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“Why don’t we get you cleaned up?” Belle lifted a pair of Charli’s clothes. Had her friend retrieved them from her house?
“Claire and Zeke are on their way,” Belle said.
Charli obliged. She wanted to wash the blood off her, but she didn’t want to miss Finn when he was out of surgery. What if he didn’t make it? It could be the last chance she’d have to see him before he was gone forever.
“We’ll be quick,” Belle assured her as if she could read Charli’s thoughts.
Charli stood, blindly following Belle into a patient room. She moved through the steps like a zombie as Belle brought the warm washcloth over her skin. Charli stared at the crimson-stained water as it washed down the drain with what was left of her hope. She closed her eyes as they burned with a fire she’d never known. The chances of surviving a shot to the head are astronomically low. Finn already got his miracle. Fate wouldn’t be so kind a second time.
Belle pulled Charli’s hair up, out of her face, before leading her back to the waiting room. The tender tug on her still-sore scalp reminded her of Stewart’s greasy hands yanking on her hair.
Two pairs of arms encircled her, holding her tight.
“I’m so sorry—” She hiccupped.
“You have nothing to be sorry about,” Claire assured her.
“Finn’s a fighter. He’ll— He’ll make it through this.” Zeke’s voice broke.
They released her, and Claire asked, “When is the last time you ate something? You’re shaking.”
Charli shook her head. “I can’t—”
“I’ll go grab you some tea and crackers,” Belle said before leaving the small room.
“Bently said he’s in surgery. Probably be awhile before we hear anything. Why don’t you rest, dear?” Zeke ushered her to a chair.
They didn’t get it. It was Charli’s fault Finn was dying. If she hadn’t shot Stewart, the man wouldn’t have pulled the trigger, probably a reflex. Maybe if she’d waited, they could have ended things differently.
What’s done is done. Now her husband lay in one operating room and the man who’d stolen the other piece of her soul in the other.
Bently sat across from her, his expression grim. He wouldn’t even look at her. Belle walked in, followed by a doctor with a surgical cap. Bently shot to his feet, approaching the surgeon as Belle handed Charli the crackers. Charli stood, eyes glued to the doorway where the men spoke in hushed tones. Bently shook his head, shoulders dropping. The words “I’m sorry” formed on the surgeon’s face before he flicked a pitying glance towards Charli.
She staggered back, her knees giving out. She reached for the arm of the chair, steadying herself. No. Nonononononono. Her lungs stuttered as violent pain raged through her, incinerating everything left in its path until all that was left was a hollow shell of devastation.
“Nooooo!” Charli screamed as a flood of water burst from her, trickling down her legs and pooling on the floor.
Her hands went instinctively to her belly, panic once again swallowing her whole. “No. It’s too early. Not my baby too!”
“How far along are you, Charli?” Belle asked, immediately coming to her aid.
“Thirty-two weeks,” she grit out as a wave of pressure barreled through her.
Belle snapped orders. Charli was put in a wheelchair and rushed into a room. The bright lights made her wince. Pain tore through her. Her chest ached. More commands were shouted as her clothes were cut off. Cold oxygen pushed up her nose from a plastic tube. Sweat beaded her brow as she screamed, unable to do anything but survive in that moment as wave after wave of pain sliced through her.
“Heart rate dropping.”
“Cord prolapse.”
“Prep the OR.”
Voices of nurses and doctors and whoever else was in the room pulsed through the fog of pain.
“Do you have any allergies, Charli?” Belle asked, tone urgent.
Charli shook her head. “No.”
“Charli, I’m Doctor Stanley. Your baby is in distress, so we’re going to need to get him out. Okay?”
