can you do it?”
“We can prep her within the hour. But…” He pauses, hesitating before he adds, “The procedure is expensive. Her insurance won’t cover this type of corrective operation, nor the hospital stay or the treatments she’ll need afterward.”
Those words twist the knife in my soul. “How much will it cost?”
“Four hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars.”
Jesus.
My knees nearly give out. It feels like being punched.
Four hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars.
“Oh God. I… I don’t…” My throat closes. “I can’t pay that. Is there anything else that can be done?”
His face softens. “No. Nothing else will help. Surgery is the only option, and we’ll need at least a fifty percent deposit, plus confirmation you can cover the balance, before we can take her in.”
The only time I’d ever think to use Knox’s credit card is now. But with a hundred grand spending limit, not even that will save me. I need more money than I’ve ever needed in my life.
“Four hundred and eighty-five thousand dollars. I…”
The walls blur.
The floor tilts.
I stumble back, trembling as everything closes in on me.
My legs give, but then an arm slips around me, strong and steady, stopping me from falling.
I look up and find myself staring into Knox’s bright blue eyes.
“I’ve got you,” he says, pulling me closer. Then he looks at Dr. Blakely. “I’ll pay for everything. Just save her. Please.”
Dr. Blakely’s shoulders ease. “I’ll get the paperwork.”
“Thank you,” Knox tells him.
The doctor nods and heads back through the doors.
I’m stunned and weak in equal parts, like my body was ripped to shreds and stitched back together in the span of a single heartbeat.
Knox keeps his arm wrapped around me, holding me upright, my only anchor in this sea of chaos.
He touches my cheek, his thumb brushing beneath my eye, catching a tear I didn’t feel fall.
“Breathe,” he murmurs. “I’m here now.”
“Thank you. Thank you so much,” I rasp.
“You don’t have to thank me for anything.”
“I owe you everything.” I don’t know if I fall into him or if he pulls me closer, but suddenly, my forehead is pressed to his chest and his hand is in my hair, grounding me.
All the angst from losing the restaurant feels like nothing compared to this.
And here Knox is… saving me.
Trying to save Mom.
“I can’t lose my mom, Knox,” I sob into his chest. “I can’t. My heart can’t take it.”
“I won’t let anything happen to her,” he whispers. “I will make sure they do everything under the sun to save her.”
I mouth another thank you, but he can’t see me. I’m clinging to him for dear life, and he’s holding me the same.
Forty minutes later, Mom goes into surgery. That quickly. I dread to think what would have happened if Knox didn’t step in to help us.
Dr. Blakely advises us to go home and rest since the surgery will likely take up to twelve hours, but I refuse to leave. I can’t be away from my mother. If something happens, I need to be here.
Knox doesn’t argue. He just speaks to the staff and arranges for us to be set up in one of the private family consultation rooms. That’s where we stay.
The hours drag in a slow, aching silence, but I cling to Knox the whole time.
He only leaves to bring back food or water, but even then, he moves fast, like he can’t stand being gone more than a minute.
I want to talk to him. I want to ask how he knew to come, how he found me so quickly. But the words won’t form. I’m too distraught to speak.
So, we sit together in the quiet. My thoughts race. His presence steadies me. He keeps his arm around me, and I eventually stop fighting the exhaustion and fall asleep against his chest.
It feels like I close my eyes for mere seconds, and the next moment, someone is shaking me awake.
It’s Knox. And Dr. Blakely is standing beside us.
His face looks less tense than it did when I last saw him. I pray that’s a good sign.
I jolt upright, desperate for some news. “Is she okay?”
“She’s stable,” he answers gently. “The surgery went as well as we could have hoped. The tear was extensive, but we repaired the artery and bypassed the other blockages. Her heart responded better than we expected.”
For a second, the world tilts and rights itself all at once. “Thank you.”
Knox’s hand comes down on my back, steadying me.
“You’re welcome. She’s not awake yet,” Dr. Blakely says. “That’s normal. She’s in recovery now, and we’ll monitor her closely. The next twenty-four hours are important, but her vitals look good, and everything points in a good direction.”
Good direction.
That’s all I wanted to hear. “Can I see her?”
“In a few minutes.” He gives me a reassuring nod. “She’s being settled into the cardiac ICU. I’ll come get you when it’s time.”
I nod, but it doesn’t feel like enough. Relief is flooding me too fast, hitting every place fear hollowed out.
When Dr. Blakely steps away, I turn to Knox. His eyes soften the moment they meet mine, like he’s been holding his breath, too, and can finally let it out.
“She’s okay, Knox,” I choke out.
“She is.” He brushes his thumb across my cheek.
“You saved her. I can’t thank you enough.”
“It’s okay, love. It’s okay.”
The sun isn’t even fully up when Knox and I arrive at my mother’s house.
He unlocks the door and guides me inside, holding my hand.
After the chaos of the last twenty-four hours, the world feels too quiet. Like it’s calmed the noise so we can have this time together to reconnect and breathe.
There’s so much I want to say to him. I know he has a lot to say to me, too.
He leads me into the kitchen and switches on the light, his movements as practiced as if this is our home.
