Chapter 26
twenty-six
Jackson
Time doesn’t move properly anymore.
It stretches, folds in on itself, loses shape somewhere between the moment we left that cabin and now, and I don’t know how long it’s been until I glance at the clock on the dash and realize it’s been almost forty-five minutes.
Forty-five minutes of this.
Forty-five minutes of her not waking up.
Forty-five minutes of blood soaking through Zach’s hands no matter how hard he presses.
Forty-five minutes of me talking to her without getting anything back.
“Lia,” I say again, because I don’t know what else to do, because if I stop talking then the silence will mean something I don’t want to understand. “Lia, come on, sweetheart. Just...just open your eyes for me. Just once. You don’t even have to talk. Just look at me.”
Her head shifts slightly with the movement of the car.
That’s it.
That’s all.
Her lashes don’t move. Her mouth doesn’t respond. There’s nothing there except the weight of her in my arms and the way her body feels too loose, too heavy, like she’s slipping further away the longer this goes on.
Zach hasn’t looked at me in minutes.
Not properly.
His entire focus is locked on her side, on where his hands are pressed into her, and I can see it in him now, the change from earlier, the way his jaw is tighter, the way his shoulders are set like he’s holding himself in place by force.
Something’s wrong.
Something is...
“She’s not—” I start, but the words don’t come out properly, my throat tightening too hard around them.
Zach doesn’t answer me.
That’s worse.
“Elijah,” I snap, my voice cracking as I look up toward the front. “You need to go faster.”
“I am going as fast as I can,” he says, and his voice is rough, controlled in a way that sounds like it’s being held together by nothing but sheer refusal. “We’re not crashing this car.”
“That’s not fast enough,” I shoot back immediately, panic rising higher now, pushing everything else out of the way. “She’s...Elijah, she’s not waking up!”
“She’s not dying!”
The words cut across me.
Flat.
Final.
Like he’s already decided that’s the truth and nothing else is allowed to exist.
“Then fucking prove it!” I shout, my voice breaking completely now as I look back down at her. “Because she’s not...she’s not...”
I can’t finish it.
I can’t say it.
My hand comes up to her face, cupping her cheek, my thumb brushing over her skin in a motion that feels too gentle for what’s happening, too small, too useless.
“Lia,” I whisper, and it hurts to say her name like this, it physically hurts in my chest. “Come on. Please. Don’t do this to me. Not now. Not when we just...”
My voice breaks.
I swallow hard and try again.
“You don’t get to leave now,” I say, more desperate, more raw. “You don’t get to, do you hear me? You don’t get to leave me now.”
Her chest rises.
Falls.
There’s a pause after it.
Too long.
My breath catches.
Zach’s hands shift.
“Jackson...”
Something in his voice makes my stomach drop.
“What?” I say immediately. “What is it?”
Her chest doesn’t move.
I stare at it.
Waiting.
Waiting.
Waiting... Nothing.
“She’s not breathing.”
The words land and for a second I don’t understand them.
My brain refuses to process them properly, like if I don’t fully take them in, they won’t be real.
“What?” I say, because it’s the only thing I can say.
Zach looks up at me then, and there’s something in his face I haven’t seen before.
Fear.
Real fear.
“She’s not breathing,” he repeats, sharper now. “We need to move her. Now.”
“No,” I say immediately, shaking my head, because that can’t be right, that can’t be happening, not now, not like this. “No, she.... she just...she just needs a second.”
“Jackson.”
The way he says my name stops me.
“Help me.”
Everything in me freezes for a split second.
Then moves.
“Okay, okay, what do you need?”
“Take the pressure,” he says, already shifting, already pulling his hands away from the wound. “Hard. Don’t let it up.”
My hands replace his before I can think about it, pressing down into the soaked fabric, and the second I do I feel how much blood is still there, how warm it is, how wrong it feels under my palms.
“Fuck...” I choke, my stomach twisting hard.
“Don’t look at it,” Zach snaps, already repositioning himself, already moving over her. “Just press.”
I nod, even though he isn’t looking at me.
“Okay. Okay.”
My hands shake.
I force them still.
Press harder.
Zach moves over her, his hands coming to her chest, positioning, counting under his breath in a way that sounds too controlled for the panic I know is sitting under it.
“Come on,” he mutters. “Come on!”
He starts compressions.
The movement jolts her body under my hands, under my grip, and I have to fight not to pull away, not to stop him, not to...
“Don’t stop,” he says, like he knows exactly what I’m thinking. “Don’t stop pressing.”
“I’m not,” I say quickly, even though my voice is shaking now, even though everything in me feels like it’s coming apart.
