"Hi," Sienna tried to say, tried to push the word past the tube in her throat, but it came out as a rasping, guttering croak that didn't sound like any word at all.
"Don't talk." Elise was on her feet and at the bedside and her hand was on Sienna's cheek and her touch was gentle, so gentle, as if Sienna were made of glass. Her eyes were flooding with fresh tears and her chin was trembling and her voice cracked when she spoke. "You're okay. You're going to be okay."
Behind Elise, faces appeared. Mara, her blue eyes bright with relief, the lines around her mouth deeper than usual. Helen, standing by the door, one hand pressed to her own chest. And further back, in the corridor, the team. Lou's dark head. Camille's blonde. Frankie's broad shoulders. Dani's tall frame. Rowan's anxious face. Lex, standing beside Mara, her hand on Mara's arm.
They were all here. All of them. For her.
Sienna's eyes blurred with tears. She hadn't expected that. She'd spent eighteen months with the Valkyries being the physician, the professional, the woman in the lab coat who fixed them and sent them back onto the ice. She'd been careful to maintain distance. Friendly but not familiar. Available but not vulnerable. And yet here they all were, crowded into a hospital corridor, having been there for hours by the look of their rumpled clothes and tired faces, because she was one of theirs and they didn't leave their own behind.
The realisation broke through her in a wave that was almost as overwhelming as waking up. She had a team. Not just a workplace, not just an employer, but a team. People who cared whether she lived or died. People who came when the worst happened and stayed.
Mara stepped forward. She leaned down so her face was close to Sienna's and her blue eyes were fierce and bright. "You scared us, Park. Don't ever do that again."
The words were gruff but her eyes were red and the tremor in her jaw was visible, the controlled emotion of a woman whowas very good at holding things together and had been holding things together for a lot of people over the last several hours.
Mara squeezed Sienna's good hand. Then she straightened and turned to the others. "Let's give them some space." She herded the team into the corridor with the quiet authority she used on the bench, and Helen followed with a small, warm nod toward Sienna, and the room emptied until it was just Sienna and Elise and the beep of the monitors.
Elise sat on the edge of the bed. Her hand was on Sienna's right hand, holding it, her thumb moving in slow circles across the knuckles.
"I thought I lost you," Elise said. Her voice was a wreck. Raw and low and stripped of every defence. "Mara came to the locker room and said you'd been in an accident and I thought... I couldn't... Sienna, I couldn't breathe."
A nurse appeared at the bedside and gently removed the ventilator tube, murmuring instructions. The removal was uncomfortable, a sliding pressure that made Sienna cough, and the cough sent agony through her ribs and Elise's hand tightened on hers and she rode through it.
"How long?" Sienna's voice was a croak. Thin and rough and nothing like her own.
"You've been in surgery. About seven hours total, including prep and recovery. Dr. Mars operated. Fractured ribs, collapsed lung, internal bleeding." Elise's voice was level, the clinical details a framework she could grip. "She said you came through well. You're going to be fine."
"I dreamed about you," Sienna whispered. "The whole time. There was this light and I was floating and nothing hurt, and I could have stayed there. It was peaceful. But you were here. In this world. And I needed to come back because a life without you in it, even a painless one, isn't a life I want."
The words cost her more breath than she had but she said them because they were true and because Sienna Park had spent forty-one years not saying the true things and she was done with that.
Elise's face crumpled. The composure she'd been holding dissolved and she pressed her forehead against Sienna's shoulder, the good one, and cried. Not loud, not dramatic. Quiet, shuddering sobs that Sienna felt through her whole body. Sienna lifted her good hand and put it in Elise's hair, her fingers weak but there, threading through the dark strands.
"I love you," Sienna said. The words cost her. Each one was a breath and each breath was pain but the words mattered more than the pain. "I love you, Elise. I'm not going anywhere."
"You'd better not." Elise lifted her face. Tears ran down her cheeks and her eyes were fierce and full and her hand gripped Sienna's hard enough to ache. "I love you. I love you so much. Don't you ever do that to me again."
"I'll try not to."
Elise pressed her lips together, chin trembling. "Promise me."
"I promise." She squeezed Elise's hand and the squeeze was weak, her grip nothing compared to what it should have been, but Elise's fingers closed around hers and held and the connection was a circuit completed, current flowing between them, and the pain receded fractionally in the face of it.
"We're going to be okay," Elise said. Her voice was calmer now, finding its ground. "We're going to get through this and you're going to heal and I'm going to be here for every minute of it. You took care of me for eight weeks. Now it's my turn."
The word was small and rough and inadequate but Elise took it and held it and leaned in and pressed her lips to Sienna's forehead with infinite care. The kiss was salt-damp and Siennaclosed her eyes and felt it settle into her, a counterpoint to the pain, a reason to be here, in this body, in this bed, in this life.
Footsteps. The door opened and Dr. Josephine Mars entered, her petite frame purposeful in the white coat, her sandy hair pinned back. Her face was tired but her expression was kind, and Sienna recognised it: the look she had worn herself when a patient pulled through.
"Welcome back, Sienna." Her voice was the same calm, kind tone she'd used when she'd delivered Elise's injury diagnosis in this same hospital weeks ago. She moved to the monitors, scanning the readings with practised efficiency, her small hands deft as she checked connections and adjustments. "Your vitals are strong. Stronger than I expected, honestly, and I expected a lot. The surgery went well. We've repaired the internal bleeding, reinflated the lung, and stabilised the fractures. Three fractured ribs, a splenic laceration that's been sutured, and a forearm fracture we've stabilised with an internal plate. The cast stays for six weeks. You're young and fit and that made all the difference. Your swimming, your conditioning, they gave your body the reserves it needed to come through this."
Elise's hand tightened on Sienna's. "When can she go home?" The question was premature and they all knew it and Dr. Mars smiled gently.
"Not for a while yet. She needs to stay until the chest drain is out and we're confident the lung is holding. But I'm optimistic. A few weeks and we'll have you on your feet."
Sienna's jaw set. "A few weeks."
Dr. Mars glanced between them, one eyebrow raised. "You're a terrible patient already. I can tell." She checked the IV line, adjusted the drip rate with quick fingers, made a note on the chart, and squeezed Sienna's good hand. "Rest. Let us take care of you for a change."