Raw Redemption (Crossing the Line #4)(74)

To shield him.

Henrik’s lungs struggled to draw air. If he lost the woman he loved tonight, not even the knowledge that Caine had died on the floor of his own kitchen would avenge her. There was no vengeance to be had. There’s nowhere to go from here.

“Son.”

The familiar voice broke through the wall of agony Henrik had erected around himself, but it was only a minor puncture. Something firmly ingrained in his being—a learned respect—had Henrik lifting eyes to his father. But he only nodded once and began to replay the scene. Again. A sigh came from above, and Henrik registered his father dropping to the floor beside him, leaning against the wall.

“I might be retired, but I still hear about most things.” He tapped a fist on his knee, a mannerism Henrik associated with family breakfasts, church services. “So you can be sure I heard what you did tonight. Earned your badge back, Captain Tyler tells me.”

Henrik said nothing. But he glanced up long enough to realize his mother and sister were in the waiting room, too. His mother held a bouquet of roses, but he could only envision them being laid on a grave.

His father shifted beside him. “This girl—Ailish O’Kelly—she’s the one you lost your career over?”

“I’d do it again.” His voice was hoarse from shouting. “Or I’d find her sooner. Take her away so none of it would’ve happened. Not like this.”

They were silent for long minutes before his father spoke again. “What you did—I would’ve done the same for your mother. And I should have trusted that you were good. I shouldn’t have turned my back.” The older man gained his feet with help from the wall. “We’d like to meet her when she’s better.”

When she’s better. When she’s better. Those words echoed for God knew how long. It could have been hours or days before the doctor entered the waiting room. Everyone in the room stood. The squad, his parents. The doctor removed his glasses and rubbed tired-looking eyes with two fingers before replacing them. “Ms. O’Kelly is in recovery.” He scanned the room, as though looking for someone. “She’s asking for someone named Growler.”

Henrik was moving through the room like a launched cannonball before the doctor even made it to the nickname. Barreling through the hospital corridor, he didn’t allow relief to accumulate. Hadn’t he felt relief just hours ago, with the feeling ending in Ailish being shot? No. He wouldn’t relax until he felt life pulsing beneath her skin. Until her hazel eyes laughed back at him.

“Lish.” Henrik said her name as he turned the corner into the recovery room. And he halted. Because even with breathing tubes in her nose, color missing from her face, she was the most incredible sight he’d come across in his life. “Lish. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

Ailish reached out a hand and smiled.

Henrik lunged across the room to take it, falling to his knees beside the hospital bed and bowing his head over her prone body. When he felt her light touch stroke over his neck, thankfulness flowed through his veins like an antidote.

“I would do it again,” she murmured, her voice partially obscured by the beeping machines. “Before you say anything, I want you to know that. And I’ll never change my mind.”

Hearing the words he’d spoken to his father in the waiting room, Henrik could only stare at the girl who’d become his entire damn world in a short space of time. Until that moment, with their shared sentiment hanging in the air, he hadn’t fully understood what it meant to love someone, beyond the soul-wrenching shock of it. What it meant to love someone strong and capable and kind and brimming with potential. His Ailish. She’d wanted equal measure—demanded it—and giving it to her meant accepting that measure in all forms, good or bad. Always.

“Baby…” He blew out an uneven breath, checking the instinct to lecture Ailish or demand she never endanger herself again. “Thank you for saving my life.”

Her smile could have powered Chicago for a year. “Thank you for saving mine, too.” A laugh tumbled from her mouth, but there were tears shining in her eyes. “I love you so much.”

“That’s a good thing,” Henrik managed around the manacle choking his throat. “Because you can’t get away from me so long as you’re in that bed. And I’m not budging until you can budge with me.” He shook his head. “I have a feeling I’m going to be a worse patient than you are.”

Tears shone in her eyes. “Because you love me, too.”

Henrik leaned down and kissed Ailish, rejoicing over the warmth—the life—that greeted him. In his mind, an image rolled like an old home movie. Ailish walking toward him in the park, wearing her green dress. Except this time she smiled wide and opened her arms to greet him. “You’re damn right I love you.”





Epilogue

Four months later

Ailish was nervous. Which was ridiculous. In a handful of months, she’d survived two attempted kidnappings, a gun battle, and a fiancé who—although he’d taken some convincing that she was actually, fully recovered—couldn’t seem to stop dragging her into their bedroom every chance he got. She could admit, however, that surviving two hundred and fifty pounds of solid, groaning, aggressive male wasn’t exactly a hardship.

Speaking of her fiancé, he was next to go up on stage at the Chicago Police Department induction ceremony. At Derek’s urging, the department had been prepared to reinstate Henrik as one of their own the week following their stint undercover with Caine; Henrik had been adamant about waiting until Ailish had recovered from her gunshot wound and could attend the ceremony.