Chapter 15
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Vanna
I wake up to the sound of Garrett snoring.
It's not a loud snore—more of a soft rumble, the kind of sound that used to annoy me when we were first married and now feels like the safest thing in the world.
I turn my head on the pillow, wincing at the pull of bruised muscles, and find him slumped in the chair beside my bed.
He looks terrible.
Three days of stubble shadows his jaw.
His hair is greasy, pushed back from his face in uneven waves.
Dark circles ring his eyes, so deep they look like bruises themselves.
He's still wearing the same clothes he had on the day of the cabin—someone must have washed them, because the blood is gone, but I recognize the flannel shirt, the worn jeans.
He hasn't left.
Not once.
Not for a shower, not for a real meal, not for anything.
The nurses have tried to kick him out during shift changes, during procedures, during the middle of the night when visiting hours are long over.
He just looks at them with those cold eyes of his, and they back down.
No one argues with Bloodhound.
Not when he's like this.
I watch him sleep, studying the lines of his face in the gray morning light filtering through the hospital blinds.
He looks older than thirty.
Worn down.
Like the last three days have aged him a decade.
I close my eyes to try and keep me from spiraling.
Dr. Ganacha—the therapist they've had coming to see me twice a day—says I need to stop that.
The "what ifs." The self-blame.
She says what happened wasn't my fault, that Virgil made his choices and I'm not responsible for the evil that lives inside other people.
I know she's right.
I know it in my head, anyway.
My heart is taking longer to catch up.
A soft knock on the door makes me open my eyes.
Garrett jerks awake instantly, his hand going to his hip where his gun would be if he were wearing it.
When he sees it's just Leah pushing through the door with a tray, he relaxes. Barely.
"Morning." Leah's voice is quiet, careful. She's been like that since I woke up after the surgery—soft around the edges, like she's afraid I might shatter if she speaks too loud. "Brought you some ice chips. And jello, if you think you can handle it."
"Thanks." My voice comes out hoarse, scratchy. Three days of crying will do that.
Leah sets the tray on the rolling table and busies herself checking my IV, my monitors, the bandages on my wrists where the zip ties cut into my skin.
Her movements are efficient, professional, but I catch the way her fingers linger.
The way she smooths my blanket even though it doesn't need smoothing.
She's trying.
After everything—the years of addiction, the lies, the theft—she's trying.
"Your vitals look good," she says, not quite meeting my eyes. "Blood pressure's stabilizing. Baby's heartbeat is strong."
"Waylon," I say without thinking.
She pauses. "What?"
"The baby. We're—" I glance at Garrett, who's watching me with an unreadable expression. "We're thinking of calling him Waylon. If it's a boy."
Something flickers across Leah's face.
Something soft and sad and maybe, just maybe, a little bit hopeful.
"That's a good name," she says quietly. "Strong."
Then she's gone, slipping out the door before I can say anything else, and I'm left staring at the space where she was.
"She's coming around." Garrett's voice is rough with sleep. He scrubs a hand over his face, wincing at the stubble. "Give her time."
"I don't deserve her forgiveness."
"Maybe not." He reaches out and takes my hand, his calloused fingers wrapping around mine. "But she's gonna give it anyway. That's who Leah is."
I want to believe him.
I want to believe that I haven't destroyed every good thing in my life, that there's still a path forward, that the people I've hurt can somehow find it in their hearts to let me back in.
But I've been here before.
I've made promises before, and I've broken every single one of them.
"Stop." Garrett squeezes my hand. "I can hear you thinking. Whatever you're telling yourself right now, stop."
"You don't know what I'm thinking."
"Yeah, I do." He leans forward, his eyes finding mine. "You're thinking about all the ways you've fucked up. All the people you've hurt. You're thinking maybe it would be easier for everyone if you just—"
"Don't." The word comes out sharp. Desperate. "Don't say it."
"Then don't think it." His grip on my hand tightens almost to the point of pain. "You're here. You're alive. Our baby is alive. That's all that matters right now. Everything else—the guilt, the shame, the making amends—that comes later. Right now, you just focus on healing."
I nod, but the words feel hollow. Everything feels hollow.
That's the problem with trauma, I'm learning.
It doesn't just hurt your body.
It hollows you out from the inside, leaves you feeling like a shell of yourself, like the person you used to be died in that cabin and what's left is just going through the motions.
"I need to tell you something," Garrett says. His voice has changed—softer now, almost hesitant. "About Virgil."
