Chapter 6 - The Awakening
Back at St. Catherine Medical Center, forty-eight hours after the shooting, the rain had finally stopped, leaving a pale, golden morning sun to spill through the hospital windows.
Inside the private ICU, the heart monitor clicked along at a steady, healthy rhythm.
Beep... beep... beep...
Clara Bennett’s eyelids fluttered.
For a long moment, she thought she was still in the diner kitchen, surrounded by the smell of burnt bacon and stale coffee. Then the crushing weight in her chest hit her, followed by the dry, sandpaper scrape of her throat.
She tried to cough, but her body refused to obey.
A hand—warm, large, and calloused—closed gently over her right fingers.
Clara forced her heavy eyelids open.
Sitting in the metal chair beside her bed, looking as though he hadn't slept in three days, was the severe, dark-haired man from the ballroom. His midnight tuxedo was gone, replaced by a simple charcoal-grey sweater, but the intense, controlled gaze was unmistakable.
“Don't try to speak,” Dominic said, his deep voice impossibly gentle. “You still have the ventilator tube out, but the doctors removed it ten minutes ago. Just breathe.”
Clara stared at him, her mind spinning through fragments of memory. The ballroom. The glass shattering. The sound of gunshots. Falling onto the marble floor. Warm blood soaking her uniform.
She looked down at her right hand.
On her ring finger sat a massive, heavy platinum ring engraved with a crest she had never seen before. It looked impossibly heavy on her frail hand.
“You’re awake,” Dominic whispered, running his thumb softly across the back of her hand. “Good.”
Clara swallowed hard, her throat burning. She tried to form words, her voice coming out as a dry, ragged rasp.
“...Who... who are you?”
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Dominic didn't look away. He held her gaze with an absolute, terrifying possessiveness that made her breath hitch.
“My name is Dominic Rossi,” he said softly. “And you are my wife.”
