Chapter 28
Maddie
The ride to the hospital took ages, made longer by the fact that I had to make Mel pull over twice so I could barf. By the time we arrived, I’d chewed the cuticle on my right thumb until I bled, and Mel had pushed my hands into my lap to stop my fidgeting.
Inside the hospital, we approached the receptionist. Bou had ordered me to let Roni ask about Cook, and she held me by one arm. How pathetic was it for me to be using a pregnant woman as a crutch? But I just couldn’t get thoughts of losing Cook out of my mind. Those, more than anything, made my legs wobble underneath me.
Being in the hospital—the stench of antiseptic soap—didn’t settle me at all. I wouldn’t be okay until I saw for myself that he would live. No, I wouldn’t be well until I could curl in Daddy’s lap and thrive on his strength. My own life span had been shortened by just how hard and quickly my heart had pounded on the four hour–long drive from LA to Vegas, like it was about to explode out of my chest.
If they came out now and told me he was gone, my heart would explode. At least then I would be with Cook.
Roni rolled up to her tiptoes and leaned over the receptionist’s desk. “We’re looking for Morris Cook. He would’ve come in with a gunshot wound. There are probably three men waiting with him. Celt Murray, Angel Tuku, and—
“Bou!” a man’s voice barked off to our left.
“Wilde!” Bou shifted me into Mel’s arms and ran.
Roni turned her head and exhaled a long sigh of relief. “Celt!”
Tears pricked the backs of my eyes as I twisted out of Mel’s grasp and flew at the receptionist. If only I could get her in my claws and pull her to me and make her tell me. My hands clutched the counter to keep from latching onto the girl behind the desk. “Where is my Cook? My daddy? Tell me!”
Strong hands latched around my waist and pulled me back, turning me into a chest. I beat on the wall of muscle. Not Cook’s chest. But the arms held me tight. I pinched my eyes shut and squirmed. “Let me go! You’re not Daddy. Put me down.”
“Maddie,” a soft female voice said softly as a hand stroked my back.
I couldn’t stop what’d started, but I slowed. It was a small improvement, but I’d plummet if I didn’t see Cook soon and know he would be okay.
“It’s okay, Maddie. We need to go upstairs to wait. So you can see... your daddy.”
Roni. That was Roni talking. I stilled, still held in the iron-like grip, and I opened my eyes to meet her light green-gray eyes. So much concern in that look. It helped. Grounded me.
I finally peeked up to see who was holding me, and gasped when Celt gave me a sad smile, his blue eyes roiling with a tormented storm.
“We’ve got you, Maddie,” he said.
But I looked back to Roni for confirmation.
She nodded, and Celt added, “And Cook is too stubborn of a motherfucker to up and die on us.”
Wilde, with his arm around Bou, stepped up behind Roni. It pierced my heart to see everyone’s relief, except mine, and tears welled in my eyes again.
Bou hardened her gaze at me. “You’re coming upstairs with us, Maddie. Calmly.”
I liked that she was taking a firm hand with me. It helped in Daddy’s absence.
“Cook is strong, so you have to be strong too. Okay?” she pressed.
Giving her a small nod, I pushed away from the wall of muscle holding me. “Okay.”
Bou ran her hand down Celt’s arm with a silent thank you. I should thank him too. And Bou. Between them both, they calmed me enough to walk to the elevators.
“Cook’s stable right now,” said Wilde, head bent like this was hard for him too.
With the three men and four women, the elevator was too full. Almost like a cage. I pulled at my collar as my throat started to constrict. Everything pressed in on me. Sweat broke out on my forehead and trickled down my back, but I felt cold all at once.
“Maddie?” Roni’s voice sounded alarmed as her hand reached for my wrist. Her small fingers pressed into the side. “Her pulse is too fast.” She looked up at Celt.
The elevator dinged, the doors opened, the bodies poured out, and finally—finally!—I drew in a breath.
Bou grabbed my shoulders and stared into my eyes. “You’re almost to Cook, Maddie. Come with me.”
I gave her a shaky nod and picked up my feet. I could do this. I needed to be strong for Daddy. He needed to know I could hold myself together. One foot forward. Another.
We walked down a hallway, past a nurse’s station, and stopped at a door that looked like all the rest. There were chairs lined up along the hallway.
“Why don’t you go in, Maddie?” said Wilde.
I had many reasons not to. I didn’t want to see Cook hooked up to machines. I didn’t know how I would react to seeing him weak, not smiling. I wanted him strong and protective, dominant and punishing. Those were the things I loved about Daddy, and it terrified me to see him weak.
Closing my eyes, I took several deep breaths. I forced my eyes open to the hospital hallway.
I needed Cook.
Walking over to the door, I was about to push it open but paused. I was trembling. I was about to fall again. I couldn’t do this.
“Roni,” I whispered, though I wasn’t sure she could hear my peep over the bustling hallway. Nurses going about their duties. Doctors visiting all the rooms. A beeping somewhere. The white noise that sounded like we were in a wind tunnel.
