She glanced around, though lifting her head was nearly impossible. Soon a woman in bright-green scrubs hovered over her, poking and prodding around her chest, checking her pupils, and then writing on a chart for a minute or so. She was in a hospital.
But why?
“She’s awake,” the doctor said.
Jude snorted. Ella smiled. He was holding on to his sarcasm, and she wanted to praise him for it.
“Vitals look good. She’s healing well. I’ll need to get some labs and an MRI to check how that lung looks, but if she’s coming along as it appears she is, she should be able to go home today,” the doctor said and left.
“She’s awake,” she heard Jude say. He was on his satellite phone. “Yeah, today.”
She slowly took inventory, moving her hands, her feet, performing a systems check of sorts. Her side hurt like someone had stabbed her with a hot poker, but other than not remembering how that had happened, and some pretty serious weakness, she seemed okay.
“I’ll be bringing her home, but yeah, send Brody,” Jude said. “Got it, Your Highness.”
Then he was in front of her again. A nurse came in and asked Ella how she felt.
“Like I’ve been shot,” Ella replied.
“Sounds about right,” the nurse said and then asked if Ella wanted anything to drink.
She did, but the nurse only gave her ice chips. She wanted answers, but Jude stood there watching the nurse fuss over her, arms crossed over that delicious chest, staring at her like she was his entire world and he’d die if he couldn’t see her face.
She decided she really liked it when he looked at her like that.
“I’ve got to take her down for some tests,” the nurse told Jude.
“I’ll go with you,” he said implacably.
She started to argue, he shot her a look, and she sighed. Then the nurse was wheeling Ella’s bed out of the room and down the hall. After the MRI, the nurse wheeled Ella back to her room and asked if she wanted the head of her bed raised.
Ella nodded, but as the bed lifted, she winced when her wound pulled.
“Stop,” Jude said harshly.
The nurse stopped.
“Leave it there,” Ella encouraged the nurse. She was nowhere near vertical, but it was an improvement over being flat. The nurse left, and Ella gazed at Jude.
“Baby,” he whispered reverently.
“He shot me,” Ella said as images from the last time she’d seen Dresden flashed through her mind.
Jude nodded as he sat on the bed beside her, raising her hand to his lips again and kissing her fingers slowly, one at a time.
“How bad?”
“Bullet hit a rib and punctured your lung,” Jude told her, his voice tortured as if the memory was too bad to be borne.
“I heard you,” Ella whispered, breathing through the pain and her own memories. “I saw him smile, and then he fired and I heard you calling me.”
Long moments of silence passed between them.
“I thought I’d lost you,” she said, squeezing his hand and bringing it to her lips. “I thought I’d lost us.”
“You fought, lady. Like a beast, you fought to stay with me,” Jude responded.
Her heart thumped in her chest. “I love you, Jude Dagan. I don’t ever want to leave you again.”
He closed his eyes and swallowed. “You won’t.”
“Did you get Dresden?” she asked tentatively.
He nodded.
A tear fell down her cheek. It broke his heart.
“Look, he has no place here, even dead. I need you to rest so I can take you back to Port Royal and get you completely healed. We’ve got a rough couple of days coming up. There’s so much to bring you up to speed on.”
“Nina?”
He nodded. “She’s alive.”
“She’s scared,” Ella said firmly. “She wouldn’t run and hide if she wasn’t scared.”
“We’ve got to find her. If she’s scared, she knows something, and for her sake, we need to find her,” Jude stated. “But first, we get you out of here.”
Twelve hours later, her MRI showed no concerns and that she was healing nicely. Jude had brought her up to speed on her injury and how she’d come to be at Walter Reed. He’d told her everything, leaving nothing out, and by the time he had finished, Ella had been crying but so had Jude.
Once her tests returned clear, she was ready for discharge. Jude listened intently to the doctor and took notes on her upcoming care. She was scheduled to follow up with a doctor in two weeks. She could be cleared as early as then.
It was a two-hour drive to Port Royal, and they made it in the middle of the night. Brody brought the vehicle to the hospital door, and Jude carried her down to the SUV, placed her in the backseat, and moved in beside her while Brody drove.
She slept most of the ride, having no energy to do much but lie on Jude. He seemed fine with that, his hands never far from her, his voice in her ear telling her what she meant to him, how he was never going to let her go.
Brody said two words, “Goddamn, Ella-Bella,” but he smiled to alleviate the reprimand. He’d always said she got into more trouble than she was worth, yet he’d always been there with her in the midst of it. Now was no different. She guessed they’d kinda saved each other in that cell of Dresden’s.
She didn’t remember falling asleep or being carried up to her room. She remembered waking up cold and needing to pee, so she tried to get up on her own.
Jude was there that fast. “Ella, let me know you need to get up, okay?” he admonished.
She threw him a nasty look and then let him lift her.
“I really can walk, Jude,” she informed him, tempering the frustration in her tone.
“Just let me do this for a little while longer,” he said, holding her against his chest and then setting her on