“Let’s go over here.” I let him steer me toward the breakfast table, where he sits me down. He pulls up another chair, sits in front of me, then looks me over. “How are you holding up?”
“I’m…” I inhale a sharp breath. “I feel like I've been stuck in a nightmare and am slowly making my way back.”
He offers me a faint smile and reaches across to take my hand into his. “How about we talk, then I’ll make you something healthy to eat, and you go upstairs and rest. I’ll check in at the hospital for updates.”
“That sounds like a good plan.” I fold my hands in my lap. “I'm just grateful you're here.”
He nods. “Thanks to Mia.
I would’ve never guessed it was her. I kept thinking he still had eyes on me somewhere, so one of his people told him Mom was in the hospital.
He leans closer, his knees brushing mine. “You should have called me, Isla.”
My head dips, and I nod slowly. “I know. I’m sorry. That was foolish of me. It’s just that with everything going on with us, and it all happen so sudden…I didn’t know what to do.” A ball of bad luck blew in on a storm and knocked me off my feet.
“Always call me. Especially for something like this. It doesn’t matter if we’re arguing.
” He squeezes my hand and traces his finger over my wedding band.
“You and I are fire and ice. I’m sure we’ll clash again and again in the future.
I can already picture years of arguments…
and even more years of happiness to make up for the times I piss you off.
Or when I try to kill someone for hitting on my wife.
” His gaze drops to my ring, then lifts to mine. “We won’t part at death, Isla Vale.”
Tears sting my eyes. “That’s a long time, Knox Vale. And it sounds like you still plan to keep me.”
“Absolutely. That was never up for discussion. Because I love you.”
A tremor runs through me, sharp enough to shake my bones. My lungs seize, and something inside me breaks open quietly and painfully. Like every part of me has been waiting years to hear those words.
A tear slips down my cheek, and my heart warms under the weight of his words. “I love you, too, Knox. I do.”
He leans closer and brushes his lips over mine, lingering in a light kiss as if he’s trying to remember what I taste like. When he inches away, a look of seriousness washes over his face. “If I truly love you, and I do, then I need to make you happy.”
“That works both ways. I understand about the restaurant, Knox. I know I just need to accept it. Because you need to—”
“I’m not doing it, love. There will be no demolition. The restaurant stays.”
My breath snags, and I stare at him in wide-eyed disbelief. “What? What do you mean?”
“I mean I choose you. Your happiness. Your family legacy. The place that was another home to you. That makes it important to me, too.” He smiles. “How could it not be? It brought you to me.”
My heart swells. A wave of emotion sweeps through me, and I can no longer hold back the tears.
“Oh, Knox. Thank you. It brought you to me, too. But what are you going to do about the board and your investors?”
He smiles. “I already took care of everything. I took back control of my status at Vale Global. I realized I didn’t need to prove myself anymore to people who don’t matter. The only person who matters to me is you.”
“Me?”
“Yes, you. I’m also wiping your father’s debt clean.”
“No, Knox.” I shake my head. “I can’t let you do that. That’s too much. You already spent so much on my mom. That’s money I can’t even dream of paying back.”
“It doesn’t matter. That was a gift, love. This is a gift, too. So, by this time tomorrow, our contract will be void because I’m forfeiting. You win.”
I let out a shaky laugh. “Forfeiting. I can’t believe you’re doing this.”
“Well, I am. I want a clean slate with you. The restaurant’s yours, and I’ve made sure no one can come after you or your family for whatever your father may have done. Let his sins die with him.”
“I truly, truly can’t thank you enough.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t do this before. Things could have been handled better. You shouldn’t have found out the way you did about my plans.”
“It was Chad,” I say his name with caution.
“I know.” His jaw clenches. “When I found out he leaked the information, I went to see him.”
My breath catches. “What happened?” I pray they didn’t fight again.
“Something unexpected,” Knox reasons. “It seems he finally got the message that you’ve moved on, so he gave me everything he found out about us. Including the contract.”
“He gave you everything?” I was bracing for another scandal.
“He did. But even if he goes back to the press, it doesn’t matter. The restaurant’s staying, and so are we.”
“We are.”
He gives me another kiss, then pushes to his feet. “How about that healthy meal I promised you?”
“That sounds great.”
“I’m going to make you that bacon omelet you liked in Italy.”
I gasp. “Oh, wow, I would really love that.”
He heads to the fridge while rolling his sleeves up past his forearms. The sight of him alone warms my heart. He pulls the meat and vegetables from the fridge, sets a pan on the stove, and reaches for a knife. But he moves too quickly and pricks his thumb.
“Damn it,” he swears, laughing. “Need to be more careful.”
A thin line of blood slides down his thumb. He grabs a paper towel to wipe it, but my eyes stay glued to the blood.
And just like that, the memory of Madame Corvina’s dreadful curse claws its way to the front of my mind.
I see it all over again—the glass dome shattering, the rose falling apart beneath my touch, the exact moment she cursed me with those haunting words:
“The rose is the heart, and the glass is its protection. You’ve broken both. Now you’ll pay with a curse. Everything you love will fade, one petal at a time… until someone dares to bleed for you and mends what was broken.”
Bleeds for me.
Knox Vale just bled for me.
And he fixed my broken heart.