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Ma sat on my left side, while Pop eased his way onto the hard metal chair on my right. I hadn’t even realized I was crying until she wiped the tears from my cheeks.
“You were always the most willful of my sons,” she said, pulling me flush to her side.
“I thought that was me, Ma?” Alec quipped from where he sat, his arm around a stoic Quin.
“Silenzio, Alec. Your time is coming,” she remarked, coaxing a chuckle out of the otherwise somber room.
Turning her warm gaze back to me, she continued.
“She is fighting to come back to you, Luciano. You mustn’t give up. Hope is the one thing in the world we have to draw strength from when darkness threatens our future.” Kissing the side of my head, she finished. “She is your light. Reach for her.”
“Family of Emory Daubson?” The doctor entered the room.
I jumped from my seat, nearly crashing to the floor as the blood rushed from my head. Thankfully, Alec and Rico thrust their arms under mine to keep me upright.
“I’m her fiancé,” I lied, knowing they wouldn’t give me any information otherwise. But the lie would become a reality soon enough. After what we’d been through, I wasn’t waiting any longer to make her mine in the eyes of the law.
“She’ll be okay,” he said and the relief I felt was instantaneous. “We’re moving her to the intensive care unit to monitor her for a while, just until all the sedatives she was given are out of her system. But she should make a full recovery.”
“When can I see her?”
“Give us about an hour, then I’ll have the nurse come to get you.”
He left the room and I lost the battle. Dropping to my knees, I thanked God and whoever else was listening for sparing her life. River and Quin joined me on the floor, our arms tangled together, both of them crying in relief.
My beauty would survive.
Maxwell and Joel were dead.
There would undoubtedly be fallout from the events of the day, but those were far from my mind while I walked behind the nurse toward Emory’s new room. Her well-being was the only thing that mattered. Well…and getting my ring on her finger as quickly as possible.
EMORY
I OPENED MYeyes and immediately shut them again, groaning as the harsh lighting hurt my already throbbing head.
“Easy, Bellezza,” Luc’s voice sounded on my right, his fingers stroking the side of my face.
“What’s going on,” I croaked.
The second the words were out of my mouth, memories flashed through my mind. Joel. My apartment. The gunshot.
Oh God, I was gonna be sick.
Lurching up in the bed, I turned my head and leaned to the left in time to vomit spectacularly all over the floor. Luc was there immediately, pulling me into his warm body as he rubbed circles against my shaking back.
“It’s okay, Emory. You’re okay,” he cooed in my ear.
But it wasn’t. It may neverbe okayagain. I shot a man, maybe even killed him. Shaking uncontrollably, I replayed the scene over and over in my mind. My stomach pitched and I barely had time to scramble out of Luc’s hold before I was dry-heaving off the side of the bed.
“Here, Luciano.”
My embarrassment doubled when Mrs. del Toro handed her son a cloth, which he immediately pressed to the back of my neck. It was cool…soothing, and I sank into the solace it offered.
“Breathe in through your nose, mia piccola stella,” she said.
Her little star.
I mimicked her, trying to control the breaths which had become erratic.
