Page 189 of Surfer's Paradise

“Stay with me.”

“Still here, Coco. Always.”

And then the lights overhead blurred, tilting.

Still, he stayed awake.

Because she needed him to.

Because he’d promised her—once, a lifetime ago—that he wouldn’t let anyone hurt her again.

And this time, he’d kept it.

* * * * *

Pain wasn’t new to Isaac.

He knew how to breathe through it. Knew how to slow his heart rate, regulate his thoughts, let his body fall into discipline when the agony screamed loud. But this? This wasn’t a battlefield.

This was blood soaking through his shirt. This was Rosie sobbing against his chest. This was a goddamn museum.

He was dimly aware of the paramedics shouting over the rush of sirens, of lights streaking the sky as they cut through traffic. His teeth clenched as the pressure increased on his side, something hot and awful blooming just under his ribs.

“You with us, Isaac?” a medic asked, adjusting the oxygen under his nose.

“Yeah,” he muttered, jaw locked. “Still fucking here.”

Rosie’s voice—sharp, panicked—faded somewhere behind him. “I’ll drive. I’ll meet you there—just keep him awake.”

It cut deeper than the bullet.

He didn’t want her scared like that.

Didn’t want her crying over him.

In the back of the ambulance, the world narrowed to sensation. The gurney rattling beneath him. The sting of a needle. The burn of gauze pressed too deep. He coughed once, and it lit his side on fire.

“We’re hitting you with fentanyl,” someone said.

“Great,” Isaac rasped. “Bring a hammer while you’re at it.”

Then—nothing.

Just heat and adrenaline and his own blood running sticky down his hip.

He didn’t black out.

Wouldn’t give himself the luxury.

They wheeled him into Balboa and straight into hell.

Bright lights. Freezing air. Metal instruments clattering. Voices barking instructions over the whir of machines.

“Vitals are stable, BP’s holding.”

“Start another line, get imaging on the right flank. We need to clear liver and kidney.”

“Type and cross—he’s gonna need fluids.”

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