Chapter 13 #5
“It’s not like I expected a big hug and a kiss.
” Delilah doesn’t even snort at my joke.
Her eyes sink to the ground, and a pit grows inside my belly.
This woman has become known to me, as I have become known to her.
I have seen past the lace and the silk to the woman beneath.
She is tough, funny, and honest. She is gifted in presenting painful information, wrapping it carefully as to soften the blow, like a whale’s ambergris.
I recognize the half-truth. “What aren’t you telling me? ”
“Last night, I received a late report that Taylor was involved in an intense firefight, resulting in the destruction of a building. The area was rife with civilians. Taylor was trying to protect them.”
“And the building collapsed?” It’s stupid, of course, for me to picture Taylor trapped beneath rubble. I already know she’s on her way, but my anxiety takes a fast track to the worst possible scenarios, heart palpitating.
“Taylor was inside evacuating civilians.”
Fury and fear duke it out inside my chest. “Why didn’t you wake me up?”
“Because Taylor escaped.” Delilah swallows, looking uncharacteristically sheepish. “I wanted her homecoming to be a surprise.”
“Who ambushed them?”
Delilah scans the report screen rolling information in a constant stream. “I don’t know yet. But I will find out.”
A threat, and a promise.
“She sent the communication to us, so she must be okay, right?” I need the assurance. I need her assurance. “Right?”
Hands splayed out on the papers on her desk, Delilah’s hard expression melts. “It stands to reason that she is at least functional enough to speak into the talk-to-text. There’s no telling how incapacitated she is otherwise.”
Incapacitated. Without capacity. If I’m incapacitated…stay with Delilah.
“Let’s get changed and wait at the hospital. I’ll brief Shuri so she can take over while we’re gone, and radio ahead for the hospital to expect Taylor and Mason.”
Within minutes, we’re riding in the back of a cream-colored sedan, eyes out the window, silence between us.
Delilah’s hand brushes across the back seat and takes mine as we near the hospital.
When I catch her gaze, a level of worry, sadness, and anger exists there that I’ve never seen in her before.
Delilah’s even keel keeps everyone afloat.
As such, I’ve tethered myself to her. She is my rock, and if she’s sinking, I am too.
Predictably, the hospital is busy when we enter, though our joint status gives many people pause. Delilah confidently strolls to the desk, arresting the attention of everyone behind the chest-high counter. “Have Eos and Helios come through?”
A tall nurse with incredible cheekbones stands, a clipboard in his hand. “Yes, ma’am. About five minutes ago. Helios is about to go into surgery. Eos is—”
“Hey! I go with him!”
I’d know that angry growl anywhere. As Delilah begins laying into the nurse for not informing her sooner, I take off in search of Taylor.
What am I feeling? Elation? Dread? Some god-awful combination of the two?
Whatever it is, it propels me down the hallway in time to see Taylor get locked out of an emergency room.
She pounds on the door with her fist. As I get closer, she comes into full, frightening view.
Her arms are bare, uniform torn or burned near the biceps.
She’s covered in blood, streaming red and coagulated black.
“Taylor.”
Her attention snaps to me, and reveals a face covered in blood spatter. “They won’t let me in,” she whines. “That’s—my brother. He’s—it’s Mason. They have to let me in there.”
“Taylor. He’s with the doctors, he’s going to be fine.” I’m as cautious and calm as I can be, hoping not to spook her. Her dark skin is light beige, and it’s probably from the blood pooling at her feet. “You need a doctor.”
“I need to make sure Mason is going to live.”
“We need a doctor here!” Inspecting Taylor more closely, I spot a dark hole where black blood oozes from her shoulder. She’s been shot. Frantic, I yell even louder. “We need a doctor now!”
“Lucy?” Taylor coughs blood and saliva into her palm, and looks up at me with disoriented eyes. “I think I’m hurt.”
She promptly passes out. I barely get there in time to grab her by the back and lower us to the ground. Taylor’s exposed skin is almost ice cold to the touch, raw and bloody like someone tried to grind her into sausage. “Delilah! Somebody help!”
Delilah rounds the corner and gapes at us in horror. Nurses finally show up with a gurney and push me out of the way to gingerly lift Taylor’s lifeless body onto the mobile bed. Doctors surround her and everyone disappears behind two frosted glass doors that angrily swing closed.
In the nick of time, I find a chrome trash bin, slap off the rounded dome, and vomit into the bag inside.
She’s alive.
If I should fall—
Cool marble kisses my cheek, the smell of bile and formaldehyde wafting up into my nose.
Scrambling to my knees, I again toss up the contents of my stomach into the trash before collapsing against the wall again.
Tears stream down my face and into the trash can, then onto the floor as I sink to the ground.
Only Delilah is clear in my blurry vision, mouth open and eyes glossy. She’s in shock.
Like me, she flattens against the wall and slides down to my side. “They can’t die. They can’t—they won’t die. They won’t. My babies.”
She whispers prayers in a mix of English and Spanish, wraps her arm over my shoulder, and pulls me into her. White sneakers and wobbly wheels fly by us in an endless race against death. It’s no use, I want to tell them.
Death always comes first.