Fire in the Blood

1. Chapter One - Praying

1

Chapter One - Praying

Manhattan

Jess Olden ignored her phone and waited for Margot to arrive at the restaurant. She hated this, hated it every time she broke up with a boyfriend or girlfriend, but this one was a particularly painful split. For a while there, she had thought Margot was the one: smart, funny, successful.

They had planned a future together without ever discussing whether they actually wanted the same things, and when Margot had tearfully confessed to Jess that she wanted the whole white picket fence and two-point-five kids thing, Jess knew it was over.

Not that she had any problem with that dream—it just wasn’t for her. She hated the idea of marriage, and she’d never wanted kids. Something to do with her own upbringing…

“Hey, gorgeous.” Margot was standing by her elbow when Jess looked around.

Margot’s eyes were soft and sad, and as Jess stood to kiss her hello, they hugged for a beat too long. Finally, both silent with emotion, they sat and ordered, sitting quietly until the waiter brought them their wine.

Margot reached across the table and interlaced her fingers with Jess’s. “I keep waking up in the night thinking this is a mistake. Maybe I was wrong; maybe it was just panic that made me say those things.”

Jess smiled, but gently removed her hand. “We both know it wasn’t, baby. It wasn’t. It hurts like to hell to admit it, but…”

“God, Jess…”

“I know.”

Neither of them ate much; they lightly talked around the fact that they were in pain, but towards the end of the meal, Margot’s shoulders slumped, and she nodded. “You’re right. We want different things.”

“We do.” Jess wasn’t someone who cried, especially not in public, but she felt her eyes fill. “But I do love you, Margie. Never forget that.”

“I love you, too.” Margot’s voice cracked, and she looked down as Jess’s phone began to ring incessantly. “Answer that. It’s driving me crazy.”

Jess touched her hand as she answered the call. “Yes?”

“Jessie?”

“Lazlo?” She was immediately alert. Lazlo never called this late unless it was something serious. At first, she couldn’t understand him, he was sobbing so hard, then when she caught the words ‘Carter’ and ‘India’ and worse still, ‘stabbed,’ her entire body went cold. “Lazlo, breathe. Tell me.”

“She went to LeFevre; that’s where she was hiding out. We think he was in league with Carter. Carter took her, Jess. We just found her. He stabbed her, again, Jess! Again!”

The breath froze in her lungs. “Is she…” Please God, no, please don’t let her be dead…

“No. They’re flying her to Lennox Hill now, but she’s in bad shape. We’re in another chopper on the way.”

“I’ll meet you there.”

Margot looked up as Jess stood. “What is it, babe?”

“It’s India. Carter caught up with her. She’s hurt.” Jess felt her throat close as the shock of what had happened hit her. Margot caught her as her knees gave way. “Come on. I’ll drive you.”

They arrived at the hospital before the helicopter carrying India, and they had to wait around while the place was being locked down by the FBI and Lazlo’s security team. Jess overheard the doctor saying the helicopter had arrived, and before anyone could stop her, she took the elevator to the roof.

They were rolling the gurney over to the lift just as she arrived, and Jess couldn’t help her cry of distress when she saw her friend. India was covered in blood, deathly pale and unconscious. “Indy!” Jess darted to her friend’s side as the paramedics shot her an annoyed look.

“She’s my friend,” she stuttered, resisting them from trying to push her aside. She grasped India’s cold hand as they hurried into the elevator.

“We’re taking her straight to surgery.” One of the nurses took pity on the distraught woman. “We can’t stop the bleeding.”

The sheet covering India’s abdomen was soaked with blood, and Jess clutched her hand tighter. “You have to fight, Indy, fight! Live! Don’t let him win, please.”

“Ma’am, please step aside now. We need to get her to surgery.”

In a daze, Jess let go of India’s hand as they arrived on the surgical floor, and she slowly followed the gurney out until she could no longer move. Margot found her standing stock-still, staring into space, and steered her into the relatives’ waiting room.

Jess had pulled herself together by the time Lazlo and India’s lover, Massimo, arrived at the hospital. She quickly told them what she had discovered, leaving out the most gruesome parts.

“He did it,” Massimo kept repeating, a man in total shock.

Lazlo was pale and Jess hugged him. “We have to be positive.” She took a deep breath in. “What happened to Carter?”

“She killed him.”

“Oh, thank God.” Jess felt her body relax. Braydon Carter had relentlessly stalked India after she survived his r**e and stabbing and the murder of her mother in front of her twelve years prior. A few days previous to today’s horror, he had shot one of India’s closest friends, a sweet young kid called Sun, who was still recovering in a hospital in Seoul.