My whole body goes rigid.
"You don't have to—"
"He's dead." The words come out flat. Final. "I killed him. With my hands. I made it slow, and I made it hurt, and I'm not sorry."
I stare at him.
I should feel something, shouldn't I? Relief, maybe. Satisfaction. Closure.
But all I feel is numb.
"Good," I hear myself say. "I'm glad."
Garrett nods.
He doesn't ask if I'm okay, doesn't push for more of a reaction.
He just holds my hand and lets the silence stretch between us, comfortable and warm.
That's one of the things I love about him.
He never tries to fill the quiet.
He just... exists beside me, solid and steady, an anchor in the storm.
I must fall asleep again, because the next thing I know, the light has changed and there's a different voice in the room.
"—don't care what the doctor says, I'm not leaving until I see her."
Tildie.
I open my eyes to find her arguing with a nurse in the doorway, her hair wild around her face, her eyes red-rimmed and swollen.
She looks like she hasn't slept any more than Garrett has.
"It's okay," I croak out. "Let her in."
The nurse gives me a skeptical look but steps aside, and then Tildie is rushing across the room, stopping just short of the bed like she's afraid to touch me.
"Vanna." Her voice breaks on my name. "Oh God, Vanna, I'm so sorry. I'm so fucking sorry. I should have—I tried to stop them—I ran inside to get help but by the time I—"
"Tildie." I reach out with my free hand—the one not connected to Garrett—and she grabs it like a lifeline. "It wasn't your fault."
"I was right there." Tears are streaming down her face now, cutting tracks through her makeup. "I saw them take you and I couldn't—I didn't—"
"You got help." I squeeze her fingers as hard as my battered body will allow. "You ran inside and you called the club and that's why they found me. That's why I'm here right now. You saved my life, Tildie."
"But if I'd been faster—"
"Then they might have taken you too." I hold her gaze, forcing her to see the truth in my eyes. "And then Ruger would be the one sitting in that chair, and you'd be in this bed, and nothing would be different except there'd be two of us hurting instead of one."
She makes a choked sound, somewhere between a laugh and a sob.
"Come here." I tug on her hand, and she leans down, and I wrap my arms around her as best I can with all the wires and tubes.
She smells like coffee and Ruger's cigarettes and vanilla perfume.
She smells like friendship. Like home.
"I'm so glad you're okay," she whispers against my hair. "When they brought you in, when I saw all the blood—I thought—"
"I know." I hold her tighter. "But I'm okay. The baby's okay. We're going to be okay."
I'm not sure if I believe it yet.
But saying it out loud helps.
Like maybe if I repeat it enough times, it'll become true.
Tildie stays for an hour, filling the room with chatter about the clubhouse, about Ruger driving her crazy with his hovering, about Aunt Ellie stress-baking enough food to feed an army.
Normal things. Safe things.
The kind of mundane details that make me feel like maybe the world outside this hospital room hasn't completely fallen apart.
After she leaves, I sleep again.
That's mostly what I do these days.
Sleep, wake up, eat whatever Leah or the nurses bring me, sleep again.
My body is healing, but healing takes energy, and I don't have much to spare.
It's the middle of the night when the nightmare comes.
I'm back in the cabin.
Back on that filthy mattress with Virgil's weight pressing me down, his breath hot against my neck, his hands—
I wake up screaming.
Garrett is there instantly, gathering me into his arms, holding me against his chest while I shake and sob and claw at the fabric of his shirt like I can climb inside him, like I can burrow somewhere safe where the memories can't reach me.
"You're okay," he murmurs into my hair. "You're safe. I've got you. He's dead, Van. He's dead and he can't hurt you anymore."
I know that.
I know it intellectually, the way I know the sky is blue and water is wet.
But my body doesn't know it.
My body is still trapped in that cabin, still feeling phantom hands on my skin, still hearing Virgil's voice whispering all the things he was going to do to me.
"I want to get high."
The words come out before I can stop them.
Garrett goes still.
"I want to get high so bad right now I can barely breathe.
" My voice is shaking, cracking, barely recognizable as my own.
"I know it's wrong. I know it won't help.
I know it'll just make everything worse.
But God, Garrett, I want it. I want to not feel this.
I want to disappear into that fog and never come back. "
He doesn't pull away.
He doesn't lecture me about my sobriety, doesn't remind me of all the work I've done, doesn't tell me I'm being weak or selfish or any of the things the voice in my head is already screaming.