Chapter 40
Zora
Darkness is the first thing I become aware of. For a long time, I cannot tell whether my eyes are open or closed. Everything feels strangely weightless, as though I am floating somewhere between sleep and consciousness.
Gradually, distant sounds begin filtering through the silence.
A steady electronic beeping repeats at regular intervals while quiet voices drift in and out around me, too muffled for me to make out the words.
My body feels impossibly heavy. Even the simple act of opening my eyes feels exhausting, but after several attempts, my eyelids finally begin to cooperate.
The bright hospital lights immediately make me squint.
My vision remains blurred for several seconds before the outlines of the room slowly come into focus.
The first thing I notice is that I'm not alone.
A young woman sits beside the bed with her head resting against folded arms, clearly asleep and just as clearly exhausted. For several moments, I simply stare at her, trying to force my sluggish brain to catch up with what my eyes are seeing.
Eventually, her eyes flutter open. The moment she notices me looking at her, her entire body goes still.
"Zora?" Her voice breaks around my name.
I frown slightly. "...Who are you?"
The color drains from her face so quickly that I almost feel bad immediately.
"What?" Fresh panic floods her expression. "Zora, that's not funny."
I blink at her. "I wasn't joking."
"Zora." Her voice cracks. "Please don't do this."
For a moment, I let her suffer. Then the corner of my mouth betrays me.
"I'm kidding."
Aurelia stares at me. A laugh escapes despite the pain in my chest.
"Relax. I know exactly who you are." I tilt my head slightly. "You're the woman who somehow turned wedding planning into a full-time occupation for everyone around you."
For a heartbeat, she simply looks at me. Then she exhales sharply somewhere between a laugh and a sob before lightly smacking my arm.
"You are genuinely awful."
"That's fair."
"I've barely slept in three days." She mutters. "I'm too tired for your personality."
The smile never leaves her face. Neither does the relief. The commotion quickly draws the others inside.
Keith reaches me first.
For a moment, he simply stands there looking at me as though he's trying to convince himself I'm actually awake. Then some of the tension leaves his shoulders and he exhales slowly.
"I thought we were too late." The quiet admission catches me off guard.
"So did I." I admit.
His hand settles briefly against my shoulder before he nods once, more to himself than to me. "I'm glad I was wrong."
Anton steps forward next. He looks terrible. There are dark circles beneath his eyes, his hair is a mess, and for perhaps the first time in my life, he genuinely looks exhausted.
"You look awful." I tell him.
A short laugh escapes him. "Good. It means I don't have to pretend you look any better." The smile fades quickly. "You scared us, Zora."
Aurelia moves back to my bedside and folds her arms.
"Three days." She says. "Do you know how many times I threatened the doctors?"
Keith raises an eyebrow. "An alarming number."
"They deserved it."
Despite the ache in my chest, I laugh softly. The sound seems to relax everyone at once.
Keith notices it first. "There's the Zora we know."
I look between all of them, suddenly overwhelmed by the realization that they were here through all of it. "I'm sorry."
Aurelia immediately shakes her head. "Don't." Her expression softens. "Just focus on getting better."
For the first time in my life, I do exactly that.
After the conversation settles, the question that has been sitting quietly at the back of my mind finally forces its way forward.
I look down at the blanket gathered in my lap, my fingers tracing absent patterns across the fabric.
"What happened after I lost consciousness?"
The room grows noticeably quieter.
Keith exchanges a brief glance with Aurelia before looking back at me.
"The police took control of the building almost immediately. They collected statements, reviewed the footage, and reconstructed everything that happened inside your office."
He pauses briefly. "Officially, Mikkel attempted to seize control of your office with Tobias and Sebastian acting alongside him. Somewhere in the middle of it, Tobias turned on everyone. Including his own father."
"And Tobias?"
Keith holds my gaze. "Dead."
The answer lands heavily between us.
"And Sebastian?"
A different silence follows this time.
Keith exhales slowly before answering. "He didn't leave that office alive either."
I don't ask how. Something in Keith's expression tells me I don't want the answer.
Instead, another question rises to the surface almost immediately. "Nico?"
For the first time since the conversation started, Aurelia smiles. "A better question would be when Nico."
I frown. "What does that even mean?"
"It means he barely left this room."
I blink.
Aurelia gestures toward the chair beside my bed. "For three days, that chair was occupied more consistently than your hospital bed was."