Jess rubbed her eyes. “Listen, I hate to be the practical one at a time like this, but we need to get ahead of this in the press. From what you told me, LeFevre is going to try and obfuscate responsibility as long as India is unconscious. I need to get a press statement ready.”

“Jesus, Jess…”

“I know, but this is what we do, Laz, and you’re in no fit state. Let me just check that they haven’t got it already.”

She flicked on the television in the waiting room and flicked to the news channels. To her relief, none had picked up the story yet; most of them were concerned with the newly announced divorce of movie stars Teddy Hood and Dorcas Prettyman, the Hollywood power couple for the last ten years. The divorce had come out of nowhere and mud was already being slung, mostly by Prettyman’s team. Jess rolled her eyes. She’d had previous run-ins with Dorcas Prettyman and found her to be a vile attention seeker with little regard for anyone else.

Hood she didn’t know, but she already had no sympathy for anyone voluntarily involved themselves with Dorcas. Jess flicked off the television and went to work.

An hour later, she saw the press gathering at the hospital entrance. She and Lazlo wrote a short statement, and Jess went down to read it, glaring at the surrounding journalists.

“Earlier this evening, India Blue was abducted by Braydon Carter, the man who twelve years ago attacked and seriously injured India and murdered her mother. During the ensuing struggle, Braydon Carter was killed, and India suffered serious abdominal injuries. She is currently in emergency surgery. We’ll give you an update later, but in the meantime, we ask you respect both India’s and her family’s privacy and remember there are many other sick people and their families here who deserve their privacy as well. Thank you.”

Jess ignored the flood of questions that exploded as soon as she finished speaking and went back into the hospital. God. She felt sick at this whole thing, mainly because of the inevitability of it all. Carter was always going to get to India, wasn’t he? Obsession like that was unstoppable. Jess shivered. After her break-up with Margot, she could do with some serious alone-time, away from other people’s s**t. Not that Margot was ever toxic. She saw her approaching now and hugged her. “Thank you for being here, Margie. I don’t know what I would have done.”

Margot smiled at her. “You would have done just fine, my little tigress.” She raised her hand to stroke Jess’s face, then let it drop, realizing it was no longer appropriate to do. Jess felt a pang of sadness. Never again would she wake up to Margot’s soft, gentle kiss.

“I should go now,” Margot said, “give you all some privacy, but listen. Keep me up to date, right? And you need anything, anything, I’m here for you.”

Jess went back upstairs after saying goodbye to Margot and found Massimo alone in the waiting room. He looked wrecked. “Lazlo has gone to make some phone calls. He got a message from Tae. The news has broken in Seoul. They’re making the link between India and Sun’s shooting, so this thing’s gone international now.”

“Any news from the surgeon?”

Massimo shook his head. “Not yet.”

The television was flickering on the wall, the sound muted, and Jess watched as the news shifted from the Hood/Prettyman divorce to outside of Lennox Hill. She and Massimo watched her statement to the press, then it cut to a package of India performing and doing interviews. They also managed to rehash the Rome scandal, the nude photographs taken by a snoop paparazzi of India and Massimo making love. So much for respecting India, Jess thought grimly.

Massimo gave a choked laugh. “God, how beautiful does she look? Why would anyone want to destroy it?”

Jess put her hand on his shoulder. “Sick f***s will always be sick f***s, Massi. He’s gone. He can’t hurt her anymore.”

Massimo nodded. “If she lives. Otherwise… he won.”

“She will live,” Jess said fiercely, hurt and anger in her voice. “There’s no way India would give up now. Did you hear what she did to him? She wanted to live, Massi. For you, for Sun, for her Mom. For herself. She wanted to live. She’s not going to give up now.”

For the first time there was a faint smile on Massimo’s handsome face. “Thank you. I needed to hear that.”

“Look, why don’t I go get us some coffee and maybe something to eat? We’re no good to India if we collapse from hunger and thirst.”

Jess patted his shoulder and went out of the room. She walked down the stairs to the cafeteria, hoping it was open this late, but as she came to the bottom of the stairwell, she stopped and bent double, trying to quell her sudden urge to scream, to cry, to indulge in everything her broken heart wanted to do. She sank to the floor, pulling her knees up to her chest and took several deep breaths. Don’t. Don’t lose it now. This isn’t about you.

She took a deep lungful. India will live. Believe what you told Massimo.

“Yes,” she said quietly to herself, “yes. She’ll be fine. She’ll be okay.”

As she pulled herself to her feet, Jess told herself the same thing again and again, ignoring the simmering fear inside her that her friend might be too far gone this time.