Page 48 of Soul Bound

“What are you looking at?”

She doesn’t look at me when she talks. “There’s a ghost in there.”

“What? What are they doing?” I wish I were able to see what she sees.

“She’s just sitting there on the bed.” A sad look takes over Winslow’s expression. “She isn’t very strong; she keeps fading in and out. She looks so lost…”

I squeeze her small hand. “Maybe you can help her after we get the blood.” I hate to pull her away from someone who needs help, but Thalia is our priority right now.

She nods once. “Hopefully she’s still around when we come back.” Winslow takes one last look at the spirit before continuing to walk down the hallway. “She’s not the only one here. I can sense them hanging around.”

“A lot of people died here,” I say.

“I hate hospitals.” She turns down another hallway when I point at it. “So many spirits get tethered to the place they died. It’s like they don’t know how to leave. I usually avoid places like this like the plague. I want to help as many spirits as I can, but it’s exhausting and overwhelming when there are so many in one place.”

“We’ll be in and out as quick as possible,” I promise her. I can understand how dealing with confused and angry spirits can take an emotional toll on her.

I see the double doors up ahead that I know lead to the operating room Thalia died in. I know her body is no longer here, but I’m half expecting to open the doors and find her still lying on the cold metal table. Her brown colored gaze staring blankly at the ceiling.

“This is it.”

We pause outside of the door for a second, my legs feel like they’re made of concrete, not wanting to move forward. Winslow is the one who finally pushes the swinging door open and pulls me behind her as she takes a small step into the room.

For the first time since we walked into the facility, Winslow’s face is full of terror. Someone had put a clean white sheet over the operating table, so the carnage is hidden there, but dried blood still covered the white-tiled floor.So much blood.I sometimes thought I was remembering the amount of blood wrong, that I was overexaggerating the amount in my head. But being back here proves I remembered correctly.

Thalia had hemorrhaged out.

“Holy shit.” Winslow’s wide eyes scan the floor, taking it all in. “She didn’t stand a chance.” With a shake of her head, she looks at me. “No one could have survived this.”

“I keep thinking if I’d found her sooner, she would have.”

She takes a step closer to me. “Ranger, hear me when I say this, there was nothing you could have done to save her life. No one can survive this amount of blood loss. The guilt you’re carrying around; you need to let it go. All you could have done is what you already did—just be there for her and hold her hand.That’s it. And sometimes that’s enough.”

Emotion clogs my throat, but I push it down. “It doesn’t feel like it.”

“It was,” she promises me. “So many people die alone and scared, but not Thalia. She had you with her and she was lucky she did.”

Winslow drops my hand, and I instantly don’t like the loss of her touch. “Hold this,” she instructs, holding out the flashlight. She drops her canvas back onto some of the clean tile floor. She rummages around in her bag that seems to go on forever before she pulls out a glass vial with a cork lid. “I took this from Esme’s, I don’t think she’ll mind.”

She reaches into the side of the knee-high leather boots she’s wearing that lace up the front. She pulls something out of it, the gold metal reflects off the beam of light the flashlight I’m holding casts. “Is that a knife? Did you have that in your boot the whole time?” I ask when I realize she’s holding a knife similar to the one Esme used on her the day at her shop. It’s not as ornate or big as Esme’s, with just a plain black hilt and four-inch blade.

“I didn’t have it in there on the plane if that’s what you’re asking.” She twists it around her hand. “Esme gave it to me.” She shrugs like that explains everything.

I watch as Winslow kneels by the dried pool of blood on the floor and with the blade, starts to scrape it up. She takes the dried flecks of blood and puts them into the glass vial she had brought. She fills the whole vial up with dried blood, scraping some off the operating table as well.

As she’s finishing up, I feel a chill run down my spine, and my wolf jerks to attention. My eyes scan the room, not finding anything. But the feeling persists, the hair on the back of my neck now stands up. I look at Winslow to see if she feels anything, but she’s busy collecting blood still. A slight movement in my peripheral vision catches my attention. In the pane of glass on a medical supply cabinet door, Thalia’s reflection stands staring back at me.

“Winnie,” I whisper.

“Huh?”

“Thalia is here.”

That gets her attention, she stands up and looks around the room. “I don’t see her.”

I point at the glass panel. “I can see her reflection in the glass.”

Winslow follows my direction and smiles when she sees Thalia standing there. “It’s so cool she works so hard to appear to you. Do you have any idea how much energy it takes for spirits to appear to normal people? She goes out of her way to show herself to you. You should feel special.”

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