Page 91 of The Pretty Psycho

A friend who worked with Dain.

A friend who had been a mole all this time.

Time wasboth our friend and an enemy as we sat huddled in the waiting room of the hospital in Munich, waiting for the doctor to come out of the operating room.

The ride in the chopper was a short one, but it felt as if another lifetime had passed from the moment we all got inside until we landed on top of the hospital, each of us as quiet as a mouse when the doctors took Jax away, hooking him up on different machines and leaving us behind.

That was almost two hours ago, and we still had no news.

Gabriela kept pacing from one side of the room to the other, driving us all insane, but no one said a single word to make her stop. It was her way of thinking, and seeing as her team members were the ones also betraying us, I could understand the need to pace and be pissed off.

"What's taking them so long?" Vega asked, her knee bouncing right next to mine, while her hand kept squeezing mine on and off, as if she was trying to give me her strength even when she didn't have enough left for herself.

"I don't know," I said. "He looked bad, Bambi. He was practically?—"

"No," she cut me off. "Nope. Listen to me, Adrian." She cradled my face in her hands, her eyes shining with a myriad of emotions she was still processing. "Jax will be okay. He has to be okay. He—" Her voice broke, her eyes closed, and I could see the fresh tears trickling down her cheeks. "He has to be okay."

I knew they had become closer over these past few weeks, and as much as it pained me to see her like this, I appreciated the fact that she was as close to my friends as I was.

"Yeah," I placed my hand on top of hers, "he's gonna be okay."

"I still can't believe it," Dante finally spoke, after keeping quiet from the moment we arrived at the hospital. "I just… We fucking trusted her. We took her in, showed her everything. She knew about The Brotherhood, and this is how she repays us."

"We don't know what really happened," Gabriela chimed in. "It seems as if she tried to explain."

"Don't try to defend her," Vega gritted out. "There's no excuse for betraying us in such a way. There's no excuse in lying to us, pretending to befriend me, making me believe she was one of us. If she was in real trouble, she should've told us. She should've said something. Instead, she left him there to bleed out, probably trying to run away."

"She did save you," Vin added, earning a glare from Vega. "Just saying."

"And is that supposed to excuse her behavior? She was probably banking on killing him to cover her tracks. Hell, she even lied about her lack of training, which makes me wonder what else she's lied about."

Ethan kept quiet, observing the situation, probably weighing everything we had learned from Hailey who was sitting in the corner, her eyes plastered to the floor.

"Did she mention anything else?" I asked Hailey, hoping to clear this all up. There was no way Yolanda was such a goodactress. She couldn't have faked her concern for Vega and every time she came to ask for an update on her whereabouts. I just… This didn't make any sense.

"Not really," Hailey said. "She kept telling him it isn't what it looks like. That there's a reason, but…" she trailed off. "She never got a chance to explain anything. I don't know Jax all that well, but I have never seen him so angry. Although," she straightened up, "Yolanda begged him to stay with her after she shot that other guy. She tried stopping the bleeding, but she ran just moments before you guys came." She looked at Ethan, Dante, and Vin. "I just didn't think she could be capable of something like that."

"Me neither," Vega murmured.

I turned toward her to gauge if she saw anything weird from Yolanda, when the doors leading toward the OR opened, revealing the doctor who was operating on Jax.

All of us stood up, rushing toward him as a group, and I could only imagine what a sight we all made. Half of us had blood on our clothes and our faces, the other half was bruised, but the doctor stood still, not even flinching when Gabriela got into his face, asking for news.

"Is he okay?" Gabriela asked at the same time Dante asked, "Did he survive?"

"Can we see him?" came from Vin.

"What's the prognosis?" asked Ethan, while Vega and I stood behind them, our hands clasped together, waiting for the doctor to speak.

"Guys, guys." He smiled softly, looking over all of us as if we were kids. "His left lung had been hit, which we've managed to repair. The bullet missed his heart by a millimeter, and I don't know if it was luck or somebody looking down on him, but whatever it was, it saved him. He has lost a lot of blood and we are keeping him in the ICU and giving him a transfusion. We'vemanaged to patch up the wound on his face, but…" We all waited with bated breath when he smiled widely. "He’s young and he’s strong. These next twenty-four hours are critical, but we will keep you posted." A collective gasp could be heard from all of us. "He has a long road ahead of him, but we believe he will pull through with flying colors."

"Thank you," I croaked. "Thank you so much."

"When can we see him?" Vega asked, squeezing my hand to the point of pain, but I let her. She needed this news as much as any of us. "Are we actually able to see him?"

"They're moving him to his room right now, but I don't see why not. Just, not too many people at the same time. I want him to rest, to heal, and he can't do that if he has the excitement of too many people at the same time. I'll send a nurse for you guys once they settle him in and we will let you see him then. Only two at a time, please."

We all nodded, finally relaxing for the first time tonight.

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