I come to a halt just outside the plastic screen that covers the lady at the front’s desk, trying to be as patient as I can while she finishes up her phone call. She notices me and holds up a finger to signal that I wait another second, and I tap my fingers against the counter, trying to will myself to be still. When she’s finally done with her call, I can hardly contain myself anymore.
“Can I help you?” she asks.
I grip the edge of the counter. “I’m looking for Abby Thompson. She should have been brought in recently.”
The woman types at her computer, squinting at the screen for a moment. “Ah, yes. She’s already in an exam room. Number 112. It’s just down the hall there.”
“I can just go back?”
“Sure, they should be finishing up with her now.”
Finishing up with her?
“Is she all right?”
“Sir, I don’t have those answers. I can just tell you what’s on the screen. If you want to go down the hall there, you can see for yourself.”
I grind my teeth at her brusque tone, but I attempt to relax, telling myself she’s just doing her job. It isn’t her fault I feel like I’m coming out of my skin. I push away from the counter and head toward the hall she pointed out, rushing across the linoleum floors as I count the room numbers along the way. By the time I notice the number the receptionist mentioned, I’m skidding to a halt and standing outside the closed door with a racing heart.
I try to calm my breathing as I swallow around my tongue, which feels too thick. I gently push open the door and step inside as I brace myself for whatever I’m going to find there.
I don’t know what I expected, but a perfectly fine-looking Abby sitting on the edge of a hospital bed seeming slightly annoyed was definitely at the bottom of the list.
“Abby?”
Her head snaps up to look at me, her mouth falling open in surprise. “Jack?”
My eyes drink her in, trying to look for any signs of injury. She looks relatively fine, but then I notice the bandages on her right arm, the sleeve cut to the elbow and stained with her blood.
I rush to her side. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” she tells me. “It was just a cut. They got me all stitched up.”
All-over relief floods through me. “I thought—When Ian called and said you were hurt, I thought—”
She must notice the growing panic that’s welling inside me, must see the way my breath is coming shorter as the idea of her being seriously injured wars with the relief I feel at seeing that she’s all right.
“Hey,” she says. “It’s okay. I’m okay. Really.”
I’m as careful as I can be when I pull her into my chest, mindingher arm as I throw mine around her shoulders to hug her tight. “I can’t tell you how fucking worried I was.”
“I’m really okay, Jack,” she says quietly, patting my back.
I pull back, my hands cupping her shoulders as my eyes rove over her face. “All I could think about was what I said to you yesterday. Jesus, Abby. You could have fuckingdied, and the last thing I said to you was fucking awful.”
“It seriously wasn’t that bad—”
“I’m so sorry,” I blurt out. “About everything. I shouldn’t have said those things. I shouldn’t have made you feel like you weren’t an important part of my life, because youare. I never should have let you think any differently.”
“Jack,” she says softly. “I’m sorry too.”
“You have nothing to apologize to me for.”
“You needed me, and I walked out on you. I feel terrible about it.”
“I deserved it after all the things I said.”
“I should have stayed and tried to hear you out,” she laments.