CHAPTER TWELVE
Juno and Obe had looked at her in surprise when Ebony told them she was taking them straight from the airport to Atlas’s home. “I’m kind of staying there,” she said, coloring bright red, and saw Juno and Obe grin at each other, understanding. “It’s early days,” she told them, admitting her feelings for Atlas, “But I’m so excited. You’ll love him, and his family.”
Her brother and his wife looked suitably impressed as the limousine drove them to the mansion, but as soon as they arrived, they were greeted by an excited Fino. Mateo grinned at them both. “So good to meet both of you, please, do come in.”
After a lunch of steak sandwiches and champagne – luckily, Ebony had never liked champagne, so Obe didn’t notice her not drinking – Mateo showed them the grounds. He and Obe strode ahead, talking as Juno held back and looped her arm through Ebony’s. “So, you came to sing, and fell for the boss?”
Ebony chuckled. “I know, so cliché, right? But, Juno, when you meet Atlas, you’ll know why. He’s incredible.”
Juno nodded towards Mateo. “If he’s anything like that one – gorgeous, by the way – then I completely understand.”
Ebony nodded. “I hope Livia won’t think I’m being unprofessional, it’s just…I’ve never, ever felt this way. It was like instant chemistry, you know?”
Juno grinned. “I do know. It was like that between your brother and me.”
The thought of Juno and Obe doing half of what she and Atlas had been doing made Ebony turn bright red. “Didn’t hear that,” she teased her friend, who smirked.
“There’s a whole lot of that to hear,” Juno said mischievously, and Ebony groaned and buried her face in her friend’s shoulder.
“Didn’t. Hear. That.”
They walked on, noticing that the light was fading. Mateo and Obe were far ahead of them now, almost hidden by a copse of trees that were heavy with snow. Fino ran back toward them, grinning. “I’m going back to the house to switch on the Christmas lights.”
“Okay, be careful, Fino.”
The boy scrambled past them toward the house, just as Mateo and Obe came back into view, waving at them.
Afterwards, Ebony would try to make sense of what happened next, but still, she could not comprehend. As she turned to see Fino going into the house, a loud noise echoed across the grounds. For a moment everything froze, and then, to her horror, she realized what the sound was.
A gunshot. As she looked around, the next thing she saw was a body falling. Then there were people screaming and a body on the ground, bleeding. So much bleeding.
Blue went to check on his patients for the third time, not quite believing how well the surgery had gone. All of them were responding well – one had a slightly elevated blood pressure, but that was to be expected. He chatted with a couple who were awake, but then handed over to his second-in-command, Bill.
“Go get some sleep with that lovely wife of yours,” Bill told him and Blue grinned.
“Sleep wasn’t what I had in mind, but I like your thinking. Thanks, Bill.”
Blue went to the attendings staff room to find Romy, but seeing it empty, checked the on-call room again, then the cafeteria. Romy was nowhere.
Going back to the surgical floor, he stopped a nurse. “Hey, have you seen Dr. Sasse?”
“Not for a while. She was going down to the lab last time I saw her.”
“Thanks.”
As he headed toward the stairwell, a very pale man who Blue recognized as one of his patient’s husbands, burst through the door. “Please, can you help? I think she’s been stabbed.”
“Who?” Blue rushed towards him.
“I don’t know, I think a nurse, or a doctor, or someone, a young woman…she’s on the floor in the corridor, and there’s so much blood. I just found her.”
His heart thumping, Blue followed the man, trying to quell the panic in his chest. It’s not her, it’s not her. But even before he reached the corridor, he knew it was her. Romy. His Romy, laying in a pool of her own blood. Her scrub top was pushed up, multiple stab wounds in her belly, and her eyes were closed. She was so quiet, so pale.
He dropped to his knees beside her with a keening wail and felt for a pulse. Nothing. Blue roared out his pain. “No, no…someone help us…someone help us...”
His scream could be heard throughout the hospital as people began to rush to their aid.
Mateo’s expression was confused for the longest moment, then, as the blood began to bloom across his sweater, across his chest, understanding came into his eyes. Understanding and sorrow, along with a farewell. “Fino…” He gasped his son’s name as he touched the blood with his fingertips. “Son … sorry …”
“Call 911!” Obe was the first to spring into action, picking him up. While Juno dialed 911, he and Ebony hauled Mateo into the house, locking the door behind them. They had no way of knowing if the shooter was still outside. Laying Mateo on the floor, Obe shoved up his sweater to get a better look at the wound. Blood from his mouth and nose poured out, mixing with the blood from what seemed like every other part of him, so much that it was impossible to tell if he’d been shot more than once
Ebony fell to her knees beside him. “No, no, please…Mateo? Mateo?” She began to blow air into his mouth and pump on his chest. A split second later, they heard Fino returning, and Ebony looked at Juno, panicked. “Stop him…”
But it was too late. “Dada!” Fino screamed and ran to his stricken father before any of them could stop him. “DADA!”
Juno gathered the boy in her arms, but he struggled, kicking, screaming, clawing and howling in utter despair as she bore the distraught child out of the room.
“What the hell happened?” Obe demanded, watching Ebony perform CPR, waiting to take over when she tired.
More gunshots echoed from outside, followed by loud shouts. “Fuck… Ebony, let’s get him away from the windows.”
“Can’t stop,” Ebony gasped out as she kept up the rhythm on Mateo’s chest but they could both all see it was too late. His bright green eyes were glazed, his beautiful face pale slack. Ebony checked his pulse again then began to sob, laying her head on her lover’s brother’s chest as the chaos continued.
Fino was somehow back in the room again then, on his knees in the blood. He patted Mateo’s face, eyes huge and afraid. “Dada?”
“I’m so sorry, Fino,” Ebony whispered. “There was nothing we could do.”
The boy’s wail broke all of their hearts and Ebony reached for him, holding the weeping child in her arms, her own bewildered, brokenhearted tears mingling with his.