50. Ellie
ELLIE
The ambulance's siren cuts through the late April night like a blade, piercing the quiet suburban streets.
Cherry trees are in bloom outside, the scent of fresh blossoms drifting through the ambulance windows.
It's a sickly sweet contrast to the turn of autumn when Killian first entered my life all those months ago.
His blood has already soaked through multiple layers of gauze, heavy and warm against my palms, keeping my frantic heart tethered to the reality of how close I am to losing him.
I'm still wearing the cotton shorts and oversized t-shirt I had on in the kitchen when the raid happened, the pale fabric now heavy and slick with blood from chest to hem.
Killian's blood has dried dark under my fingernails, streaking rusty brown lines down my forearms. Thin cuts from shattered glass peek through the crimson smears on my legs, and marble dust from the destroyed kitchen island coats my shins.
The paramedics had tried to check me over, reaching for my wrist to take my vitals, but I pulled away. I couldn't let go of his hand long enough for them to examine scrapes that didn't even register against the crushing terror of losing him.
"ETA three minutes!" the paramedic calls from the front, his voice infuriatingly calm compared to the absolute panic tearing me apart inside. The ambulance takes a hard corner, throwing my weight, but I brace my whole body against the gurney to keep Killian steady.
His breathing is a shallow, ragged rasp against the chest seal I applied in the bunker.
The IV fluids are running, but his skin has a sickly blue tinge creeping around his lips from the massive blood loss.
My medical training forces me to recognize every failing vital sign, even as the rest of me screams at the terrifying reality that he is slipping right through my fingers.
"Stay with me," I whisper, my thumb stroking hard over his blood-stained knuckles. "Just hold on."
His eyelashes flutter. For a heartbeat, those slate-gray eyes cut through the haze and lock onto my face. The corner of his mouth twitches, the barest hint of his usual smirk, before his eyes roll back and he slips under again.
Jackson's voice crackles through the radio clipped to the paramedic's shoulder. "Trauma bay prepped. Kai's briefing the surgical team now."
I close my eyes, a ragged breath tearing from my throat.
Grateful doesn't begin to cover it. The sheer violence of what they were willing to do to get us out is beyond comprehension.
While I was sealed in the bunker fighting to keep Killian alive, they had been systematically tearing apart the Order's assault unit.
Jackson coordinating with hospital security to secure the trauma wing, Gabriel leading his tactical team to lay down heavy fire and clear our route to the road, Kai demanding advanced medical prep I wouldn't have known to ask for.
They acted on pure, violent instinct to protect their own.
I've never had people fight for me the way they fought to reach us tonight.
The ambulance brakes hard, and we're instantly swallowed by the glaring lights of St. Michael's Level One trauma center. The back doors bang open to a rush of chilly air, and a swarm of blue scrubs descends, dragging Killian's gurney out onto the pavement.
"Male, early thirties, gunshot wound to the left chest!
" the paramedic shouts, jogging alongside us as we hit the automatic doors.
"Entry wound high lateral, no exit. Stabilized tension pneumothorax.
Bystander sealed a sucking chest wound and established IV access.
Loaded with antibiotics, morphine, and TXA. "
I stay glued to the edge of the rushing gurney.
A trauma doctor steps in, instantly cutting away what’s left of Killian's bloody shirt to start a rapid assessment.
I want to explain exactly what I did in the bunker, to make sure they know how long he's been bleeding, but I force my feet to stay planted.
My psychology degree is completely useless here.
I stare at my hands clinging to the metal rail. The dried blood on my palms belongs to Killian. The spray coating my knuckles belongs to the man I shot. I put a bullet in someone's chest tonight, and I don't feel a fucking thing about it. I'm just watching the man I love bleed out.
The lead surgeon, a woman with silver hair and sharp eyes, points at the chest seal. "Dr. Martinez. Excellent pre-hospital stabilization. Who strapped him?"
"I did," I manage to choke out.
Dr. Martinez offers a tight, reassuring nod before turning back to the gurney.
The acknowledgement means absolutely nothing.
Before I can take another step, a nurse shoves me back behind a painted red line I can't cross. I’m forced to stand there, watching through the glass as they rip away his remaining clothes and hook him to monitors that instantly erupt into a chorus of shrill, urgent alarms.
