Page 26 of In Too Deep
I checked the stitches.They’re fine.See you tomorrow.
That guy.
Her thumbs flew across the screen.
Meg
You said you’d let me look.And we need to talk about the cave.
Noah
Soon
He was pushing her away again.His MO had become so routine she didn’t even know why she was surprised anymore.
And that’s why it was time to move on.More than just the stupid injuries or the idea of facing another Lydia in a cave, she couldn’t force Noah to change, to open up, to let her in past those walls he’d built.
And she couldn’t live in this yo-yo of emotion, this constant whiplash.
She lifted her hand and rapped hard on Virgil’s office door.
“Come in.”His deep voice came through muffled from the other side.
She pushed it open and walked in.Virgil wasn’t tall—maybe five eight on a good day—and his hair had faded to a nearly white shade of gray.But the guy could command a room with just a look.No one questioned him, not even Noah.
She clicked the door shut behind her and stepped over to the desk, then slid her letter across the surface.“This is my two-weeks’ notice.”
She tucked a wisp of dark hair back toward her loose braid.She swallowed and tried to keep her voice steadier than she felt.“I know I agreed to finish the summer, but my four-year arrangement is up July 31, and I have a great opportunity to work with a research team.It starts August 1.”
Virgil skimmed the letter, then motioned to the chair across from him.“This is a big change.Can I ask why?”
“Research was my original goal.And with…everything”—she swallowed again and fought past the painful tightness in her throat as she settled into the stiff brown chair—“I think it’s time.”
He reached to the side of his desk and lifted a red folder.“Is this about Lydia?”
Meg flinched.It wasn’t.Well, at least not entirely.“I know I did all I could.”
“Do you?”He slid the red file to her across the desk.“That arrived this morning.”
Meg lifted it with both hands and read the label.
Lydia Bradley.
Meg opened the file and paused on the top page.Official Autopsy Report.She drew a deep breath and scanned the document.Extensive internal damage—ruptured spleen, lacerated liver, massive hemorrhage into the peritoneal cavity…
Beyond field intervention…
Her breath eased.That ever-present knot in her chest—the one that had been there since Lydia’s heart stopped beneath her hands—loosened just a touch.
She hadn’t failed.
No one could have fixed all that in a cave.With what was stated in this report, it would have been a miracle if Lydia could have been saved in a hospital with everything at their disposal.
Meg set the report aside and skimmed the full workup they’d done on Lydia.She’d been just eighteen.Jeremy twenty.They lived with their dad, Ryan Bradley, former military, explosives expert, dishonorable discharge.Maybe Jeremy’s volatile side came to him naturally.
“Does that change anything?”Virgil watched her.
Meg shut the folder and slid it back.“I’m glad to know, but it’s more than that.”
