Grounded (Up in the Air #3)(119)

I wasn't myself as I followed her unconscious form inside the hospital. I felt disconnected from reality as they worked on her. I began to fight when they wouldn't let me follow her into surgery. Clark and Tristan had to snap me out of it. It wasn't until the world came back into focus that I realized that I had been in shock.

"James, you need to be present for this," Tristan was telling me, his voice firm, his eyes steady. "Your influence can help them. I guarantee it. You can't follow her into surgery, but you can call in some favors."

"Buy the fucking hospital if you want them to give Bianca, Stephan, and Blake their best chances," Clark added.

The nurse was putting a blanket over my shoulders, saying soothing things, and shooting Tristan and Clark perplexed looks. Tristan understood me well, though, and his tactic couldn't have been more brilliant. I didn't have time to wallow in this, and certainly none to agonize about it. What I needed was action. The more the better. There were things I could do to help.

"Get the board of directors and the head of the hospital on the phone," I told Clark. "If they ask what it concerns, tell them that someone is willing to donate an obscene amount of money for some special treatment."

He nodded, and moved away, a small, satisfied smile gracing his mouth. I remembered that he'd said Blake, as well. I was relieved that she at least had a chance. I also knew that the names he hadn't mentioned were surely dead. Paterson and Henry had fallen in their duty of protecting Bianca. I made a note to pay out the families of both men. It was the smallest consolation, but at least neither of them had left behind children, or wives.



       
         
       
        

My first call was to my offices in Vegas, and then New York-to my second-in-command. I enlisted all of the help at my disposal to get the ball rolling faster.





CHAPTER FORTY

Mr. Helpless





BIANCA





I woke with a violent jerk, my thoughts going immediately to Stephan. It was as though the sight of him lying there, lifeless, with bloody holes in his chest, had just been circling around in my head while I was out. I remembered everything as though it had happened just instants before, though I knew very well that I was in a hospital by the familiar sounds and smells.

I turned my head sharply, seeking out James. The short motion made my head ache and the side of my face burned sharply.

I felt my hand in his and knew that he'd stayed at my side for the ordeal. I saw in his weary, grief-stricken face how it had cost him, what he'd been put through.

"Stephan?" was the first word out of my mouth. It was agony to try to talk. I had to speak through my teeth, since I could barely open my mouth. I ignored the pain, focusing on James, desperate for an answer.

James raised his bloodshot, agonized eyes to mine. Those turquoise depths had never looked so relieved. He gasped in a breath, as though coming up for air. He blinked at me several times before he found his voice. "He's recovering from surgery."

I only heard his voice in one ear, and wondered vaguely if I'd lost the hearing in the other. But that didn't matter. Nothing mattered to me but finding out about Stephan just then.

"How badly was he hurt? Will he be okay? I need to see him now," I said, trying to sit up.

He paused for a long time to choose his words, and that scared me more than anything. "He's in the ICU. He was badly hurt. No one can see him-"

I pulled the IV from my arm, sitting up. The pain in my head and ear temporarily darkened my vision and a dull roar started up in the ear that was working. "I need to see him now."

I didn't realize what a commotion I'd caused until I'd been wrestled back into the bed, and saw the amount of people that had gathered to restrain me.

My eyes sought out James while a nurse shoved needles into my arm. I felt terrible as I saw the tears running down his cheeks and the helpless look on his face. "Please, James. I have to see him."

Finally he nodded. "Please don't do that again. I'll arrange for you to see him, but you must stay in your bed."

I nodded, closing my eyes in relief. He would do as he said. He always had.

I didn't sleep, but I didn't open my eyes again until I felt my bed begin to move. A team of nurses surrounded me, James at my right, clutching my hand as he followed beside the wheeled hospital bed. "Who else made it?" I asked James, bracing myself for the answer. 

"Blake was wounded badly, but they're telling me now that she'll make it."

"So that means that … " I swallowed hard, finding it hard to finish the sentence.