Chapter 36
Chapter Thirty-Six
GIA
Neither Misty nor I breathed during the bumpy ride in Dad’s truck. Misty sat in my lap in the passenger seat. Our hands were duct-taped to the oh-shit handle above the window.
“You never were worth a damn, Regina,” my father murmured. “You’re not even my blood. I poisoned Caleb when I found out he stole Valerie from me. If I couldn’t have Lisa, then I sure as hell wasn’t letting my good-for-nothing brother have Valerie.”
What? Jimmy McClary was my uncle? Not my father?
My mind snapped back to something Mama said. “You’re of good blood. A good heart.”
She hadn’t meant I’d inherited the better genes in the family.
She’d meant Jimmy wasn’t my biological father.
Relief punched through me first, hot and dizzying, but it was quickly followed by something uglier.
That truth lowered my value to him even further.
It also explained why he’d never tried to track me down when I left.
Good riddance to Valerie’s first child, the bastard he’d been forced to claim.
When we reached Hurst land, Jimmy proved he wasn’t stupid. He didn’t pull up to the main house. Instead, he stopped near a cluster of trees farther down the driveway, keeping cover around him so no one could line up an easy sniper shot.
Please, let Jackson be out here. The man could sniper shoot a nail off a fence post from unreasonable distances.
Then he shoved Misty and me ahead of him, using us as shields as he marched us up the driveway toward Timothy’s black truck.
Timothy stood beside the truck, rigid with tension. Even from a hundred yards away, I could feel it rolling off him in waves. He wore sunglasses, like a poker player hiding emotions.
Jimmy stopped us. His fist twisted in the back of my shirt like a leash. Misty hung off my arm as if the effort of walking was too much.
“What’s your play here, Jimmy?” Timothy called out, his voice calm in a way that felt far more dangerous than shouting. “Wipe out your whole bloodline? Spend the rest of your life rotting in prison?”
“I want you to watch me destroy your life,” Jimmy snarled. “Just like you destroyed mine.”
Timothy huffed a low, humorless laugh. “Jimmy, you destroyed my life long ago when you tried to kill Gia the first time.” His head tilted slightly. “Everything after that? You getting caught for bigamy, drugs, all of it? That’s just consequences finally catching up to you.”
Jimmy pushed Misty and me hard in front of him such that I stumbled. I felt the shift in his body stepping away. The rise of the gun.
Misty must have too.
The shot cracked through the air at the exact moment Misty spun toward me.
Her body slammed into mine.
For half a second, my brain refused to understand what had happened. The force of her rocking forward knocked me backward into the dirt. Misty collapsed over me. Warmth splattered across my chest.
Timothy lunged and grabbed the barrel of the gun before Jimmy could shoot again, wrenching it out of his hands. He punched him hard enough to crack his nose. Jimmy swung back, catching him with enough force to push him backward. The gun fell between them.
Another shot rang out. I knew in my bones it was aimed at Jimmy. I heard his body hit the ground. I noted him not moving.
“Misty?” My voice broke on her name. I pushed upright and dragged her head into my lap. Blood spread fast across her pink T-shirt, soaking through my hands no matter how hard I tried to hold it in. “No, no, no—”
Sirens screamed somewhere in the distance. Gravel crunched. Doors slammed. None of it mattered.
Misty looked up at me and smiled. Actually smiled. The relief on her face was so pure it shattered me. Tears blurred my vision.
“Doesn’t hurt,” she whispered through uneven breaths. “This…” Her lips trembled. “This has dignity.”
A sob tore out of me. All her life, people had hurt my little sister. They’d used her. Made her feel small. And now she was dying like this, saving me.
I clutched her hand tighter. “I love you.”
Her fingers weakly squeezed mine.
Behind her, I saw sheriff’s department cars flooding the driveway. An ambulance. Timothy running toward us with a look on his face so destroyed it nearly undid me. But Misty held my gaze like I was the only thing she wanted to see before she left this world.
“Marry him,” she whispered. “Live… Love. Dad…can’t hurt you more.”
My tears fell onto her cheeks. “I will.” My voice shook apart. “If we have a little girl someday, I’ll name her after my favorite sister.”
Her lips parted in the faintest, broken smile.
I whispered, “I’ll give her the love we never got.”
Then they were loading Misty onto a gurney. I never released her hand but choked out, “She has a DNR.”
“Are you okay?” Timothy asked me.
I was numb as I stepped onto the ambulance with Misty. “She’s dying. I need to be with her.”
“Okay. I’ll be at the hospital. Right behind you,” I heard him say.
The ride was bouncy, but I held onto Misty’s hand until the EKG showed her heartrate flatline. The sadness was there, but I’d been saying goodbye for a long while. So, there was also relief and a bit of happiness that she got to go on her own terms.
“Ma’am,” the paramedic next to me asked. “Are you sure you’re okay?” He pointed to my scrub top.
“Mostly her blood.” I felt a bit of stinging pain. “Hurts a little bit.”
“I’m real sorry she’s gone, but I need to take a look at you.
” He lifted my shirt and examined my back.
Then he took vitals on me. Without asking, he whipped off my shirt and started bandaging around my middle.
A second paramedic was putting an IV line in my arm.
Both looked far more tense than they should’ve been if it’d only been a glancing blow.
