They start moving her. I follow, holding onto her fingers for as long as I can until a nurse forces me to stop, and then she’s gone. My whole body collapses forward in the empty room, hands braced against my knees as I struggle to catch my breath.
I fumble for my phone, fingers still shaking as I dial. Cam picks up after two rings.
“What’s wrong, man?” He sounds half-asleep. “What’s going on? Is everything okay?”
“They found a heart.”
There’s only silence, then a sharp inhale.
“Holy shit.”
“They took her back to surgery now.” I scrub a hand over my face, breath unsteady. “They don’t know what’s gonna happen. But—” My voice catches. “This is it, Cam. This is her only chance.”
Another pause. “I’ll be there soon.”
The line goes dead. I stare at the empty space where she was just lying, where she has been for seven fucking days, and I don’t know how to exist without her in this room. My hands are still trembling. My heart is still racing. Hope and fear crash into me like waves, battling for dominance, and I don’t know which one will win.
I just know that I will not survive if I lose her.
The wait is unbearable.Time slows, stretching each minute into an eternity. I feel every single one of them, dragging like an anchor in my chest. Every breath feels too loud, every heartbeat too fast.
Cam showed up an hour ago. He messaged everyone the update—Leo, Frankie, Liv and Sophia, even messaged Dallas in New York—but told them to wait until morning for any visiting. There is nothing any one of us can do now except hope, and waking them in the middle of the night wouldn’t change the outcome.
He now sits beside me in the dimly lit waiting room, elbows on his knees, hands clasped like he’s praying. He might be. I think I might be too, in my own way. Neither of us says much.
What the hell is there to say?
Eight hours.
That’s how long it takes. Eight hours of agony, of pacing and sitting and standing and sitting again. Eight hours of trying to keep the panic at bay, of running my hands over my face, gripping my hair, digging my nails into my palms just to feel something other than the fear clawing at my throat.
Finally, Dr. Rivera appears.
I shoot to my feet, chest locking so tight I canbarely breathe. Cam does the same beside me, his movements stiff and tense like he’s bracing for impact.
Dr. Rivera takes a breath before speaking. “The surgery was successful.”
The world stutters and I stagger back a step, gripping the chair beside me to stay upright. My ears are ringing and for the first time in seven fucking days, I feel like I can at least take a breath again.
But Dr. Rivera isn’t finished.
“The next twenty-four hours are crucial,” he says, steady and calm, but laced with the same warning I’ve heard too many times. “Her body has been through significant trauma, and there’s always a risk of rejection. We’ll monitor her closely, watch for signs of complications, infection, or her body rejecting the heart. Right now, she’s stable. That’s all we can ask for at this stage.”
I swallow hard, forcing myself to focus again. “Will she wake up?”
“We hope so,” he says. “We’re optimistic, but only time will tell. She’s sedated for now, and when we begin reducing the sedation, we’ll see how she responds. It could take a few days.”
A few days.
Another stretch of waiting. More hell to endure.
“She’s been moved to the cardiac ICU,” he continues. “You can see her, but only one at a time.”
Cam looks at me, but he already knows. “Go,” he says, nodding toward the doors. “I’ll wait.”
I was going to make sure I was the one to see her first, regardless, so there was no hesitation at his words.
The beeping of significantly more machines than before is the first thing I hear when I step inside her room. The sight nearly knocks me down. She looks even smaller in the bed than before, pale and fragile against the stark white sheets. There are more wires, more tubes, more reminders that she is still fightingfor her life. The ventilator is still there. The countless bruises from IVs and blood draws stand out against her skin. I know beneath the hospital gown, there’s a fresh scar down the center of her chest.