"Tachy at 119, systolic dropping to 84, he's hypovolemic!" a nurse shouts over the alarms. "He's bleeding out into his chest cavity!"
"Type and cross for ten units, get OR 3 prepped!" Dr. Martinez barks, the air in the room suddenly crackling with violent urgency. "We're opening him up. Now."
The bay explodes. Nurses rip monitor cables from the walls and grab IV poles, shoving the gurney forward. Someone shouts a blood pressure reading that makes my stomach freefall. I only catch one last glimpse of Killian's lifeless, pale face before they ram the bed through the double doors.
They swing shut with a heavy, metallic bang, locking me out.
I press my palms flat against the cold glass, staring at the empty trauma bay and the carnage that is left behind.
The floor is a wreck of strewn equipment and discarded gauze and cut-off fabric, but my eyes are anchored to the blood that ran off the gurney and onto the floor: a dark, wet trail leading straight to the doors they just disappeared through.
The adrenaline is finally crashing, draining out of my system and leaving behind a violent, uncontrollable shaking that starts in my knees and works its way up. I can't even feel my fingers.
This is what I train my patients to do. Maintain composure. Process trauma objectively. But standing here, watching a nurse wipe the streak of Killian's blood off the linoleum floor, every psychological technique I've ever learned shatters. I am nothing right now but pure, suffocating panic.
"Ellie," Jackson's voice is quiet and steady behind me.
I turn to find him standing with Kai and Gabriel.
They look wrecked. Bruised knuckles, torn clothes, and dark patches of cordite tracking across Gabriel's jaw.
Kai flashed a badge at the desk to keep the cops away, but a nurse is still staring at the blood dripping from his boots onto the sterile tile.
The heavy alertness that comes from surviving a bloodbath is still rolling off them in waves.
"How bad?" Gabriel asks, his usual sardonic humor completely gone.
"Bad," I manage to say, unwilling to sugar-coat it. "The bullet's still inside. Tension pneumothorax, significant blood loss. He crashed before they even got him out of the room."
Kai's expression gives away almost nothing, but a muscle ticks in his jaw. "Dr. Martinez is good. If anyone can fix him, it's her."
We settle into the surgical waiting area. It's a bright room consisting of hard plastic chairs and carefully arranged medical pamphlets on the coffee tables.
Jackson sits heavily across from me. He reaches into his jacket and slides a translucent, high-security ID card across the plastic table. It’s smeared with a thick streak of blood.
"Kai did a fast sweep of the kitchen before we pulled out," Jackson says, his voice low. "He pulled this off the man you shot."
I pick it up. The rigid plastic is tacky against my fingers, but the name is clearly printed beneath the official photo: Anton Reeves.
My breath hitches. I remember those eyes watching me through the crack in my father’s study door when I was eight years old.
He was mid-sentence when I pulled the trigger.
Whatever he knew about my father died with him, and I'd do it again without hesitating.
"I ran a sweep on the drive over," Kai adds, not looking up from his tablet. "Reeves wasn't just Order. He was high up. Really high up. Higher than Julian."
"Killian recognised him before he went down. Said he was Genesis, whoever Julian was protecting."
"Whatever secrets Reeves was keeping, they’re buried with him now," Kai says.
"Fucking brilliant." I let out a sharp exhale, the chair scraping loud against the linoleum as I shove back, my hands dropping limp to my sides.
I sink back into the hard plastic chair, my forehead resting in my hands.
The blood on my skin has started to flake, itching as it dries.
I stare at the rusty crust under my fingernails, refusing to wash it off.
If I scrub it away, I have to admit Killian is bleeding out on a table on the other side of those doors somewhere.
And part of me wonders if that's the last I'll have of him.
Four hours pass in an agonizing blur of fluorescent lights humming until the sound vibrates in my teeth. I choke down bitter hospital coffee that leaves an oily film on my tongue. I don't move. I barely breathe.
When the surgical doors finally swing open, Dr. Martinez doesn't look like a savior.
She looks exhausted. She peels off a surgical cap, her hair matted to her forehead.
Her dark scrubs are crumpled from leaning over a table for hours, and there are fresh, bright red speckles of arterial blood across the tops of her surgical shoes.
She walks toward us. I stand up, forcing my locked, shaking knees to hold my weight so I don’t collapse.
"He's out of surgery. We have him stabilized, but he is still critical," Dr. Martinez says, her voice raspy.