I keep my head down to her ear and whisper everything and anything I can think of to let her know that she is safe and I’m here. The ten-minute drive to the hospital comes to a halt, and before they can roll her out, her eyes flutter open and she meets my gaze.
“Hey there, Princess,” I say, the emotion thick in my voice and the relief rocking me to my core. “Hey, my love.”
“Axel . . . love . . . you,” she says weakly before closing her eyes and drifting off again.
I jump out and follow the gurney into the emergency room, finally breathing easy for the first time since I answered her earlier phone call.
Izzy
The first thing I notice when I wake up is the quiet humming. Opening my eyes, I look around the dimly lit hospital room, trying to orientate myself to my surroundings. I feel a soft tickle on my arm and move my head to the side to look down.
Axel is sitting next to my bed with his chair pulled as close as he can get it. My right hand is held firmly in his and his lips are pressed against my skin. The humming I keep hearing is coming from him, his soft whispering against my skin. He is speaking low enough that I can’t understand the words, but the tone is light and loving.
“Ax-xel?” I say, my throat dry. It hurts to get the word past my lips.
His head shoots up and his red-rimmed eyes meet mine.
“Princess . . .” he whispers. Tears are forming in his eyes and a small smile tugs at the corners of his lips. “My girl, my brave girl,” he says, and a few tears fall over his lids. He closes his eyes tight and more spill over. “I thought I had lost you. When I walked around the corner and saw you . . . saw you lying in all that blood . . .” He trails off but not before his words hit my ears.
Blood? I wasn’t bleeding. Was I? Oh no! The baby!
“The . . . the baby?” I whisper hoarsely. “Please . . .” I shake my head back and forth violently, tears of my own streaming down my face. Not our baby! Please, God, not our baby!
“What? Oh, Izzy, no baby. The baby is fine. You are fine. I’m so sorry I didn’t mean your blood. Princess, stop crying, I promise, our baby is fine.” He is quick to reassure me over and over telling me that our little miracle is safe and fine.
When I finally calm down, I look into his eyes—his beautiful eyes. “We’re okay?” I ask.
“You’re both perfect,” he responds smiling before giving me a soft kiss.
“Greg? Dee?” I ask when he moves away to sit down on the side of my bed.
“Dee is going to be fine. She’s shaken up. Shaken up pretty fucking bad, but she will be okay. From what she said, Brandon had just tied her hands and taped her mouth. He had only been there for about an hour before you showed up. I think the worst of her injuries are where he clocked her when she opened the front door and a split lip. She’s fine, baby.”
“Where is she?” I ask, looking around the room again.
“Beck made her leave. He is taking her back to his place for a while. She said she was putting the townhouse on the market.”
I take that in and try to process it. I understand. I wouldn’t want to be there anymore either.
“I offered for her to stay with us for a while, but she said she would have to think about it.”
I scrunch my nose at that. “Why would she need to think about staying with us?”
“I don’t know, Princess. That’s something you will have to ask her yourself.”
“What about Greg?” I ask, almost afraid to know.
“He’s going to be okay. He came out of surgery a little while ago. It wasn’t anything serious even though it sure as fuck looked like it. Bullet went straight through and missed everything important. He’s one lucky son of a bitch.”
“He’s really okay? There was so much blood, Ax. And he wasn’t moving. He wasn’t moving at all.” My panic is coming back again, at remembering the way Greg looked—lifeless. He looked dead. “Axel, I need to see him!” I yell.
“Hey, hey . . . calm down, baby. I promise he’s okay. He’s in recovery, but I’ll see what I can do about getting you on a field trip, okay?”
I look up and catch the slight concern that crosses over his eyes before his quickly masks it. I know he has to be a mess over everything that happened, but he is holding it in and being strong for me.
“Okay. I just really need to see him, Axel. I need to see with my own eyes that he is going to be okay.”
“I understand, Princess. I’ll make it happen.” He leans down and gives me a gentle kiss. “Got room for one more on there, baby? I need to feel you close.” His mask slips slightly for me to see the vulnerability simmering under the surface.