My confusion must have shown on my face. “You have bruising all over your body that indicates assault and sexual trauma.”
Oh.
“Are you safe with your father? Would you like us to keep him out of your room?”
“No!” I said, almost shouting my refusal. “No,” I repeated more calmly. “It’s not from—” I stopped myself, ashamed. I’d let those men touch me, got on my knees and begged for it. “It’s not from him,” I finished at a whisper.
“Is there anyone else you’d like us to keep out?”
I shook my head.
“Kiddo,” she said quietly, “we can put security on your door if we have to.”
“Can you—” Why were the words so fucking hard to say? They blackmailed me. They degraded me. When I revealed my secrets, they’d doubled down.
And they weren’t here.
They were back in fucking Yorkfield, nursing their wounds from their losses, while I laid here accumulating more debt.
I hated them.
Didn’t I?
Enough.I raised my chin, pitiful as it may have been in ahospital bed, naked under my gown, beat up and surrounded by monitors. “Could you please keep everyone but my father out?”
Reyes raised an eyebrow. “Everyone but your father and hospital staff.”
Relief rushed through me, followed by an odd sense of disappointment I quickly quashed. “Thank you.”
The medication she’d administered a few moments before pulled me under, despite my desperate fight to stay awake. Fragments of consciousness filtered through—Dad’s quiet murmur in the hallway, the squeak of nurses’ shoes on linoleum, the steady beep of monitors marking each beat of my borrowed time.
“Eva.” A male voice dragged me back to consciousness. Sunlight streamed through the window, painting golden stripes across my hospital bed. How long had I been out? “I’m Dr. Wentworth, the physician on call. We need to discuss your condition.”
I forced my eyes open. The room had filled while I dozed—Nurse Reyes, another doctor I didn’t recognize, my father looking more haggard than ever.
“Your heart rate remains unstable,” Wentworth continued. “The impact from the accident seems to have affected your artificial valve.”
The other doctor stepped forward. “I’m Dr. Nguyen, your cardiologist. We’re seeing some concerning patterns in your readings.”
More medical terminology washed over me—regurgitation, stenosis, words that blurred together until only phrases like “immediate intervention” and “possible complications” cut through the fog.
“The good news,” Dr. Nguyen said, “is that we can stabilizeyou. But you need to stay calm. No excitement. No stress.”
I scoffed, and he raised an eyebrow. “Miss Jackson—Eva—your heart is in bad shape. You’ve been inconsistent about taking your medication, and your father’s given us a picture of how busy your schedule has been this semester.”
I blinked back hot tears. What did they know about being busy? About the mad scramble that came with poverty and trying to keep a roof over our heads? About blackmail so cruel, I’d convinced myself I wanted it to protect myself from the horror?
Then, the guilt hit. He was right. Of course he was right. He saw hundreds of patients, and he’d seen every excuse in the book. This was my fault. I’d taken on too much. I’d mistaken Cole’s and Tristan’s care for their toy for emotional security, and I’d thought I could balance all the fucking plates without dropping them.
The heart monitor sped up, and Dr. Nguyen twisted his lips with concern. “We can stabilize you and repair the valve with a procedure that’s less invasive than a full replacement,” he said. “But it’s going to require you to make some changes to your life.”
“It’ll be cheaper?” I asked, and the doctor couldn’t conceal the pity on his face.
“The insurance you have through your school will cover most of it,” he replied, “although not all.”
Right.
I couldn’t stop the tear that trickled down my face, nor the next, nor the deluge that followed. It didn’t matter. I had to get on my feet again, and I had to find a way to pay back Jed Carter for my father’s debt now that I’d quit the team.