I swallow hard. But this time, it’s not panic. He’s alive. They’re both alive.
I turn back to Alex. He’s watching me. Not my hands. Not the scene. Me.
His expression shifts slightly. Something softer. Something… quieter.
“You okay?” he asks.
The question is heavier than anything else tonight.
Am I? I… I killed my own father. My father who’d been running a trafficking ring that was assaulting and violating women in horrible and disgusting ways. My father who’d apparently raped my mother, resulting in me, and left her unable to explain that to a little girl so she resorted to just saying that she didn’t know who my father was.
And on top of that, Alex and Scott were both shot because of that bastard.
My hands are still shaking. My chest is still tight. My body is still buzzing with leftover adrenaline. But underneath all of it, there’s something else.
“I…” I start, then stop. Try again. “I’m here.”
His gaze hardens slightly, like he understands exactly what I mean.
A few seconds pass between us.
And suddenly, I’m back there. That first night, in the gunfire and chaos, and finding Alex in the middle of it.
Only this time, I’m not the same person as I was that night. I’ve been hurt, affected, and had my trust violated. And he knows it. I see it in the way he looks at me now. Not like someone who needs saving but like someone who just did the saving.
“You did that,” he says quietly. Not a question, so I don’t answer. I don’t need to.
His brown eyes flick briefly toward my rig, then back to me. “You’re incredible.”
I shake my head slightly. Not rejecting it. Just… grounding myself. Because I simultaneously feel it and don’t.
“I did what I had to,” I reply.
His mouth curves faintly. “Yeah. You did.”
For the first time since this started, since all of it started, I feel it. Not the fear or the adrenaline but the weight. Of what I did. Of what it means. And the fact that I’m still standing. Someone who saves lives but was forced to take one. Not an innocent life but the life of someone who took lives from innocents.
Sirens continue in the distance. Officers move around us. The scene shifts into something manageable and controlled as the shooters are taken into custody or their bodies are covered and dealt with.
Chapter 48
Liv
Hospitals have a rhythm. It’s not loud or chaotic. Just… constant.
Monitors beeping in steady intervals, soft footsteps in the hall, and the quiet murmur of voices that never quite rise above a certain level as they talk about patients like the entire building has agreed not to disturb the fragileness in here.
I sit in a chair beside his bed and listen to it all, counting the seconds between each beep, and watching the slow rise and fall of his chest. Alive. That word still feels unreal.
They said the surgery went well. Clean through-and-through with minimal damage. A little bit of torn muscle but the bullet missed the bone. He’ll recover, scarred but alive.
His arm is immobilized, bandaged thick at the shoulder. I stare at it longer than I mean to. At the place where the bullet went in. Where it almost-
I stop that thought before it finishes.
My fingers curl slightly in my lap, still shaky. It’s not as bad as before but not steady yet either.
There’s a chair on the other side of the room that sits empty. Mason was here earlier before he went off to visit Scott as well. He’s in another room a few doors down. He’s pale, stitched up, very much alive, and complaining loudly about hospital foodbefore a nurse threatened to withhold pudding. That helped. Apparently he’s a big fan of the pudding at least.
