Page 189 of Brutal Collateral

Cormac comes back into the room, and if I wasn’t lying down, I would probably collapse. Med students don’t tell you, you’ve lost your baby. A doctor does that. Especially a lifelong friend.

“Are you sure, Scarlett?” he asks his student.

“Right here.” She points to the monitor.

“Cormac, what’s going on?” Griffin bites out again harshly. “Is the baby...”

He whips his head toward us. “Oh, you’re fine.” His touch on my shoulder is so comforting.

Griffin curls up next to me since this just got a lot more real. Taking my hand, he presses a kiss to my forehead. “I love you.”

“I love you,” I say back.

Cormac and Scarlett just look at each other, a smile ghosting their lips.

“Do you want to know the sex?” Scarlett asks.

“Sex?” I say. “You can tell the sex?”

“Hell yeah,” Cormac boasts.

Griffin looks at me. “Do we want to know?”

I bite my lip. “Sure. I guess.”

“Okay, which one?” Cormac says with a wide grin.

“Which one what?” Griffin asks.

“Which baby do you want to know the sex for?”

“There’s more than one?” I say, sitting up, but a rush of pain has me easing back down.

“How... How many babies are in there?” Griffin asks the doctor, sounding a wee bit terrified.

“Two.”

“That’s impossible,” I bark a laugh.

Cormac covers Scarlett’s ears while she adorably rolls her eyes. “It’s not if you’ve been fucking a lot. Aye, Griffin?”

That probably had something to do with it. Andoh my God, I’m having twins.

Cormac’s phone beeps. “Transport is here. Shoot those sonogram photos to my Dropbox, Scarlett. I’ll access them when we get to Mercy.”

“Yes, Dr. O’Rourke,” Scarlett purrs, and Cormac’s face flushes.

Before I’m wheeled away, I look up and my heart drops to my stomach.

Shane stands there, his hands wrapped in bloody gauze. Everything tilts, and I’m ready to detonate, thinking the cult got to him.

“Shane...” I push through a tight chest. “What happened?”

Smiling, he lifts one hand. “I found the necklace.”

“But your hands?” I cry out.

“Your lawn is filled with glass. But it was Norah’s. I couldn’t let the clean-up crew just suck it into their vacuums and grind it to dust,” he chokes up.

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