Chapter 26 Sloane
Sloane
I wake to the sound of my heartbeat. It pounds against my ribs, too loud and too fast. For a second, I have no idea where I am. The ceiling is unfamiliar; just a shade off-white, hairline crack running from the corner.
I'm in the guest room. The sheets carry detergent and whatever dryer sheets Maggie insists on, and everything in me reaches for a scent that isn't here.
Last night slams back in pieces. Donovan on the table. Blood on my hands. Malachi's voice slicing through the air as a blade. Knox's questions. My refusal to answer. The look on his face when I shut down. Again.
You don't get to—
You don't understand.
I can't—
Then my feet on the floor. My hands grabbed a pillow and an extra blanket. His voice at my back, rough and cracked, saying my name.
Sloane. Don't go.
I'd gone anyway.
I stare at the ceiling until the edges blur, until a younger version of me surfaces beneath a fluorescent light in a hospital wing, clipboard in hand, smile too bright. I blink hard, shove the image away, and sit up.
The house is quiet. Too quiet. I only hear the heating system hum and the faint tick of the hallway clock. That's it.
My phone reads 5:14 a.m. I doubt I slept more than an hour, all of it in jagged pieces where dream and memory tangled.
My body feels flimsy and overused. I swing my legs over and wait for the room to settle.
It doesn't. A low, vibrating tension under my skin, nerves firing on instincts I can't shut off.
If I stay… he'll wake up. He'll come find me. He'll knock on this door with that determined jaw and that stubborn tenderness, then he'll say talk to me.
And I'm not sure if I can hear that without breaking. I push to my feet.
Scrubs. Scrubs and layers. My body moves on autopilot as I dig in the dresser for the extra set I keep here. Dark blue, already soft from wear. I pull them on, then a long-sleeved shirt, then a hoodie over that.
Volunteer channels had lit up late last night.
There was a mass casualty response, overflow triage, and a downtown pop-up clinic being erected because the local ERs were packed past capacity.
I'd heard the notifications pinging in the kitchen where I stood staring at the fridge without seeing anything. Of course they were overwhelmed.
Olivia. Donovan's blast. The Holloway Building. Leo. Frankie's face when she heard, and the way her whole mouth crumpled before she turned away from everyone, grief a private injury she refused to let us touch.
I study my reflection with the thin light sneaking through the frosted window. My eyes ringed with shadows, the hazel dulled, red lines spiderwebbing the whites. Hair is a mess from sleep and stress; I rake it back and braid quickly, fingers on muscle memory.
Braid. Elastic. Tie it off. Next step. Keep moving.
In the hallway, I pause outside the master bedroom. The door half-closed, a line of darkness sliced by a thin bar of dawn light. I tell myself to keep walking. Instead, I push the door open. The room is all him.
Knox is on his side, one arm flung across the empty half of the bed, fingers resting in the dip where I usually sleep. Covers twisted around his waist, bare back a broad solid line in the dim. Tension in his shoulders even now, as though his body doesn't remember how to fully let go.
He'd looked so raw last night, standing in our doorway watching me pack myself up and leave.
With anger, hurt, and confusion knotted behind his eyes.
And fear. Only for a second, but it had been there.
Fear I'd recognized because I'd put it there, every time I shut a door between us instead of opening my mouth.
I cross to his side on bare feet, careful with the floorboards.
His nightstand is cluttered with the small bits of his life; his gun, switchblade, a book Maggie gave him on trauma that he pretends not to read, and a crooked clay dish Ruby made during a craft night.
She gave it to him straight-faced and said it was "abstract art.
" He kept it anyway. I nudge them aside to clear a space.
The notepad and pen are shoved halfway under the book. I slide them out to write him a note.
Emergency call. Pop-up clinic downtown. Didn't want to wake you. We can talk later. Sloane
I stare at that last line. The we feels optimistic, when I've spent months building walls brick by brick just to hide behind them. I almost add I'm sorry. The pen hovers. I write the words, stare at them, then scratch them out until the paper fibers fray.
Beneath it, smaller: Please eat something. The plea makes my eyes sting.
I fold the page once and lay it by his hand, close enough that his fingers brush the edge. He shifts in his sleep, mumbling my name, maybe. Too slurred to tell. I ease back from the bed.
