Page 96 of Sheltered

“For now, I’m going to kiss you until the nurse comes in. And once she does, I’m going to give your parents a call to let them know how you’re doing. I suspect they’ll be here within the next hour anyway.”

I closed my eyes and nodded my head slowly. “You should stop talking now.”

Blaze’s laughter filled the air again.

Then he touched his mouth to mine and kissed me until the nurse came in.

And sure enough, Blaze had been right.

My parents arrived within the hour, my brothers following shortly afterward.

Later that afternoon, because the doctor was happy with the progress I was making, I was transferred to a new room in the hospital.

I knew there was still likely to be a long road ahead of me, but I wasn’t afraid. I had the most supportive and loving family in the world. And I didn’t doubt the man I loved would be right by my side, walking that road with me.

TWENTY-SIX

Harlow

Six weeks later

Making progress was slow in a situation like this.

Much slower than I would have liked.

On some level, I think I’d convinced myself it’d be easy to get back to normal. To a degree, certain things had gotten there. My wounds had healed to the point I no longer needed to worry about changing dressings, bandages, or the like. I could shower like normal, too.

But my endurance was still not there. Working the way I used to just wasn’t an option, as I couldn’t stand for as many hours as I had used to before the whole incident.

Despite my frustration over the slow physical progress I was making, I knew I had to find a way to be grateful for any progress at all.

Because I was alive.

And the moment I reminded myself of that fact, and just how lucky I was to have survived, my mood would improve.

Psychological and emotional progress had been tough to measure. There was a part of me that could logically grasp what had happened and why. That part of me didn’t seem to feel compelled to believe that something like this would ever happen to me again, as it was clearly an isolated incident.

But there was another part of me that couldn’t ignore the fact I’d been targeted as a result of my relationship and shot twice. The first few weeks had been tougher than I’d expected.

I found myself thinking about that day more than I would have liked. And without being able to return to work immediately, there was certainly plenty of time to think.

Fortunately, Blaze had been right by my side through it all. Even after I’d been discharged from the hospital, he never left me alone. Every night, he was there, and when I had several sleepless nights with recurring nightmares, Blaze was there to comfort and reassure me.

The nightmares became fewer and fewer until they finally stopped. Or, at least, it seemed they had stopped, since I hadn’t had one in the last week and a half.

And finally, there was the legal situation. Laura Atlantico was in a boatload of trouble. She hadn’t expected to get caught, considering she’d planned to kill me and not have anyone be able to identify her. Obviously, her plan hadn’t worked, because she hadn’t been successful in her attempt to kill me.

She was facing attempted murder charges along with a whole host of others related to property damage that had been done by the men she’d hired to help her carry out her plan of retribution.

Many of those men had been caught as well, and some had been willing to assist the police in building the case against Laura in exchange for reduced sentences.

Since it was still so soon after the incident, Laura hadn’t been officially sentenced yet. But from the way things were going, it seemed she’d be following in her father’s footsteps and heading to prison for a more permanent stay.

All of that was out of my hands, so I tried not to dwell on the potential outcome.

Instead, I worked to focus my attention on the things that made me feel good. My family had been an absolute blessing in my life. My brothers reached out to my clients for me, my dad handled everything with the police and getting my salon cleaned up, and my mom dropped home-cooked meals off regularly.

Blaze was in the mix as well. He was doing anything and everything for me, his main priority being my physical and emotional well-being.