“Yeah, Maddie?” Roni took my hand.
“Can you come with me?” I asked.
“The doctor only said one person could go in,” explained Wilde. “We’ve been taking turns.”
I stared at the hospital room door, still unable to push it open.
“It’s okay, Maddie,” said Roni. “We’ll be right out here. Go see your man.”
My man.
I pushed the door aside and stepped in. Immediately, the beeping from the machines hit me.
So loud.
Beeping. Ringing. Overlapping sounds swirled around me.
Cook lay in the bed, cords and tubes connected to him. A white blanket was pulled to the middle of his chest. He didn’t sleep like that. Never that peaceful and never at that angle. He never slept on his back—always on his side and a little curled up.
It wasn’t natural for him.
He was a limp shell of himself, his head tilting back and Adam’s apple sticking out of his thick neck.
The door shut, and I turned back and grabbed the handle. I couldn’t be locked inside here. Another cage. But I couldn’t leave Cook alone.
With a deep sigh, I gathered myself and then faced him. “Cook,” I croaked, my throat raw. The antiseptic burned my nostrils and slid down my mouth. I forced myself forward a few steps. “Cook,” I repeated, my voice a little stronger now.
He didn’t stir either time. He probably wouldn’t. The machine alerted me, at least, that he still lived.
“Wake up,” I said, trying to use the tone that he often used on me. It fell flat, because I could never boss him around. “Can you just be okay? I need you to be okay. Please be okay.” I took his hand.
It lacked the warmth and the pressure that it normally had. He didn’t even twitch.
He always woke up for me. Why wouldn’t he do it now?
“Cook, please,” I begged. “I need you. And I think you need me too.” I didn’t know exactly how to explain it, but then words bubbled out of me. “You and I should leave this behind. We’ve been hurt, and we can’t stay here. Not in the MC and not with the others. Not at the Ridge. You don’t talk about it, but I know what your father did. I know what happened in that house. I could see it in you and Vivi. Too close to what happened to me, and they’re all around me now. Tommy, Sloan, Signora, Massimo, and all their people. I think I see the guys that raped me—nameless and faceless—everywhere I go. They know me, and they will come after me again. We can’t stay here, Cook. Please tell me that you’ll come with. I need you to come with me. They only go away when I’m with you!”
Tears rolled down my cheeks as the words ran dry, and I gulped in a shaky breath.
He said nothing. Did nothing. The machine beeped with his pulse.
If Cook couldn’t listen to me, then I would have to turn to someone else. Someone I had long given up on and someone I never said a word to since Mom made me pray at night before bed or before a meal. If God couldn’t help me when I was abducted and raped and tortured, why would He help me now?
“Can You hear me?” I asked, tilting my chin up toward the ceiling. “Can You help me with Cook? Can You make him understand? We need to go. We can’t stay here. Please. I’ll do whatever You want. I’ll give whatever You want.”
Hadn’t I been doing that my whole life? Giving. I had been a puppet to however a man wanted me. And Cook had been the first person I could really call mine.
“Please, God,” I begged. “If Cook lives, I’ll find a way to get him away from danger and everything else. But I need your help.”
Beep.
The only answer to my begging, even as it quickened. Beep, beep, beep, beep, beeeeeeeep. It continued on, and I flinched away.
Suddenly, the hospital room door burst open, and people flooded inside. I jumped up as people pushed me aside to get to Cook, grabbing at the tubes and wires holding him to the bed and machines. Cook was flat on the bed, even though the machines screamed in alarm.
“What’s happening?” I asked.
“You need to leave,” ordered a nurse.
The doctors and nurses swarmed around Cook like bees, flattening the bed and removing the pillow from behind his neck. They ripped the wires and tubes from his body.
“What’s happening?” I repeated, but me and my voice were lost to all the growing chaos.
“Get his shirt off,” someone ordered as another person undid Cook’s hospital gown, revealing his muscles and tattoos and the bandage. Red blood started to stain the once-white bandage and the bedding.
“Cook!” I tried to move toward him, but someone pushed me back.
“Get her out of here!” ordered someone else.
“Clear!”
Paddles had been placed to Cook’s body, and whatever happened, it jolted him from the bed for a split second, like a ghost leaving a grave. His body seized. Then they placed the paddles back on his chest.
“Clear!”
Cook seized again, and I screamed, clawing toward him. What the fuck were they doing to him? How was this helping him?
Someone yelled, “Get her out of here!” but it wasn’t a doctor or nurse that had me in their arms. Celt whipped me around like I was a doll, dragging me out of Cook’s hospital room as a hospital worker said, “Call the OR.”
“Cook!” I kicked again at Celt.
Cook couldn’t die. He couldn’t leave me. I needed him.
I loved him.
Celt tugged me through the doors and deposited me into the waiting arms of Mel and Roni as they rolled Daddy away on the stretcher.