By the front door, my hands are trembling. I grab the keys from the bowl, a jacket, and am outside before I can talk myself into anything different. The air bites straight through the hoodie. The sky is still mostly dark, just the barest light along the horizon, painting the world in muted gray.
I lock the door behind me. The truck sits in the driveway where Knox left it last night; my car is still at the clubhouse.
My stomach turns over, tight and loose at the same time. I swallow against the sourness coating my throat. But staying would have cracked me open. I turn the key and tell myself I'm just going to work. That this isn't cowardice. The engine drowns out the lie.
Downtown is scarred. The closer I get to the Holloway district, the worse it looks. Barricades block off the blast site. Flashing lights rotate lazily, coloring smoke-streaked buildings in alternating red and blue.
News vans cluster beyond police tape, satellite dishes pointed accusingly at the morning sky. Reporters in too-crisp coats, the words Breaking News scrolling endlessly.
I force myself not to look at the building and fix my eyes forward.
Past the blackened windows, past the warped metal near the garage entrance, and the section of lower wall that buckled outward.
I follow hand-painted signs toward the pop-up clinic.
Someone's taped them along the fencing. PERMITTED ENTRY → TRIAGE → FAMILY CHECK-IN.
The clinic is a cluster of white tents in the parking lot of a shuttered department store. Floodlights on portable stands turn asphalt into a harsh stage. Generators hum. EMT rigs and volunteer vans are parked in crooked lines with doors hanging open, and the insides chaotic but purposeful.
I park and sit with my hands on the wheel. There’s a sour taste in my mouth from too much adrenaline and not enough food. My stomach rolls at the mix of gasoline, smoke, and antiseptic already heavy in the air.
Just get out of the truck. You know how to do this. You've done this your whole life.
And that's exactly why my hands won't stop shaking. I push the door open. Cold hits first. Then the noise.
"Where do you want this?"
"We're full on green tags. Redirect to secondary."
"Doc, he's hypotensive again—"
"Somebody get more blankets. These people are freezing!"
I duck into the main triage tent, canvas flapping behind me in the wind. Inside, there are cots in rows. IV poles stand in clusters. Portable monitors beep. The smell is a sharp cocktail of sweat, blood, alcohol wipes, and coffee that's been sitting too long on a hot plate.
"Turner! You're on station three. Grab a vest."
I turn toward Morales, stocky and brisk, dark hair piled under a scrub cap, clipboard against her chest. We did a volunteer run together last year during a chemical plant incident.
"Sorry I'm just getting here," I say, sliding into the orange emergency vest. SLOANE T. RN across the front in black marker. "I was on a different call most of the night. Got here as fast as I could."
Morales waves it off, already scanning the tent. "You good with triage? We're cycling fast. Or treatment?"
"Triage is fine."
"Station three." She jerks her chin. "ABCs, tag, move them. We're overflow. Most criticals are already inside somewhere, but we'll get the ones in limbo. Vitals, quick interventions, onto the next."
Airway. Breathing. Circulation. I step into the current and let it carry me.
For the next hour, maybe two since time has lost its shape, I live in thirty-second slices.
There's a woman in her fifties with a head wound and slurred speech.
I check her pupils, steady her, keep her talking until we're sure she's not slipping.
Then a teenage boy with glass in his forearm.
I clear debris, use pressure dressing, and reassure his mother that yes, it'll scar, but he'll have full range of motion. The flow of patients doesn't end.
I treat a security guard with burns on his hands from pulling people out of stuck elevator doors.
An older man who wasn't near the blast but whose panic attack convinced him he was having a heart attack.
A woman in a designer suit whose only injury is a cut ankle, but whose hands shake so violently I have to wrap both of mine around hers to keep the bandage steady.
"You're okay," I hear myself say, again and again. "You're here. You're safe. Breathe with me. In. Out."
My voice is calm. My face composed. My hands are steady but the pulse in my neck won't quit.
Every time an EMT calls out vitals, I hear echoes. That same cadence in a different wing, under softer lighting, with nicer sheets and better snacks. "We've got another one coming through the back. Dr. Chamberland wants labs but no chart. Dr. Mercer said to put him under an alias. Don't ask."
Every time someone mentions back corridors or private rooms, my pulse stutters.
You wanted in, I remind myself, taping down an IV line. You wanted to help. You wanted to make it better.