36. Chapter 36
Chapter 36
I saac felt the bullet before he heard the shot. A brutal, burning punch to the right side of his torso—just below the ribs. It ripped through muscle, stole his breath, lit his nerves on fire.
The museum lights blurred. Someone screamed. Glass shattered. Chaos bloomed in his periphery—but Isaac only saw her. Rosie. Frozen, wide-eyed, hands over her mouth.
He staggered away from the dead man on the ground, guiding Rosie away from that. Still needing to protect her, even though it was done.
“Isaac—” Rosie was in front of him now. Pale. Panicked. Grabbing at his shirt.
“I’m fine,” he ground out. “You good? You’re not hurt?”
“Stop talking, you’re bleeding out—”
“Don’t care.” He caught her wrist. “Long as you’re okay.”
He dropped to one, grit his teeth, and forced himself upright again. Fuck. Fuck. His hand clamped down over the bleeding. Hot. Wet. He was losing it too fast.
Then Chris was there, yelling into his phone. Shay beside him, waving security over. Amy was crying. Someone was shouting about a gun. Sirens were already echoing in the distance.
Rosie knelt beside him, pressing harder against the wound. “Don’t pass out,” she whispered, voice shaking. “Don’t you fucking dare.”
He looked at her. Everything slowed.
There was blood on her hands. His blood.
Her eyes shimmered, glassy with fear.
Isaac exhaled. Managed a smirk. “Can’t pass out,” he said hoarsely.
“Stay with me.”
“Still here, Coco. Always.”
And then the lights overhead blurred, tilting.
Still, he stayed awake.
Because she needed him to.
Because he’d promised her—once, a lifetime ago—that he wouldn’t let anyone hurt her again.
And this time, he’d kept it.
* * * * *
Pain wasn’t new to Isaac.
He knew how to breathe through it. Knew how to slow his heart rate, regulate his thoughts, let his body fall into discipline when the agony screamed loud. But this? This wasn’t a battlefield.
This was blood soaking through his shirt. This was Rosie sobbing against his chest. This was a goddamn museum.
He was dimly aware of the paramedics shouting over the rush of sirens, of lights streaking the sky as they cut through traffic. His teeth clenched as the pressure increased on his side, something hot and awful blooming just under his ribs.
“You with us, Isaac?” a medic asked, adjusting the oxygen under his nose.
“Yeah,” he muttered, jaw locked. “Still fucking here.”
Rosie’s voice—sharp, panicked—faded somewhere behind him. “I’ll drive. I’ll meet you there—just keep him awake.”
It cut deeper than the bullet.
He didn’t want her scared like that.
Didn’t want her crying over him.
In the back of the ambulance, the world narrowed to sensation. The gurney rattling beneath him. The sting of a needle. The burn of gauze pressed too deep. He coughed once, and it lit his side on fire.
“We’re hitting you with fentanyl,” someone said.
“Great,” Isaac rasped. “Bring a hammer while you’re at it.”
Then—nothing.
Just heat and adrenaline and his own blood running sticky down his hip.
He didn’t black out.
Wouldn’t give himself the luxury.
They wheeled him into Balboa and straight into hell.
Bright lights. Freezing air. Metal instruments clattering. Voices barking instructions over the whir of machines.
“Vitals are stable, BP’s holding.”
“Start another line, get imaging on the right flank. We need to clear liver and kidney.”
“Type and cross—he’s gonna need fluids.”
Heath Carrington’s voice cut through the noise like a scalpel.
“Of course it’s Rayleigh.”
Isaac turned his head and saw him—scowling in his white coat, already snapping on gloves.
“Heath,” he breathed.
“You again,” Heath muttered, stepping in. “I leave town for two days and you find a way to get shot at an art exhibit?”
Isaac smirked. “Trying to diversify my skillset.”
Heath didn’t smile. Just looked at the monitor, then at the blood-stained side of his abdomen. “You’re lucky. Bullet missed everything that matters. Through and through. Hurts like hell but you’re not dying today.”
Isaac didn’t respond. He wasn’t so sure.
They stitched him up. Packed the wound. IV fluids dripping into his arm. Monitors beeping steady and slow.
He drifted.
Half-asleep. Half-awake.
Every time he stirred, there were hands adjusting tubes, checking vitals, cold fingers pressing to his wrist.
But then—
Rosie.
He didn’t even have to open his eyes. He knew the feel of her fingers brushing through his hair. Knew the sound of her breath hitching as she whispered his name.
“You scared the hell out of me,” she said, her voice breaking.
He reached for her hand.
Didn’t say a word.
Didn’t have to.
She stayed with him. Sat beside him while the pain rolled in waves, while the hours bled into each other and the hospital settled into its usual rhythm of life clinging to the edge.
He was still here.
Still fighting.
And for once in his life, he wasn’t doing it for country, or team, or the goddamn Navy.
He was doing it for her.
* * * * *
It was the pain that woke him—or maybe the silence.
Hospital silence was never real silence. There was always something beeping in the background, always the low shuffle of feet, hushed voices through a curtain, the hum of fluorescent lights.
But this silence felt heavier. Like the world was holding its breath.
Isaac blinked into the dark, the dim glow of a wall monitor the only light in the room. His ribs ached like fire, a dull weight pressing into his side. There was something tight across his chest—then he realized it wasn’t pain.
It was her.
Rosie.
Curled against him, her head tucked into the crook of his shoulder. Barely breathing. A warm, steady weight against the bandages and the bruises. She was here. In his bed. Her hand resting low over his stomach like she’d claimed the space.
And fuck, maybe she had.
Isaac let his eyes drift shut for a second, just breathing her in. Her scent—warm skin, faint shampoo, paint maybe. Something that always smelled like home.
He shifted, just enough to look at her.
She didn’t stir.
Of course she didn’t. He’d seen how exhausted she was. That look in her eyes when he hit the ground. That look of terror.
He swallowed hard.
She’d held it together until the ambulance.
He hadn’t.
He thought he could hold on forever—power through anything, be the guy who never cracked. But the second they’d strapped him in, the second she disappeared from his sight, everything cracked wide open.
And now she was here. Not just beside him, but pressed into him like she belonged.
He moved his arm, carefully, ignoring the sting in his side, and slid his hand into her hair. Soft. Tangled. Familiar.
She stirred this time. Made a little sound.
“Is this what heaven looks like?” he whispered.
Rosie let out a laugh and nuzzled into him. “Nope. You’re awake.”
“Thank God.”
A long pause. Her breath against his chest.
“You scared the hell out of me,” she said.
Isaac shut his eyes. “I know.”
“I thought—” Her voice caught. “When you went down, I thought that was it.”
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“I know,” she whispered.
Another beat passed. She didn’t move.
He did.
Just a little. Just enough to press his mouth to her forehead. “I love you.”
The words weren’t planned. Weren’t rehearsed. Weren’t even fully formed until they were out of his mouth.
But there they were.
Simple. Brutal. True.
Rosie didn’t say anything right away. She lifted her head instead, looking at him through the dark.
“And this is what, Day Three of being your girlfriend?” she asked softly. “It’s been spicy.”
Isaac grinned slowly. “This is what happens when you love someone from the sidelines for too fucking long.”
She didn’t cry. She didn’t break.
She just kissed him.
Soft and slow and grateful. And when she rested her head against him again, her hand found his, threading their fingers together.
Neither of them let go.