Chapter 32
Nearly six hours later, Sierra sat next to Nina in one of the chairs in the hospital waiting room.
Poppy had cried herself to sleep on her lap.
Markus, who had left LA the moment Sierra had let him know what had happened, sat with Juan on Nina’s other side.
They were all eerily silent, too scared to make idle conversation, too exhausted to care.
Nina was still covered in blood, in Mav’s blood, because in the chaos nobody had thought to find her clean clothes. She was pale, her big eyes smudged with fatigue. Sierra didn’t think she’d spoken a word since they’d arrived.
When she’d asked a deputy what had happened, he’d only said that Mav had been hurt and that the sheriff had driven Nina to the hospital so that she could stay with him.
Sierra had followed straight away. She had called Markus. But it had only been when she’d arrived and spoken to the sheriff that she’d found out that Mav had been shot.
Shot.
Her big brother, so strong and infallible … Shot.
Had she not had hours to come to terms with it, she still might not have believed it.
She’d called Benji without thinking because he would come. Mav needed him. She needed him.
And, still, if there was one thing Sierra was very, very good at, it was turning off. She didn’t cry or rant, though both were threatening. She simply went numb. She felt nothing, only stared blankly at the white wall in front of her.
Another hour passed.
A doctor came out. Nina shot upright in her chair. But he circumvented their little group with an apologetic smile and made his way to a family sitting on the opposite side of the room.
Next to her, Nina collapsed back in on herself.
‘I’m sure we’ll know how he is soon,’ Sierra said, sensing that Nina was on the edge of her threshold. ‘Surgeons don’t spend this long working on dead people.’
Nina released a warbled sob at that. She spoke for the first time, and she said, ‘He jumped in front of that bullet for me. He …’ Nina had to pause and breathe through her sobs. ‘He took the bullet for me, Si.’ She buried her head in her hands. ‘Oh, God. What have I done?’
Sierra’s heart broke. She had no doubts that Mav had jumped in front of a literal bullet; it was who he was.
But because she knew the fear and confusion Nina must be feeling just then, she replied, ‘You’ve given my brother everything he ever wanted, Nina.
Don’t diminish what he did for you with misplaced guilt. ’
‘Amen,’ Markus said quietly, and took Nina’s blood-stained hand in his.
The doors opened again, but this time it was Benji who ran in, his shirt damp with sweat, his eyes crazed and bloodshot. He stopped when their eyes met, said, ‘Sierra?’
‘We’re still waiting,’ she replied, knowing everything he wanted to know from only her name on his lips.
He exhaled a huge breath and linked his hands behind his head as if he needed to take a breather, as if he’d run from Utah instead of taking the quick two-hour flight.
Sierra hated that she was relieved to see him, hated that she needed him to take over because she could feel her panic chipping slowly away at her own walls and she didn’t know how much longer she could hold them up for.
Benji didn’t ask questions or force Nina to relive what had happened.
He simply took charge.
He dropped his small duffel bag on the floor and knelt to unzip it. He pulled out an ancient Wrangler tee, one that Sierra herself had worn many times, and he came to crouch in front of Nina. ‘Hey.’
Nina’s eyes instantly welled. ‘It’s my fault—’
‘No.’
‘He came for me,’ she insisted. ‘Alexander came for me.’ Her words came in a rush of anxiety then.
‘And I’ve survived the last months by telling myself that the assault was the worst thing that would ever happen to me – but it wasn’t.
Not even close. Benji … There was so much blood.
’ She looked down at her hands where blood had dried in the fine cracks of her pale skin.
‘I don’t know how a person can survive losing so much blood. ’
‘Have you seen the size of that guy?’ Benji teased.
‘He has a lot swimming around in there. He’ll be fine.
’ When Nina didn’t reply, only nodded, he continued gently, ‘No news is good news right now.’ He unknowingly repeated what Sierra had said only moments before he’d arrived.
‘It means they’re still working, and that’s what we’re going to hold on to. Okay?’
Nina nodded.
‘’Kay, arms up,’ he ordered. When Nina only stared at him, Benji grinned.
‘I won’t peek. Sacred rule of brotherhood.
’ As if to prove his point, he held the shirt up in front of his face, waited for Nina to tug hers off and then open the bottom of the one Benji held.
He waited until her head was through before tugging it down her torso.
‘Mind if I toss this?’ he asked, holding up Nina’s blood-stained shirt.
‘No.’
He pushed to his feet, walked to a nearby trash can, and threw the bloody shirt straight into it. When he came back, Sierra said, ‘I’m pretty sure they have separate trash for bloody items.’
‘What they don’t know won’t hurt them,’ came his succinct reply. He cocked one hip. ‘What does everyone need? Coffee? Food?’
Just the thought of coffee made Sierra want to throw up. It didn’t matter that it was close to two a.m., her empty stomach was too sick to handle the caffeine.
‘I don’t think I could stomach anything right now,’ Nina said, speaking Sierra’s thoughts.
