"Ma'am." The security guard's voice was firmer now. "Step back, please."
I didn't wait to see how it ended. I turned and walked through the automatic doors, my heart hammering so hard I could feel it in my throat.
The hospital lobby was quiet. Cool. A different world from the chaos outside.
I stood there for a moment, letting my breathing slow, letting the adrenaline ebb. My hands were shaking. My legs felt like they might give out.
But I'd done it. I'd walked through the fire and come out the other side.
The elevator ride to the pediatric floor felt endless. I clutched the stuffed sloth against my chest like a shield, running through what I'd say when I saw Millie.I'm sorry I was gone. I'm here now. I'm not leaving.
The nurse at the station looked up as I approached. Recognition flickered across her face; she'd probably seen the news coverage, but her expression held no judgment. Just tired sympathy.
"She was moved to room 412," she said softly. "She has been asking for you."
She has been asking for you.The words replayed in my head over and over.
I walked down the hallway, past rooms filled with small patients and worried parents, until I reached room 412. The door was slightly ajar. I could hear the murmur of a cartoon playing inside.
I pushed it open.
Millie was propped up on pillows, her arm in a bright purple cast, her face pale beneath a bandage on her temple. She looked smaller than I remembered. Fragile in a way that made my chest ache.
She turned at the sound of the door.
Her gray-blue eyes went wide. Then they filled with a light so bright it made everything else disappear. The cameras. The headlines. Victoria's venom. All of it dissolved in the face of a seven-year-old's joy.
"Miss Claire!" Her voice was hoarse but radiant. "You came!"
I crossed the room in three steps, sinking into the chair beside her bed, reaching for her uninjured hand.
"Hey, sweetheart." My voice cracked. "I brought someone to keep you company."
I held up the sloth. Millie's face transformed into something approaching her old smile.
"He looks confused," she said.
"He's very confused. I thought you two could relate."
She giggled, a small, precious sound that I'd been terrified I'd never hear again. "I missed you."
"I missed you, too, Millie." I squeezed her fingers gently. "More than you could possibly know."
She studied my face for a long moment, searching for the lie. Whatever she found there must have satisfied her, because she relaxed back against her pillows, pulling the sloth against her chest with her good arm.
"Daddy's going to be so happy," she murmured, her eyes already drooping. "He's been really sad. He thinks I don't see it, but I do."
My heart stuttered. "Where is your daddy, sweetheart?"
"Getting coffee." She yawned. "He never sleeps anymore. Just sits in that chair and watches me."
I looked at the chair by the window. A suit jacket was draped over the back. A phone charger was plugged into the wall. He had been living in this room day in, day out. Keeping watch over his daughter.
"Millie," I said softly, "I need you to know something. No matter what happens, with the grown-up stuff, with the courts, with everything, I love you. Okay? That doesn't change."
Her eyes fluttered open, gray-blue and ancient in her small face. "Do you love Daddy too?"
The question hit me like a truck.
