Chapter 84

Mrs. Hudson came waddling down the long hallway to our right, hair in rollers and a fuzzy pink robe wrapped around her short, plump body.

Her expression was panicked, face pale and startled as she got closer to us. Ethan laid on the tile floor, blood dripped from the bandage I tried to make and splattered against the cold stone beneath him. Mrs. Hudson’s eyes flicked between him and I, silently demanding to know what happened.

“We were attacked on the beach,” I explained, sobbing and sniffling. I tried to hold parts of myself together so that she could understand me, but fear turned me into a blubbering mess.

And I was so afraid.

“Stabbed?” She asked, her voice was far more calm than my own.

“Shot.” I clarified. Her face turned grim, but she nodded and took a deep breath.

“In the kitchen there’s a first aid kit, it should have everything I need. Get it.”

I scrambled to my feet and ran - rather clumsily - to the kitchen on the other side of the house.

I learned in my many hours of volunteering that Mrs. Hudson was a combat medic in the early years of her life. She treated wounded soldiers and learned a lot on the field, at least that’s what she told me. I prayed as I searched for the first aid kit in the cabinets that she remembered her training.

It had, afterall, been many years since she was in that environment.

I found the red box on the floor in the pantry and scooped it up. I ran back to the lobby to see Mrs. Hudson on her knees, using her hands to stop the bleeding of Ethan’s wound.

“About time,” She grunted and told me to replace my hands with hers so that she could get the necessary equipment from the kit.

“Is he going to be okay?” I asked, the fear evident in my voice.

“Luckily it looks like you got him here just in time,” She raffled through the kit, pulling out suture kits, gauze, and iodine.

“So he’ll live?” I felt the tiniest spark of hope reverberate through my bones, “He’ll wake up?”

Mrs. Hudson shot me a hard look, I could see all the years of her life displayed clearly on her face. She closed her eyes and sighed, checking her temper with my questions.

“I will do my best,” She met my gaze and there was a silent conversation between us.

She would do her best, but there was no guaranteeing anything. Ethan was hurt, he was knocked out, and he was bleeding. Even if she got the wound to stop bleeding, there was no telling if he would be okay in the long term.

I bowed my head, focusing on keeping the pressure on his wound as Mrs. Hudson got everything together and prepared. She dumped water over the skin surrounding the bullet hole to remove the blood, then poured the yellow iodine around the red flesh.

I sat back, ready to jump in and help, but ultimately letting Mrs. Hudson do what she needed to. She cleaned what she could and stopped the bleeding, then started pressing in various places on the wound. As though she was searching for something.

Whatever it was, she found it. She sighed and shook her head.

“What is it?” I asked, voice rising.

“The bullet,” She sucked on her teeth, “I think it’s still in there.”

I grimaced and looked at the purpling wound on his abdomen, “Can you get it?”

She nodded, but she didn’t look happy.

“It’s going to hurt him, he will probably wake up. I need you to hold him down and not let go until I tell you to. You’re going to need to use all of your strength, okay?” Mrs. Hudson looked suddenly ten years older in the span of those few moments, and I understood the severity of her request.

“I can do it.” I shuffled closer to Ethan and placed a hand on either side of his head, pressing his shoulders into the floor.

Mrs. Hudson didn’t look convinced but she didn’t have much of a choice. She grabbed a pair of medical tweezers and went to work on looking for the bullet.

Ethan’s eyes popped open, and at first I was ecstatic to see him awake, but his eyes never met mine. He was looking right through me, howling in pain.

“You’re hurting him!” I screeched at Mrs. Hudson.

“Hold him down!” She yelled back at me, glaring at Ethan’s thrashing body below us. “Hold him down or I will knick an artery.”

Despite Ethan’s cries for it to end, I held him down until he passed out again. Mrs. Hudson was able to retrieve the bullet, luckily it didn’t splinter and was extracted in one full piece. Mrs. Hudson got to work stitching up the broken skin and bandaging him as quickly as possible.

She warned me that I would need to get him to a real doctor as soon as I could to avoid infection, and that she would call to check up on us in the morning. She couldn’t offer us a room there, though, due to the fact that we were attacked and she didn’t want to endanger the children sleeping upstairs.

Of course I’d never want to put the children in harm’s way, so I transformed back into my wolf form and took Ethan home. Luckily we didn’t live far.

I brought Ethan up to my bedroom, worried that he would bleed through his bandage and ruin his expensive sheets, and laid him as gently as I could in my bed. He slept there peacefully through the night.

The next morning, I called a doctor to check on him. He set up an IV and steroids to put Ethan on, but ultimately told me that there was nothing more I could do until he woke up.

If he woke up.

For four nights and five days I waited at Ethan’s side, cleaning him as best as I could, changing the bandages, and reading to him when I got a spare moment. I wanted him to know that, even in sleep, I was there for him.

By the fifth night, I was worried Ethan may never wake up. Maybe this coma was permanent and I would have to live the rest of my life without my husband and mate as a conscious entity. I’d only know him in the confines of a bed and his closed eyes.

I had dozed off by his side that night. I sat in an armchair with a book that was long forgotten with my hand wrapped around his own. I laid my head on the mattress, looking for a semblance of comfort as I waited by his side.

I dreamed of Ethan. He was awake, smiling at me, kissing me. I dreamed of a paradise for the two of us, far away from businessmen and rogue wolves. A place where there was no pressure and no cameras.

I dreamed of the perfect life.

I woke up to a soft repetitive movement against my face, like the stroking of a thumb pad against my cheekbone.

My eyes fluttered open and I lifted my head slightly. Ethan was staring back at me, and suddenly the fatigue I felt mere moments ago dissipated.

Ethan smiled at me, small and tired, but he saw me. He smiled at me. I wanted to cry.

I resisted the urge to pounce on him, and went to say his name, but he beat me to it. He spoke first with a hoarse throat.

“I love you, Ava.”