Read Her Heart's Divide for Free Online

and closed my eyes.
    I sat like that for a long time. I heard people coming and going, but I didn’t look up. I felt more alone than I’d ever felt in my life. The first thing I was able to focus on was the rough blue tweediness of the waiting-room couch. There was a tiny stain with an irregular shape. A drop of something, smeared into the loose weave, never cleaned. I reached down to poke it and thought better of touching mysterious hospital stains in the nick of time.
    “Yeah, good call. Who knows what that is.”
    Jack was sitting on a matching tweed armchair nearby. Unshaven, rumpled, with a nasty cut under one eye, he still looked fantastic. But any attraction I might have felt was overwhelmed by the sudden desire to kill him.
    I nearly fell trying to get off the couch. “What the hell happened, you son of a bitch!”
    He put up his hands. “I don’t exactly know. There was that loud banging noise I heard back when all this started. I saw something orange flash out of the corner of my eye and it startled me. I hit the ditch. The passenger side of the cab crumpled, and Ryan’s leg was hurt. Lila, I’m so sorry.”
    This time I reached him and hammered on him with my fists. He didn’t even try to protect himself. I was too shaky to pummel him for long, and I realized that his face was as wet as my own. What had started as a beating turned to a hug of sorts, and we clung to each other.
    “I wish it were me who was hurt, Lila, I swear to God,” he whispered.
    “I know you do,” I said into his shoulder.
    We heard the squeak of rubber shoes on tile and turned to see a tired doctor.
    “Mrs. Crosse? How are you doing now?” he asked.
    “I’m fine. But how is my husband?”
    “He’s stable, but he’s still unconscious. He’s got a broken foot, a lot of deep bruises on his right leg that go to the bone, and a head injury. That much we know. The rest will have to wait until he wakes up. I came to suggest you go home and rest.” He gestured at the couch. “That’s not the most comfortable bed in the world, and you’ll do your husband more good if you’re in good shape when he comes around. Get some sleep. Come back tomorrow.”
    I tried not to sound shrill. “What if he wakes up and I’m not there? Or what if…” I choked, unable to articulate my fear.
    “We don’t really know what kind of shape he’s in, Mrs. Crosse. I’m not going to lie to you. But I do think he’s going to wake up, and when he does, he’s going to be in a lot of pain. We’re going to give him something for that pain, and he’ll be fast asleep before we can even fetch you from this waiting room.”
    “Why can’t I stay with him?”
    “Because we’ve got him in the intensive care unit so we can watch him closely. Head injuries are funny things, and I want to keep an eye on him. Just in case.”
    “Just in case, I want to be here,” I said. I sat down on the couch, prepared to stay all night.
    “I understand how you feel. But you’re not going to see him for a while. Go home. We’ll call you when anything changes.”
    He must have realized arguing with me was pointless, because he walked away without looking back. I turned to Jack and saw him flipping his cell phone closed. “Who’d you call?”
    “A taxi, Lila. I’m taking you home.”
    “You and what army?”
    Jack didn’t need an army, as it turned out. I fell asleep on that awful couch, worn out from fear and the adrenaline rush I’d been on since I saw Bill’s police pickup. When the taxi came, I was limp and groggy. And the fact was I was used to Jack’s presence and his friendship. His strange behavior of the past week was nothing compared to years of kindness and strength, and in my weakened state my trust for him was automatic.
    How he got me in the door and up the stairs, I’m not sure. But I was tucked under a blanket, shoes off but clothes on, when the smell of coffee wafted into the bedroom. The morning sun was glorious, and I stretched and