“You sure?”
She smiled. “Yeah. Trust me, she’ll want to see you first.”
Nate prayed her sister was right. “Thank you.”
Sarah grabbed hold of him again and gave him a tight hug. “No, Nate. Thankyou. You brought my sister back home to me. I’ll never forget that.”
Nate fought against the sudden onslaught of emotions and stepped back. “I’ll let her know you all are here.”
“Take your time,” Kole smiled.
Nate followed the doctor down the long, white hallway to Gracie’s room. Before he went in, Dr. Callahan filled him in on the extent of her injuries.
“She’s going to be weak for a few days due to the lack of nutrients and dehydration.”
“Lack of nutrients?”
The doctor nodded. “It appears as though Miss McDaniels hasn’t eaten in several days. She was also severely dehydrated.”
Several days?
Nate flashed back to that moment in the car. She was trying to tell him she was too weak to hold her breath, but he’d been so busy trying to keep her from dying that he hadn’t paid much attention to her physical appearance.
A renewed rage toward Yavuz made Nate wish the man was still alive, just so he could kill him all over again.
“What else?”
“She lost quite a bit of blood from the gunshot wound, but not enough to cause any major concern. We cleaned and bandaged the tears to her wrists and one of her ribs was cracked. Thankfully, the location of the fracture prevented it from breaking any further during the administration of CPR.”
During the plane ride here, Matt had triaged Gracie before hooking her up to an I.V. Nate thought his heart would stop when he realized she’d been shot. To find out her rib was broken, too?
All that time he’d been pushing on her chest…it was a wonder he hadn’t punctured her lung.
“Jesus.”
“She’s going to be fine, Nate,” the doctor assured him. “She’ll be sore for the next week or two, but thanks to whoever got her blood pumping again, I see no reason she won’t make a complete recovery.”
“Thanks, Doc,” Nate shook the man’s hand.
He didn’t bother to taking credit for the save. It had been a team effort. He couldn’t have done it alone.
“I took the liberty of giving her some pain medication to help with the rib. Between that and the trauma she’s endured, I suspect she’ll remain sleeping for at least the next few hours.”
“Thank you,” Nate said again.
Dr. Callahan nodded his head. “I’ll go fill your friends in on what I just shared with you. You’re welcome to stay as long as you’d like.”
Nate watched as the kind man turned and walked back toward the waiting room. Taking a deep breath, he then pushed the door to Gracie’s room open and stepped inside.
Every ounce of air he’d just drawn in escaped with a loud rush.
There, looking so fragile he thought she might break if he touched her, lay Gracie. Her hands were at her sides and she was hooked up to several monitors. One in particular beeped with every glorious beat of her heart.
It was a sound he could listen to forever.
Stepping closer, Nate grabbed one of the plastic chairs, dragging it to the side of the bed without the I.V. stand. Before he sat down, he leaned over the metal railing and pressed his lips to her forehead.
After letting them linger there a few seconds, he rested his forehead against hers and whispered, “I’m here, Gracie. There’s something I need to tell you. Something really important, but you have to be awake to hear it. So, I’m going to stay right here until you wake up.”
