Page 122 of The Temporary Bride

“I don’t give a fuck about your protocols.” I look at him straight and keep my voice level. “That’s my wife. I’m not leaving her. Tell me to get out one more time if you want, but it isn’t going to change anything.”

He holds my gaze for a moment, reading whatever is on my face, then steps aside. “Alright. Just stay out of the way and let us work.”

I nod, a quick jerk of my head.

The ambulance interior is cramped and brutally bright, the smell of antiseptic cutting through everything else. I press myself against the wall and let the EMTs do their job, praying silently for the driver to fucking step on it. As the siren blares, the medics check Chloe over, and her eyelids flutter once but don’t open.

When the ambulance jolts to a stop in the hospital emergency bay, I grab the overhead handle to keep from stumbling. The doors swing open, several hospital personnel coming out to meet us. They wheel her out, the ER doors close behind her, and I’m left standing outside with an invisible fist gripping my heart.

I find the desk inside. A woman with tired eyes looks up at me.

“Chloe Thorne,” I tell her. “She just came in. I need to know the moment there are any updates. Anything at all.”

She starts typing. “Your relation to her?”

“Husband. I’m her husband.”

“Take a seat,” the receptionist says. “Someone will come out to speak with you as soon as possible.”

I sit in a hard plastic chair under fluorescent lights that make everything look slightly worse than it is, and I pull out my phone.

ME: Chloe is in the hospital. She was hit by a car outside the house. I’m here waiting for news. Mount Mercy ER.

The replies come back within minutes.

DOMINIC: Holy shit. Is she okay? We’re coming.

BECKETT: On my way. Which floor?

REID: Jesus Christ. We’re here for you. Whatever you need.

GABRIEL: Leaving now. Keep us updated.

I don’t tell them the rest of it. I don’t tell them what happened before she walked out that door, and I don’t mention the breach. I’d been planning to talk to Chloe first before I brought my brothers into it, wanting to understand what we actually knew before I said anything. That was the plan two hours ago, when the biggest problem in my life was a list of stolen files.

Now I’m sitting in a hospital waiting room and the files don’t exist as far as I’m concerned. The expansion plans, the market strategy, the clients, all of it means nothing compared to what’s happening on the other side of those doors.

My brothers show up one by one. Beckett first, then Dominic, then Gabriel and Reid together. They take seats near me, and Beckett leaves for a bit and comes back from somewhere with a coffee that he presses into my hand. I drink it without tasting it. Nobody pushes me with questions right now, which I’m grateful as hell for. Dominic sits with his elbows on his knees, his jaw tight, watching the doors the same way I am. Gabriel keeps a hand on my shoulder for a while without saying a word. Reid just sits beside me, arms crossed over his chest.

Every minute feels like an hour, until somehow a few hours have gone by. I watch the doors. I drink the shitty coffee. I tap out a restless rhythm on the arm of the chair until Beckett shoots me a look and I make myself stop.

Finally, a doctor in green scrubs comes through and says my name, and I’m on my feet before he gets the second syllable out.

“She’s stable,” he says, and those two words hit me hard enough that I actually have to brace myself against the chair. “She has a concussion, a hairline fracture in her fibula, and heavy bruising along her left side, but the scans look good. There’s no internal bleeding or spinal damage.” He pauses briefly, then adds, “She’s heavily medicated right now. Between the concussion and the pain medication, she’ll probably be pretty out of it for the next couple of days. We’ll need to continue monitoring her closely, but I would say her prognosis is good.”

I exhale slowly. My legs feel unreliable. “Can I see her?”

“Yes,” he says. “She won’t be awake, but you can sit with her.”

He leads me back through the hospital, through corridors that all look the same under the same relentless lighting, into a room in the ICU where the lights are dimmer and the only sound is the beeping of the heart monitor.

She looks small in the bed. Chloe never looks small. She takes up a room, argues with anyone who deserves it, pushes back without thinking twice. But lying there with the IV lines and bandages and her arm and leg immobilized, she looks fragile, and it kills me.

I pull the chair right up to the edge of the bed and sit down, taking her hand carefully around the IV line. I hold on.

The doctor tells me to call if I need anything. The door closes, and it’s just the two of us, the heart monitor, and the low hum of the machines.

“I’m here,” I tell her. My voice comes out rougher than I intend. “I’m not going anywhere.”