“Elijah,” I choke out, my eyes flicking forward. “She’s not breathing, she’s not...”
“She will,” he says, and his voice is louder now, harsher, like he’s forcing the world to bend to it. “She will breathe!”
Zach leans down, breathes into her, then back to compressions, his movements steady, precise, like the only thing keeping him from breaking is the fact that he has something to do.
“Come on,” he says again, more urgently now. “Come on, Lia—”
I can’t stop looking at her face.
I can’t stop seeing how still she is.
How nothing in her reacts.
“She’s not...” I start, and the words collapse into something broken. “She’s not coming back!”
“Shut up,” Zach snaps, not even looking at me. “Don’t say that. Don’t even fucking think it.”
“I can’t lose her,” I say, and it comes out like a confession, like something torn out of me without permission. “I can’t, Lia, please, please don’t leave me...”
My vision blurs.
I don’t realise I’m crying until it hits my lips.
“She doesn’t get to die,” Elijah says from the front, and there’s something in his voice now that sounds almost unhinged, like he’s holding himself together by force alone. “Not now. Not like this. I will not let that happen.”
The car jerks slightly as he takes another turn too fast.
I don’t care.
Nothing matters except...
“Come on,” Zach breathes, his voice tight, controlled through effort as he keeps going. “Come on, breathe!”
There’s a second.
Two.
Three.
Nothing.
My chest feels like it’s caving in.
“Oh my fucking God,” I whisper, the words barely forming. “Oh my God, she’s...”
Her chest jerks.
It’s small.
Barely there.
But it’s something.
Zach freezes for half a second.
Then leans down again.
“Again,” he mutters. “Come on, again!”
Another breath.
Shallow.
Weak.
But there.
“She’s breathing,” I choke out, the words breaking apart as they leave me. “She’s...she’s breathing!”
“Stay with me,” Zach says immediately, shifting back, one hand still hovering over her chest like he’s ready to go again if it stops. “Stay with me!”
“I see the hospital,” Elijah says suddenly, his voice cutting through everything.
The lights hit through the windshield.
Bright.
Too bright.
Relief doesn’t come.
Not yet.
Not when she still isn’t responding, not when her breathing is still wrong, not when my hands are still covered in her blood.
“Faster,” I say anyway. “Elijah, go faster!”
“I am.”
The car doesn’t slow as we pull into emergency.
It stops hard.
Too hard.
I barely register it before the door is open and Elijah is out, already moving, already yanking the back door open with enough force that it slams against the side of the car.
“Move,” he snaps.
I don’t argue.
I don’t think.
I just shift back as he reaches in and takes her, lifting her out of my arms like nothing, like she weighs nothing at all, her body limp against him in a way that makes something inside me crack all over again.
“Help!” I shout as we move, my voice loud, desperate, echoing in a way that feels too exposed. “We need help! She’s bleeding...she’s not—”
People turn.
Everything moves at once.
Voices.
Hands.
A gurney appears out of nowhere and they’re taking her from him, from us, laying her down, cutting fabric, pressing hands, shouting things I can’t fully hear.
“She’s unresponsive.”
“BP dropping.”
“I can’t find...”
“Get her in! Now!”
I try to follow.
I try to stay with her.
But hands grab me, pull me back, stop me from going further.
“You can’t come in!”
“No,” I snap immediately, trying to push past them. “No, that’s my...”
“You can’t come in.”
They’re already moving her.
Already taking her away.
Already disappearing through doors I can’t get through.
“I can’t find a pulse...”
The words hit me like something physical.
Everything stops.
My chest.
My thoughts.
Everything.
“No,” I say, and it comes out hollow, like it doesn’t belong to me. “No, that’s not...no!”
“She’s coding. Move!”
The doors swing shut.
And she’s gone.
The space she leaves behind is too big.
Too empty.
“She’s dead.”
The words come out before I can stop them.
Before I can think.
“She’s dead,” I repeat, louder now, the panic turning into something worse, something colder. “Oh my fucking God, she’s dead!”
I can’t breathe.
I can’t think.
I can’t...
“We just got her back,” I choke, my voice breaking completely now. “We just, how the fuck...no...no, they can’t—”
My legs feel like they might give out.
Everything feels like it’s collapsing inward.
This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.
We found her. We got her back. We were supposed to—
“She’s not dead.”
Elijah’s voice cuts through.
Hard. Unrelenting. I look at him.
And for a second, I don’t know if I believe him.
Because all I can hear, is the silence behind those doors.
And the last thing they said.
They can’t find a heartbeat.