Danielle Steel - Safe Harbour

The phone rang in the bungalow at Safe Harbour just after two A.M. Matt had been asleep for nearly two hours, but he woke suddenly. Now that he had kids again, he never turned off the phone, and worried if anyone called him at an unusual hour. He wondered if it was Robert, or Vanessa in Auckland. He hoped it wasn't Sally.

“Hello?” he said sleepily, after he had groped for the phone.

“Matt.” It was Pip, and in the single word he could hear that her voice was shaking.

“Is something wrong?” But he knew it before she said it, as a wave of terror filled him.

“It's my mom. She's been shot. She's in the hospital. Can you come?”

“Right now,” he said, throwing back the covers, and stepping onto the floor, still holding the phone. “What happened?”

“I don't know. They called Alice, and then I talked to them. The man said she was shot three times.”

“Is she alive?” He nearly choked when he asked her.

“Yes.” Her voice was very small, and she was crying.

“Did he say how it happened?”

“No. Will you come?”

“I'll be there as fast as I can get there.” He didn't know whether to go to the hospital, or to Pip at home. He wanted to be with Ophélie, but it sounded as though Pip needed him.

“Can I go with you?”

He hesitated for only a fraction of an instant, and grabbed a pair of jeans as he listened to her. “Okay. Get dressed. I'll be there as soon as I can. Where is she?”

“SF General. She just got there. It just happened. That's all I know.”

“I love you, Pip. Good-bye.” He didn't want to waste time talking to her, or reassuring her. He got dressed, picked up his wallet and car keys, and ran to the car. He didn't even bother to lock his front door. He called the hospital from the car. They had no news, except that she was in critical condition, in surgery, and they had no further idea how she was.

Matt drove as fast as he dared over the mountain, and then hit the gas once he got to the freeway. He nearly flew over the bridge, and threw the money at the woman in the tollbooth, and he was at Pip and Ophélie's house within twenty-four minutes of her call. He didn't waste time going in, only honked the horn, and she ran out wearing blue jeans and her ski parka, which she had found in the hall. She looked deathly pale and terrified.

“Are you okay?” he asked her, and she shook her head. But she was too frightened now even to cry. She looked like she was about to faint, and he prayed she wouldn't. He was praying far harder for her mother. And he didn't comment to Pip about the insanity of her mother being on the streets late at night with the outreach team. This was what he had feared, and predicted, all along. But there was no comfort now in having been right. He couldn't see how she would survive. And Pip couldn't either. Three bullets sounded like more than any one human could survive, although Matt knew some had.

They drove to the hospital in anguished silence, and he parked the car in one of the slots for emergency vehicles, and then he and Pip ran inside. Jeff, Bob, and Millie saw them as soon as they came through the door and knew instantly who they were, or at least the child. She looked just like her mother except for the red hair.

“Pip?” Bob approached her and patted her shoulder. “I'm Bob.”

“I know.” Pip recognized him from her mother's description, and the others. “Where's my mom?” she asked, looking nervous, but remarkably composed. Matt introduced himself to them with an angry frown. He couldn't blame them for what she'd been doing, she had chosen to do it, but he was angry anyway.

“They're taking the bullets out now,” Millie explained.

“How is she?” Matt asked, looking straight at Jeff, sensing that he was in charge.

“We don't know. They haven't told us a word since she came in.” They all stood there for what seemed like hours, and finally sat down.

Bob went to get coffee, and Millie held Pip's hand, as she clung to Matt's with her other one. They sat in silence, there was nothing anyone could say, to excuse, or explain, or comfort. None of them had much hope, including Pip, and no one wanted to lie to her. The likelihood of Ophélie surviving was slim to none.

“Did they catch the guy who shot her?” Matt finally asked.

“No, but we got a good make on him. If they've got mug shots on him, we'll get him. I ran after him, but I couldn't catch him, and I didn't want to just leave her,” Jeff explained, and Matt nodded. And even if they caught him, what difference would it make if she was dead? None to him, or Pip. Nothing was going to bring her back if she died. But at least she wasn't dead yet.

He went to the desk several times and asked them, but all they could tell him was that she was still in surgery. In the end, she was there for seven hours. But at the end of it, she was still alive.

Jeff had called the Center by then, and reporters had called the desk, but fortunately no one had shown up yet. And at nine-thirty in the morning a surgeon finally came out to talk to them. Matt was terrified of what he would say, and so was Pip. He hadn't let go of her hand since they'd arrived, and whatever he did, he did with the other hand. She had a death grip on him, and he on her.

“She's alive,” the surgeon said to reassure them. “We don't know what's going to happen yet. The first bullet went straight through her lung and out her back. The other one came out the back of her neck, and missed her spine. All things considered, she was pretty lucky, but she's not out of the woods yet. The third bullet took out an ovary and her appendix, and did some nasty damage to her stomach and her intestines. We've been working on that for the last four hours. She had four surgeons working on her. That's about as good as it gets around here.”

“Can we see her?” Pip piped up in a voice that was barely more than a croak. She hadn't said a word all night, and the surgeon shook his head.

“Not yet. She's in surgical ICU. But in a couple of hours, if her vitals are stable, you can come up. She's still unconscious from the anesthetic, but she should wake up in a few hours. She'll be pretty groggy, and we're going to keep her that way for now.”

“Is she going to die?” Pip asked, squeezing Matt's hand so tight it felt like a vise, and he held his breath as the surgeon answered.

“We hope not,” he said, looking straight at Pip. “She still could, she's very, very badly injured. But she survived the surgery and the trauma. She's pretty tough. And we're doing everything we can.”

“Damn right,” Bob said, praying that she would.

Pip sat down again then, and looked like a little wooden statue. She was not going anywhere, and neither were Matt and the others. They just sat there and waited, and at noon, a nurse said that they could go up to the ICU. It was a scary place, and the glass enclosure where Ophélie was, was filled with machines and monitors and lines running everywhere. Three people were monitoring her, and every inch of her seemed to be covered with needles and bandages and tubes. She looked deathly pale, and her eyes were closed as Matt and Pip walked into the room.

“I love you, Mommy,” she said, standing at the foot of the bed, next to Matt, and he did everything he could to fight back tears so Pip wouldn't see it. He knew he needed to be strong for her, but all he wanted to do was reach out and touch Ophélie, as though to will life into her. They seemed to be doing everything they could for her. And the whole time they stood there, she never moved. They were just about to leave, when the nurse told them their time was up. She could have visitors for only five minutes every hour, and there were tears rolling down Pip's cheeks. She was terrified she was going to lose her mother too. And Ophélie was all she had left. Her mother was the only family she had in the world. And as though sensing her distress, Ophélie opened her eyes and looked straight at her, and then at Matt. And as though to encourage them, she smiled, and then closed her eyes again.