Elisabeth Naughton - Hold On To Me

Links clicked into place in Simone’s mind. She calculated the distance, the angle, the time it would take to grab the weapon. Her chances were slim, but she wasn’t going to let Mitch die without a fight.

“I know,” she whispered back.

Footsteps echoed in the hallway, followed by voices. Mitch let go of her hand. When Murdoch turned to look toward the door, Simone didn’t hesitate. She let go of Mitch, lurched for the gun, turned, and fired.

The bullet caught Murdoch in the shoulder. He grunted and fell back against the wall. Simone fired again, not even sure where she was aiming. Another gunshot rang out, this one not from her gun. Mitch’s raspy voice echoed, then he slammed into her again, taking her down to the ground.

Her hand hit the cement floor, and the gun went flying. A crack echoed from across the room. More voices. But Simone couldn’t see what was going on. Mitch was on top of her again, only this time he was like dead weight. Immovable.

“Mitch.” Panic pushed her muscles forward. She fought against him but couldn’t get him to move. “Oh God, Mitch!”

“Tate.” Ryan. That was Ryan’s voice. “Help me.”

Strong hands lifted Mitch from her. Simone scrambled to her feet, then gasped when she realized Mitch had been hit again, this time in the shoulder.

“Holy shit,” Kendrick muttered.

“Call 911,” Ryan yelled.

Kendrick whipped out his phone and started talking frantically. Across the room, Murdoch was out cold against the far wall, his gun yards away on the ground. Ryan tugged off his jacket and shoved it against the wound in Mitch’s side. “Simone, hold this here while I try to get at his shoulder.”

Simone’s bloody hands pressed against Mitch’s side.

“Son of a bitch.” Ryan yanked at the sleeve of Mitch’s shirt. “If we hadn’t gotten stuck behind that accident on the 101, we would have been here long before this happened.”

Simone tried to see what Ryan was doing, but everything was blurry. All she knew was it was bad. Mitch wasn’t answering. He wasn’t even moving.

“You sure have a knack for finding trouble,” Ryan muttered. “You know that, Mitch?”

“Ryan.” Simone stared at Mitch’s chest, a new sense of fear rushing in. “He’s not breathing.”

Ryan’s fingers froze against Mitch’s blood-soaked shirt.

“Buddy? Oh, don’t do this to me right now.” He leaned over Mitch to listen for his breath. Fear filled his eyes when he leaned back. “It’s not your time, do you hear me?” He squeezed Mitch’s nose, tilted his chin up, then blew a breath into his mouth. Shifting down, he felt along Mitch’s chest, clasped his hands together, and pressed down, starting CPR compressions. “Kendrick? I need that ambulance, now, dammit!”

“They’re almost here.”

Sirens sounded outside.

Fear closed Simone’s throat. She couldn’t lose him. Not now. She didn’t know what she’d do without him.

She reached for Mitch’s hand, lying near his side, while Ryan kept at the CPR. “Mitch? If you can hear me, hold on to me, okay? You promised you would.” She choked back a sob. “You promised, and I’m holding you to that one. Please, please, please, just hold on to me.”

“Mitch?”

Struggling to get his still-bandaged shoulder and arm into the damn hoodie, Mitch grunted from the cramped bathroom in his hospital room and rasped, “I’m in here.”

Footsteps echoed from beyond the door, then Kate’s gentle voice said, “Are you okay?”

That was a loaded question. Sweat slicking his forehead, his spine, nearly every inch of his skin, he glanced in the bathroom mirror, then looked away in disgust. His face was pale, his cheeks sunken, and the beard on his jaw had passed scruffy, even for him, and was now heading toward mountain-man scary. Not to mention he was so weak he couldn’t even get his own fucking sweatshirt on. No wonder Simone hadn’t been by to see him in days. He looked like death warmed over and felt like it too.

Repulsed by himself, he kicked the door open and took one step into the hospital room where he’d spent the last week. “Does this look okay to you?”

A ghost of a smile curled Kate’s lips, and she laughed at the hoodie half hanging off his body and twisted around his back, then quickly covered it with a frown. “Sorry. It’s not funny. I didn’t mean to laugh. Come sit and I’ll help you.”

Grinding his teeth, he shuffled toward the bed—shuffled, fuck, he couldn’t even walk like a normal person thanks to the pain still radiating up his side and the shortness of breath from his damaged lung. And oh great, he was sweating all over again, just from that little effort.

The TV was running a news program in the corner of the room, the sound on low. Dropping onto the side of the bed, he groaned, hating the smell of the room, the feel of the mattress, hating everything about this goddamn place.

Kate unzipped the hoodie, then moved around his back to gently bring the garment over his bad shoulder. “Let me guess, Mom picked these up for you.”

Mitch glanced down at the matching navy sweatpants he’d managed to tug on. “What gave it away? The cheap fabric or the fact the damn zipper doesn’t work?”

Kate pulled something from the back of the hoodie and held it up for him to see. “The price tag. We all know how much she loves Walmart.”

Mitch rolled his eyes. His mother had brought him three different sweat suits just like this, all in different colors, and while he appreciated the thought, once he got out of this godforsaken place, he wasn’t going to be caught dead in any of them. “Before I forget, I wanted to say thanks so much for calling them. Mom and Dad have been camped out in this room since I woke up, driving me batshit crazy.”

“You’re welcome. I’m just returning the favor. Remember how they rushed down here when you called and told them I was in town?”

“That was different, and you know it.”

“As I remember you saying, ‘it’s time you started pulling your weight in this family.’ Well, they’ve been hovering over me for six months. Now it’s your turn.”

He couldn’t argue with that. Their parents hadn’t wanted to let Kate out of their sight, and though he couldn’t blame them—after all, finding out your long-lost daughter was actually alive would spur anyone to do a little hovering—a tiny part of him felt guilty for enjoying the respite from their meddling.

“Where are they, by the way?” she asked.

“Talking to my doctor, I’m sure. Making sure I’m not going to inadvertently puncture the other lung by leaving. I swear they think I’m still twelve.”

Kate smiled. “You’ll always be their baby, Mitch. No way around that for a parent.”

He wouldn’t know. He wasn’t a parent and probably wouldn’t ever be one. His mind shifted to Shannon, and he wondered where she was and what she was doing. He hadn’t seen her since Ryan’s parents had brought the kids back to San Francisco, and while he knew a hospital wasn’t exactly a place for kids, he missed her.

“Do you want the sling inside or outside your sweatshirt?”

“Outside.” The weather had decided to kick into gear, and it was fucking cold outside. No way was he heading out there in his condition with an open hoodie.

Kate helped him slide his arm through the sleeve. Pain pinched his shoulder where he’d been shot, but it wasn’t nearly as bad as the pain in his side every time he twisted. And it didn’t even compare to what was happening in the center of his chest each time he thought of Simone.

By the time she finished and helped him tug the zipper up the front, he was sweating buckets. “God Almighty, I’m fucking useless.”