Page 91 of You Loved Me Once
“I don’t know what happened.” I shake against his body and a sob breaks out. “I don’t understand.”
Westin’s hands cup my face and he watches me. “You have to calm down. Explain it to me.”
I go over the surgery to him, clarifying the details, and revealing how quickly everything happened. He listens without interrupting me, and nods along. There was nothing that occurred that was out of the ordinary. Each step was handled, until her heart just...failed. After that, no matter what I tried, nothing brought her back.
“From what you explained, it wasn’t anything you could’ve done,” he tries to comfort me, but I push back.
“I was her doctor! She was fine!”
“Serenity,” he touches my cheek, but I flinch. “She was bleeding, you stopped it, but there was something else that caused her heart to fail. You didn’t do anything wrong.”
“You don’t know that!” I scream at him. “It could’ve been anything. What if the medication reacted with her heart?”
Westin moves toward me, but I lift my hand to stop him. “Then that will all come to light, but you couldn’t control that. You know as well as I do that her body was already under an extreme amount of stress.”
I shake my head as he speaks. He doesn’t get it, there’s so much more to this. “None of that matters, Westin. I did this to her.Idid this!”
“Stop!” Westin steps closer. “Stop it, you did your best to save her.”
That doesn’t matter. She’s dead and I have to tell him.
“Well, I guess my best just wasn’t good enough. If it was my best, then I need to rethink my life because I suck.”
I glance through the window at her still form, remembering the words she uttered as she went to sleep.
A single tear rolls down my cheek as my heart splinters into a million pieces.
She loved him, and now I have to break him—again.
Chapter 26
The walk to the waiting room feels like trying to escape quicksand. Each step I sink deeper into the abyss. Westin walks beside me, and I don’t try to stop him, even knowing that whatever Bryce might say could be the end.
I don’t even care about me anymore. Let everyone find out, and I’ll go down in flames because I fucked it all up. I destroyed everything, and I killed my patient. A healthy, wonderful woman who did nothing wrong.
Westin touches my shoulder, stopping me.
I look up at him, devoid of any emotion. I feel too much and I can’t possibly prepare for what will happen next.
“Can you do this?” he asks.
“She was my patient,” I say. “I have to be the one to tell her husband.”
“I can tell him,” Westin offers.
“No, I was her surgeon, her doctor, and he deserves to hear it from me.”
Westin shakes his head. “You can barely speak. You’re in no state to do this.”
I’m never in a good place to deliver news like this. No one wants to be the bearer of bad news, but I think of how brave Allison was. She trusted me without reservation. She knew who I was to her husband at one time, and still allowed me to be a part of her medical care. I don’t know that I’ve ever met anyone stronger than her. Now I need to be strong too. I have to waltz through those doors and tell him the truth.
“Then maybe I shouldn’t have killed my patient,” I scoff.
“Fucking hell, Ren. Don’t say shit like that,” he grips my arms. “You didn’t kill her. She could’ve had a heart attack or a stroke. You fixed her bleed, you tried everything you could to save her. There is no evidence that any of this is your fault. Do not walk in that room and say something like that, you know better.”
There are no assurances when we operate, I know this, but it doesn’t make the reality any easier to handle. I know he’s worried about a lawsuit, but I’m not. I’m worried about destroying Bryce’s life.
“Can we please stop?” I ask.
