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I shook her still body. To my utter joy, she moaned and her eyes fluttered open slightly.
“Luc,” she uttered.
“I’m here, Bellezza. You’re okay.”
“Need.”
“What do you need?”
I’d give her anything as long as she kept talking to me.
“Need. Ull.”
“I don’t understand what you mean.”
Her eyes closed again and I was near hysteria when Alec yelled, “Fuck!”
“What?” I growled as I felt for her pulse. Slow but steady. She was still with me.
Hearing him approach, I turned briefly to look at him. He held up a hypodermic needle with a clear substance in the bottom. Quickly searching arms, I found a puncture mark, still oozing blood.
“How far out is that ambulance? He drugged her.”
“I hear the sirens now.”
“Search him,” I demanded. “See if you can figure out what the fuck he gave her.”
Kolton and another police officer rushed through the broken door; guns drawn.
“Shit,” Kolt said. “Alec, step away from my crime scene.”
“Give me a second, man. He gave her something. I’m trying to find it.”
“Goddammit.”
The other officer used his radio to give the all-clear for the paramedics to come in. It was normal procedure when shots had been fired. The police had to secure the scene to make sure it was safe.
“Lie her down for me, Luc,” Daisy said calmly as she dropped to her knees beside me. “Where’s the blood coming from?”
“She’s only bleeding from the cut on her cheek. She was drugged,” I answered, feeling for the pulse in Emory’s wrist. It was her lifeline and the only way I knew she was still alive.
“With what?” she asked.
“Here.” Alec thrust a bottle in her hand.
“Okay. It’s a sedative. Right now she’s breathing on her own, but that could change at any minute. We need to get her to the hospital now.”
Two firefighters burst in carrying a stretcher between them. They scooped the love of my life onto it and hurried out the door. I was two steps behind them the entire way to the ambulance and once they pushed her inside, I was sitting beside her with my fingers on her wrist.
*****
EVEN SURROUNDED BYa waiting room filled to the brim with family and friends, I felt truly and utterly alone. When the ambulance had come to a stop outside the emergency room doors, there was a flurry of activity. Somehow, I lost my grip on her arm and was pushed to the side as they rushed Emory into a large room marked for traumas. I could only stand in the doorway and watch helplessly as they cut the clothes from her beautiful body and hooked her up to various machines. The only indication she was still alive was the steady beeping I heard echoing through the room and the rise and fall of her chest.
Daisy tried to talk to me, but her voice was too far away for me to understand. Hands grabbed at my arms, pulling me away from the room where my heart and soul lay lifeless on a table. I fought with every ounce of strength I had, knocking them away, but my efforts were in vain. My brothers were stronger.
One by one, they pulled me into their arms, saying things like “She’ll pull through” and “You got to her in time.” Their words were meant to comfort me, when the only thing I wanted to do was rail against the world at the injustice of it all and scream, “Why her?” Emory was a good girl; loving and kind. She’d been raised by vipers, yet fought tooth and nail to become something greater. After years of torment, she became unyielding…relentless in her determination to ensure other children didn’t suffer; to make certain they had the voice she never did.
“Mio figlio.”
