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My dad.
“I shouldn’t be up here,” I blurted into the mic.
That made the press sit up.
“My dad was always the one who made the speeches,” I explained. “I just drew the plans. I designed this hospital but it was my dad who got us here.” The words flowed easily because I was just telling the truth. “You know when he first decided we should build it? It was after the TPS bridge collapse, five years ago.”
I almost didn’t see the crowd, now. I was lost in the memory. “It hit us hard, just like all New Yorkers. Hundreds dead. Hundreds more injured. My dad heard about the ambulances taking too long to arrive and it made him so angry, it killed him to see people suffer. He said, "This city needs to finally build a new trauma center.” I shook my head. “No one thought it was possible. The state didn’t have the budget and the land was too expensive. But my dad found this site and figured out a way.”
I suddenly realized I’d been rambling on, caught up in thinking about my dad. Oh God. “Um, thank you.”
And suddenly, the crowd was applauding. I stared at them, bewildered. But I didn’t even give a speech! I’d just…talked. I looked at the PR woman and she was nodding and applauding. I went shaky with relief. It’s over.
That’s when I saw movement at the back of the crowd. A man in a baseball cap swung his arm up to point at me. A flash of silver in his hand—
“Gun!” yelled JD.
He slammed into me as a gunshot rang out.
20
LORNA
My feet left the floor and for a second I was weightless. Then I crashed down hard on the stage, JD on top of me. He twisted a little onto his side, staring into my eyes from just a few inches away.
There was another gunshot and the noise of wood splintering, right behind JD. I suddenly realized what he was doing: he’d made his body into a wall, between me and the shooter. No! JD! I wanted to get us both somewhere safe but my body wouldn’t listen: I just lay there, numb.
Two more gunshots and I felt things cut through the air above me, close enough that I could feel the breeze on my face.
Then nothing.
I heard someone panting and realized it was me.
I started to take stock. I was on my back and JD was hunched over me, one knee between my thighs. My skirt was hiked up and JD’s arm was pressed tight against the side of my breast.
JD looked over his shoulder, scowling towards the crowd, his whole body tense: I thought of a dog alerting. He clearly wanted to jump down off the stage and race after the gunman. So why didn’t he?
Then it clicked. He was staying there to make sure I was safe.
JD shouted to someone in the crowd and they yelled back an answer. JD’s body relaxed. “It’s okay,” he told me. “He’s gone.” He looked down at me. “Are you hit?”
Hit. He means by a bullet. My mind wouldn’t function and I couldn’t make my mouth move.
JD didn’t wait for an answer. He started patting me down, his big hands starting at my shoulders and tracing quickly but efficiently down my body and under my back. “You’re okay,” he told me, and I could hear the shaky relief in his voice. “You’re okay.”
He seemed to become aware of how we were lying and I felt his cock harden against my thigh. Then he was up and offering me his hand.
I tried to take it but my limbs felt like concrete. I stared up at him, panicked.
“It’s okay,” he told me in that low, Texas growl. “You’re in shock. I’m getting you out of here.” He bent, slid an arm under my back and another under my legs and—
Suddenly I was lifted into the air. Cradling me protectively in his arms, he marched off the stage and through the last few stragglers - almost everyone had fled as soon as the first shot rang out. Then we were at the car and he was carefully sliding me onto the back seat. Paige was standing nearby, her face white. “You too,” JD told her. “Get in.”
“But I drove myself here,” Paige began. “My car—”
“Paige, get in the car!” JD ordered.
Paige jumped in beside me. You didn’t argue with JD when he used that voice.
JD slammed the door. I saw him point at one of the reporters. “You! You were filming the crowd. I’m gonna need a copy of the footage. You send it to McBride Construction, okay?”
The reporter nodded meekly, not about to argue with a six-foot Texan.
JD jumped into the passenger seat and told the driver to go, and I was pushed back in my seat as the car shot away.