When we arrived at the emergency entrance, the paramedic asked, “You think you can step out and get on the gurney we have waiting for you?”
I stood, but my head went so light I thought I might pass out.
I remembered this. I’d experienced this the last time I went to a hospital.
I shook my head and sat back down. The gurney with Misty’s covered body was rolled out and another was rolled in.
I didn’t remember lying on it, but found myself lying flat.
I grabbed the paramedic’s hand before he rounded me off to an ER clinician. “Timothy…I need him. Timothy Hurst.”
* * *
TIMOTHY
“Where is Gia Stevens?” I demanded at the emergency room desk. “She just came in. Her sister had a gunshot wound.” I looked wildly around the crowded waiting room. “Gia isn’t here.”
She wasn’t answering my texts nor a phone call.
The woman behind the desk barely glanced up at first, fingers flying across her keyboard. “Gia Stevens…” she repeated. Then her expression shifted. She picked up the phone, murmured something quietly, and looked back at me. “What’s your name?”
“Timothy Hurst.”
She nodded, clinical and professional. “Mr. Hurst, she asked for you when she arrived.” She typed a bit more, not even looking at me. “I’m going to ask you to wait out here while surgery evaluates her. The doctor assigned to her case will update you as soon as possible.”
Surgery. The word hollowed me out. Misty hadn’t fully shielded her. Gia had been hit too.
For a second I couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t hear anything except the roar of blood in my ears and the echo of gunshots replaying in my skull.
“What’s going on?” Jackson put a hand on my shoulder.
“She got shot.” My voice sounded hollow. I didn’t move to sit. “I want to wait with her.”
“Are you family?” The question hit harder than it should have.
“She’s…” My throat tightened painfully. “I’m all she’s got now.” My voice cracked. “Her mother was just murdered. Her father was killed. Her sister likely died in her arms on the way here.” I swallowed hard. “Please tell me if she’s… I need to see her.”
The woman stared at me, the exhaustion leaving her face all at once. Horror replaced it. Then she stood quickly and motioned me toward the locked doors.
The emergency floor beyond them was chaos. Stretchers rolled past. Voices called out numbers and vitals. The sharp antiseptic smell mixed with blood turned my stomach.
But all I could think was: Gia is alone in here.
Jackson followed silently behind me.
The nurse hurried me down a long hallway and into an exam room crowded with people. There she was, so pale it scared me. IV fluids dripped into her arm. Blood stained the side of her gown.
A doctor examined beneath a giant gauze pad against her side, the one that already had the long scar. A nurse read off numbers I couldn’t process.
I crossed the room in seconds and went straight to her bedside. “I’m here.”
Her eyes fluttered open at the sound of my voice. Drugged. Exhausted. But when she saw me, something in her face loosened. She tried to lift her hand toward me, but she was too weak.
I grabbed her hand immediately and held it tight between both of mine.
“I got you,” I whispered, fighting to keep my voice steady while people rushed around us. “I got you, baby. I’m right here.”
“Misty’s gone,” she whispered.
“This is about you now,” I said roughly. “I need you not to die on me.”
A faint laugh escaped her, weak and breathy. “Oh, Rye.” Her fingers twitched against mine. “He tried to kill me once before. This?” She swallowed painfully. “This is nothing.”
A nurse hung a bag of blood and hooked it up to her IV.
“This doesn’t look like nothing.” My throat burned. “He can’t ever try again.”
Relief softened her face in a way that nearly undid me. “Thank God.” Her voice dropped to almost nothing. “You’ll be safe now.”
Even now—even after everything she’d lost—she was worried about me. I pressed her hand harder to my mouth, trying to hide the fact I was falling apart right in front of her.
She blinked slowly, fighting whatever drugs were pulling at her. “Was it you,” she whispered, “or Jackie?” Her eyes drifted to the doorway where Jackson lurked.
“Jackie,” I whispered.
A sleepy smile touched her lips. “He needed that.” She winked at Jackson and squeezed my hand. Her eyelids drifted closed. “I’ll be okay now. You’re here.”
“I’ll always be here.”
Her brows pinched slightly, like she’d just remembered something important. “I promised your mama I’d go to church with her and make potato salad for dinner this week. I don’t know if I can.”
A broken laugh escaped me before I could stop it. “I think she’ll give you a pass.”
“I don’t want a pass,” she murmured. “It’s rude to miss that kind of invite. I also don’t think I’m going to be able to do the state fair next week. I’m sorry. So sorry. Maybe the week after we’ll drive somewhere just us and Sofia. Got to force you to take a day off.”
I looked up then and realized the doctor and two nurses had gone still during our conversation. None of them looked alarmed anymore. Just quietly amused. Relieved.
For the first time since the shooting, I let myself breathe.
Then Gia looked at me again. Really looked at me. “Mama’s dead, isn’t she?”
The question hollowed me out. I nodded once.
Her face crumpled so softly it hurt worse than screaming would’ve. “I’m so sad she was alone. That she had to bear all that by herself.” Even smaller she said, “I don’t have any family left.”
I lifted her hand and pressed a kiss into the palm. “Yes, you do,” I whispered. “You got me.”
Jackson moved forward and stood nearby. “You got all of us.”
“I’m not letting you go this time,” I whispered.