A small laugh escapes Keith. "The doctors hated him."
"The nurses loved him." Aurelia corrects.
"He argued with every doctor who came through that door." Keith adds. "He memorized your chart, your medication schedule, your test results, and somehow convinced himself he was qualified to disagree with actual surgeons."
Aurelia shakes her head, though she's smiling now. "I threatened to drag him home myself yesterday."
"And?"
"He asked whether I planned on carrying him."
Keith snorts quietly. "To be fair, he had a point."
Aurelia rolls her eyes. "The man is impossible."
The room falls quiet again. I look toward the empty chair beside my bed.
For a moment, I can almost picture him there. Arms folded. Eyes fixed on the monitors. Pretending not to be worried while jumping to his feet every time one of the machines made a sound.
Something warm settles painfully in my chest.
Anton, who has been unusually quiet for the past several minutes, suddenly checks his phone before letting out a dramatic sigh.
"I should probably go."
The three of us look at him.
"I've got another problem waiting for me."
I raise an eyebrow. "What kind of problem?"
Keith immediately pinches the bridge of his nose. "The kind involving Anton shooting one of his customers in his ass."
I stare at him. "...What?"
Anton throws his hands into the air. "Oh, come on. When you say it like that, it sounds much worse."
Aurelia laughs. "Does it?"
"He deserved it." Anton insists. "The idiot was harassing one of my employees all night. She told him no several times, and he still wouldn't leave her alone."
He shrugs unapologetically. "So I... encouraged him to rethink his decisions."
Keith deadpans. "You shot him in the ass."
"It was a warning."
Despite the soreness in my side, I burst into laughter. The movement immediately sends pain through my ribs, and I wince, pressing a hand against the bandages.
Aurelia gently shakes her head. "See? Look what you've done."
Anton points at me. "That's not my fault."
Aurelia smirks before turning back to him. "So..." Her eyes sparkle mischievously. "Are you absolutely sure she's just an employee?"
Anton freezes. "What?"
"The woman you defended."
He immediately looks offended. "I defend all my employees."
"Mhm."
"I do."
Keith folds his arms. "You've never shot anyone over one before."
Anton opens his mouth, closes it again, then glares at all of us. "You people are unbelievable."
Before anyone can respond, he turns and walks straight out of the room.
The moment the door closes behind him, Aurelia smirks. "Well, that's new."
I raise an eyebrow. "What is?"
"The king of New York nightlife finally caught feelings for someone."
"And judging by that reaction, it's serious." Keith says quietly.
"He has been denying it for weeks."
I blink. "Seriously?"
Aurelia nods.
I can't help smiling. "Anton? Nervous? I'd pay money to see that."
"Trust me, it was entertaining." Aurelia says.
"Then why am I only hearing about this now?"
"Because Anton would have hidden it from Keith too if he hadn't needed help cleaning up the mess it created."
Keith sighs. "Unfortunately for him, some of us got dragged into damage control."
Aurelia's grin widens. "And once I found out, getting Keith to tell me the rest became my personal mission."
"I held out for almost a week." Keith mutters.
"Three days." Aurelia corrects immediately.
"That still counts as resistance."
Despite myself, I laugh.
Somewhere out there, Anton is apparently panicking over a woman, and somehow that might be the most shocking development of the entire week.
Nearly half an hour passes in easy conversation before another knock sounds against the hospital room door. None of us pays much attention to it at first, assuming it's another nurse checking on me.
Then the door opens. Nico stands there. And for a moment, the entire room goes quiet.
He looks as though he came straight from wherever he was the moment someone told him I was awake. His shirt is wrinkled, his hair slightly disheveled, and the dark circles beneath his eyes make it painfully obvious that the last few days haven't been kind to him either.
He looks exhausted. He also looks terrified. Not because something is wrong. Because he's only now allowing himself to believe that maybe everything is finally going to be okay.
Aurelia notices it first. "I think we'll give you two a few minutes."
Keith nods immediately.
A few moments later, the door closes quietly behind them and the room falls silent.
Not the awkward kind that demands to be filled, but the kind that settles naturally between two people carrying far too much history for words to ever feel sufficient.
After everything that has happened between us, after the lies, the anger, the confessions, the blood, and the fear, language suddenly feels painfully inadequate.
Slowly, he crosses the room. His eyes never leave mine.