Chapter 39
"We need to go NOW," the EMT said, wheeling Griff toward the exit.
Sarah didn't care about her mangled thumb, the reporters shouting questions, or the FBI agents trying to establish order. Griff's eyes had rolled back. He was unconscious again.
She pushed after the stretcher. "I'm coming with him."
"Ma'am, you need medical attention—"
"Then I'll get it at the same hospital." She kept pace despite her ankle screaming. "I'm not leaving him."
"Sarah Winters! Ms. Winters!" Reporters surged toward her, but she didn't even turn.
"Back OFF." Maya stepped between them, hand on her sidearm.
Doc appeared at Sarah's elbow. "Dear, your thumb—"
"Can wait." Sarah didn't slow down. They were at the ambulance now, EMTs lifting Griff inside.
"Family only," one EMT said.
"She's family," Ronan said firmly, appearing beside them. "Let her ride. And check her out, too. She popped her thumb out of joint."
The EMT looked between them, then at Sarah's destroyed hand, and nodded. "Get in. We'll treat you enroute."
Sarah climbed in awkwardly, her injuries making everything difficult. But she got to Griff's side, took his hand with her good one.
"Is he—"
"Severe concussion," the EMT said, starting an IV. "Possibly worse. We need to move."
The doors slammed shut. The siren wailed. Through the small window, Sarah caught glimpses of chaos—reporters doing stand-ups, FBI processing the scene, and somehow Axel still wandering around with a tray of canapés.
"Your thumb," the second EMT said. "I need to look at it."
Sarah held out her hand without letting go of Griff's.
The EMT whistled low. "You dislocated this yourself?"
"Had to."
"That takes serious guts."
Or desperation. Or being too intense for your own good.
Griff's hand was still in hers, but limp now. No reassuring squeeze. His face was too pale under the blood and bruising.
"He saved me," she said quietly. "Tackled a senator with a gun to save me."
"Sounds like you saved each other," the EMT said, working on her thumb. “Hang on. I don’t want to numb this until the doctor sees it, but I’m gonna immobilize the joint. Sorry.”
The pain was extraordinary, but she didn't let go of Griff's hand.
Through the sirens and medical equipment, she could hear the EMTs on the radio with the hospital, using terms that made her stomach clench. Possible brain bleed. Trauma team. Neurosurgery standing by.
Her own pain faded into the background.
She leaned close to his bloodied ear. " You promised we'd do this together, remember? So you don't get to check out now."
No response. Just the steady beep of monitors and the wail of sirens as they raced through Charleston.
Behind them, she knew the story was already spreading. The conspiracy exposed on live television. Lives saved. And others––Marcus Sullivan included––avenged.
None of that mattered if Griff wasn’t okay.
"Almost there," the EMT said as they pulled into the hospital bay.
The doors burst open. A trauma team waited. They transferred Griff with practiced efficiency, medical terms flying over Sarah's head.
"Ma'am, you need to come with me," a nurse said, trying to lead her away.
"No, I need to—"
"He's going to surgery," the nurse said gently but firmly. "You can't help him right now. But we need to fix your hand."
Sarah watched them wheel Griff through double doors marked "Authorized Personnel Only." He looked so still. Too still.
"Come on," the nurse said. "The sooner we treat you, the sooner you can see him."
Sarah let herself be led away, but she kept looking back at those doors.
Please, she prayed silently. We've come too far to lose him now.
Tank's mission was complete.
But Sarah's wasn't. Not until Griff woke up.
Not until she could tell him what she should have said in that bunker, in Charleston, in a dozen moments when she'd been too scared.
The intensity and fear and violence of these past days had shaken something loose inside of her. And Griff and his team had shown her a different way to life. Not the safe, boring path she’d chosen. She might not know what lay ahead, but she knew she didn’t want to go back.
The only thing she knew for certain was she wanted Griff in her life, no matter what.
Too intense, David had called her.
Maybe. But Griff had never minded.
Now she just needed him to wake up so she could tell him that.