‘Markus? Juan, I’m guessing?’ Benji leaned forward to shake Juan’s hand.
‘We’re good, thanks,’ Markus replied.
But because she knew Benji, and she knew he needed something to keep his thoughts from focusing on Mav, she said, ‘Could you take Poppy for me while I go to the restroom?’
He came to her immediately, gently took Poppy’s weight with a practised ease, and when Poppy stirred, and said, ‘Daddy?’
Benji kissed the side of her face and replied, ‘Not yet, honey. I’ll wake you up when you can see him.’
Poppy yawned. ‘’Kay,’ she murmured, and then buried her face against Benji and promptly fell asleep in his arms, her legs dangling.
When that near-constant grief rose up within her, choking her, Sierra pushed to her feet. She refused to let the memories of her lost dreams pull her under, especially now when Mav needed them both.
So, she let the past lie. And she walked away.
Nina was so consumed with thoughts of Mav that she didn’t hear the exchange or see Sierra walk away. Nor did she see when Sierra returned and took her place at her side again, like some tireless watchdog.
Time was irrelevant. Every second may as well have been a year, and it didn’t matter how long it took so long as whoever came to speak to her told her that Mav was alive and fighting. Because if he had even a small chance, he would take it. Mav always fought for what he wanted.
Thirty minutes later, an exhausted-looking doctor came out.
Nina shot to her feet because they were the only ones left in the waiting room.
He took those steps towards them, and for a long moment Nina could only look down at his soft-soled shoes as they padded across the linoleum floors, because she was too afraid to look at his face and read the news there.
‘Sierra Hunt?’
‘Yes,’ Sierra said.
‘And Nina.’ The surgeon smiled at her. ‘He said your name the moment he started coming out of anaesthetic.’
Nina slowly raised her eyes to meet the doctor’s, and what she saw there had her knees close to buckling. ‘He’s alive,’ she said even though she had clearly heard him say that Mav was coming out of anaesthesia.
‘Yes. And he’s doing great. We took a while because we had to do a full exploratory laparotomy and cardiac evaluation to assess the extent of his injuries.
The bullet did some damage, but we’re confident that we found and repaired it all.
’ He passed her a bag. ‘These were on him when he came in.’ The surgeon grinned.
‘Personal items I’m sure he’ll have some use for. ’
‘Thank you.’ In her relief, Nina didn’t look at the bag or its contents. She threw her arms around the doctor, uncaring that she was a mess of blood and sweat and that she was blubbering all over him. ‘Thank you so much.’
He patted her on the back.
‘Can we see him?’
‘He’s in recovery now. But he should be fully awake soon. A nurse will come and get you.’
She exhaled in relief. ‘Thank you,’ she repeated.
The surgeon grinned. ‘My pleasure.’ He rubbed the back of his neck awkwardly. ‘This is so unprofessional, but do you think I could get an autograph?’
Nina laughed for the first time in what seemed like forever. Tears streamed freely down her face, and she didn’t even bother swiping them. ‘You just spent six hours saving my world. Yes. Of course. Anything.’
He passed her a blank piece of paper and a pen, and after a glance at his name tag, Nina wrote:
Dear Doctor Bently,
Thank you for saving my heart!
Love,
Nina Keller
He smiled when he read it. ‘This is awesome. Thank you.’
‘Thank you,’ Nina said sincerely.
‘The nurse will be with you shortly,’ he reminded her. And then he left.
Nina spun around. Every single one of them was crying, even Poppy, who had just woken up and wasn’t even sure what was going on, and Juan, who had never even met Mav before. None of them spoke; they just met in a huge group hug.
Nina knew that they had all been listening as intently as she had to the surgeon, but she said, ‘He’s alive. He’s going to be okay.’ And because she needed to hear the words aloud again, she repeated, ‘He’s going to be okay.’
When she broke away from the group, Benji was frowning down at the bag in her hand. Nina’s gaze began to drop, but before she could look at what he had been staring at, he snatched the bag from her, ‘Ah, I’ll hold on to this!’
‘… Sure. Thanks, Benji.’ When he crossed his arms, hiding the plastic bag, Nina frowned. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Yup.’
Sierra snort-laughed, and when Nina glanced at her, she only shrugged.
‘What did I miss?’ Nina asked.
‘Nothing,’ they replied at the same time.
‘Guys—’
Nina’s attempt to pry it out of them fell flat the moment she saw the nurse approaching. She hurried over to her. ‘He’s awake?’
‘Yes.’ The nurse smiled. ‘We can take you two at a time, but only for a few minutes each.’
Nina turned to the others because even though she wanted – needed – to be there, she respected that they were his family and that they needed to see him too.
‘I just have something to give him,’ Benji said. ‘I’ll be quick.’
‘I’ll go with you,’ Sierra seconded. ‘That way, Nina and Poppy can stay longer once we’re done.’
Nina nodded. She took Poppy’s hand and gave it a squeeze, said, ‘We can see him soon,’ even as she watched Benji and Sierra walk away with the nurse.