The ICU room felt both too small and endlessly vast at the same time. Machines beeped in a steady, mechanical rhythm that had become the only heartbeat I could rely on. Dario lay motionless in the hospital bed, his powerful frame looking strangely vulnerable under the thin sheets and wires. Tubes snaked across his chest where the bullets had torn through muscle and nearly claimed his life. The doctors had induced the coma to give his body the best chance to heal, but every hour that passed without him waking tightened the knot of fear in my stomach until I could barely breathe.
I had not left his side since they allowed me back in after the second crash in the emergency room. My blood-stained dress had been replaced by borrowed scrubs from a sympathetic nurse, but the metallic smell of hi
