Page 115 of Wreckage

They kept promising me she was OK and that she was alive. That they were getting her out.

And then, a helicopter.

The sound roared around us, the wind whipping through the trees, snow kicking up in all directions like it was creating its own storm.

I was loaded inside, my vision dancing with exhaustion and hunger. The pain in my guts and body was unbearable, and I let out a cry.

“Easy, we got you,” someone said, easing me back onto a stretcher and strapping me in. The needle pinch met my arm, and then a warm rush of fluids, the strange metal taste hitting my tongue.

I saw them lift Elena onto the stretcher. I saw her pale face, her limp body, her chest barely moving with breath.

I sobbed again.

“Elena…butterfly. Please. Stay. Stay, Elena. W-We’re going home, baby. Please…"

We lifted into the air suddenly, the sounds of people still working quickly around us in the cramped space. I couldn’t see Elena now, but I could hear the soft beeping of a monitor.

The wreckage grew smaller below us, disappearing into the trees.

And I knew?—

We made it.

We were finally going home.

Chapter 41

Troy

The light burned behind my eyelids.

I sucked in a breath and immediately regretted it. My throat felt like I’d swallowed a glass of razor blades. Everything hurt. My body felt like it had been ripped apart and then shoved back together. All my muscles ached and seared with sharp pain. Even the slightest wiggle of my fingers made me ache in new ways I didn’t think possible.

Where was I?

I tried to sit up, but the second I did, a soft beeping filled the room, followed by the hushed murmur of voices. I fell back into my bed, my head feeling like it was going to explode, my body still screaming at me to just chill the fuck out and figure shit out.

Footsteps sounded out, and a door opened in the distance. Warm hands reached out and pressed me back into bed as I kept my eyes closed. The light was too much.

“Easy, Troy,” a woman said gently. “You’re in the hospital. You’re hooked up to a lot of stuff right now. We need you to stay in bed, OK? You’re safe here.”

Safe.

That word felt so foreign, so impossible, my mind refused to believe it.

I wanted to speak, to demand to know where Adrian and Elena were, but the darkness was already pulling me back down as a new warmth entered my veins.

I let out a soft, weak breath, then faded away again.

The next time I woke,I was aware. I was painfully aware of where I was and what it could mean. I panicked instantly, my heart slamming against my ribs, my mind in overdrive as I considered everything.

I wasn’t in the wreckage. I wasn’t in the snow.

Where was I?

The hospital.

The wires, the IV, the tight hug of a blood pressure cuff around my arm. I yanked at them, ripping them free, ignoring the way my body screamed in protest. The monitor blared, the shrill alarm piercing through the room.

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