Page 46 of Shadowed Hearts: Frost (Nightfall Syndicate #2)

The crash echoes through the hallway as equipment scatters across the floor, syringes, surgical tools, everything sliding across polished concrete.

Damian approaches with caution. His gray eyes track possible strike points.

"Stay the fuck away!" I roar, grabbing a portable monitor, cables trailing like electronic intestines and hurling it at him. He sidesteps, the machine exploding against the wall in a shower of plastic and sparks.

"What the fuck?" The voice cuts through my rage like a blade.

I spin toward the sound. Kade stands in the medical bay doorway, his massive frame filling the space, Alina beside him. Her green eyes are wide with shock, taking in the destruction.

But I don't care about their horror. Can't process anything beyond the flat line on that fucking monitor visible through the doorway behind them.

"She's dying!" I scream at all of them, at the universe, at whatever god let Sarah die and now wants Vanessa too. I turn towards Chaos again. "She's fucking dying and you're trying to—"

Arms like steel cables wrap around me from behind. Kade's massive frame locks me in a bear hug, my feet lifting off the ground as he restrains me with controlled force.

"Let me go!" I thrash against his hold, throwing my head back to catch him in the face. "LET ME GET TO HER!"

My legs kick out wildly at the empty air. My shoulders strain against his grip. But Kade is immovable, an unbreakable wall of strength and resolve pinning me in place as I shatter completely.

"We've got a heartbeat!" Remy's voice cuts through my rage like salvation. "Weak and thready, but it's there!"

The fight dies out of me instantly. My body goes slack in Kade's arms as if someone cut my strings. He releases me carefully, and I collapse to my knees on the cold floor.

"Heart rate is rising," Remy announces from inside the medical bay. "The counteragent's working."

I scramble forward on hands and knees, crawling back through the doorway to Vanessa's bedside. The monitor beeps irregularly but persistently. Her chest rises with a shallow breath. Then another.

Alive. Fighting.

I kneel beside the examination table, my bloodied hands finding hers again. The faint flutter beneath her skin registers against my fingertips. It's weak but growing stronger with each minute that passes.

Cole works frantically at his monitoring station, coordinating readouts and medication timing while maintaining careful distance from my position. Xander leans against the doorframe, blood streaming down his face from his broken nose, his brown eyes holding shock rather than anger.

Jax pushes himself off the floor in the hallway where I threw him, one hand pressed to his ribs.

"Jesus Christ," he breathes, but there's no accusation in his voice. Just stunned recognition.

My vision clears gradually, like emerging from underwater. Through the medical bay doorway, I can see the devastation I've left behind.

Shattered monitors hanging from twisted mounts, equipment scattered across the floor like electronic carnage, scorch marks on the walls where sparks flew. The metallic taste in my mouth intensifies as the scope of destruction registers.

I look down at my hands. Split skin across my knuckles weeps crimson mixed with Xander's blood. I flex my fingers, watching torn flesh pull apart, feeling the sting of exposed nerve endings.

The reality crashes into me like a freight train.

My brothers. My team, my family…and I put my hands on them. Hurt them. Drew blood.

I press my bloodied fist against my mouth, teeth against knuckles, tasting copper and salt. My chest heaves with breaths that seem impossible to complete. The muscles in my jaw spasm as fragments of control try to reassert themselves and fail.

Damian stands motionless near the equipment area, observing with those gray eyes that see everything. No judgment. Just recognition of a pain he understands intimately.

Alina watches me from beside Kade, her own cheeks wet. Something passes between us, understanding? Horror? Compassion? Right now, I don't have the capacity to process.

"This isn't just about Vanessa," Kade says quietly, moving closer with the careful deliberation of someone approaching a wounded animal. His eyes hold mine, knowing. Understanding.

Sarah.

The unspoken name hits like a bullet to the brain. Everything I've kept locked away bursts free at once.

The morgue. Fluorescent lights humming overhead. Dad's ragged breathing beside me as the attendant pulled back the white sheet. Sarah's face. Peaceful but wrong, her skin the same waxy color as Vanessa's now. The same blue lips.

"Is this your sister, Mr. Cross?" The words that changed everything. The moment I understood that all my precision, all my skill, meant nothing when it mattered most.

"She's dying," I whisper, the confession ripping from my throat. "Just like—I couldn't—"

The words fragment as memories cascade through my mind. My shoulders curve inward, every carefully constructed wall demolished.

"I was supposed to protect her." The admission comes out broken, barely audible. "Supposed to be there. But I was… I was winning fucking trophies while she… while he…"

My voice cracks completely. The control I've spent years building crumbles like sand.

"I had to identify her body." The words emerge as a whisper. "Had to look at her face and tell them yes, that's Sarah Cross. That's my sister. The one I failed."

Jax steps closer despite everything, his usual energy dampened by the gravity of my breakdown.

"I can't lose her, Kade." My voice doesn't sound like mine anymore—raw, desperate, stripped of every defense. "I can't watch another person I—I can't do this again."

"You won't have to," Xander says through his broken nose, blood still streaming down his face. "She's fighting, man. Look at the monitors. She's fighting back."

The monitors blur through my tears. Her heart rate, while irregular, shows patterns, resistance patterns. Her body rejecting the poison, fighting to survive.

"Vitals are improving," Remy announces, adjusting another IV drip. "Blood pressure's coming up. Respiratory rate's stabilizing. The counteragent's working."

The monitor continues its irregular but persistent beeping. Vanessa's chest rises and falls in increasingly steady movements. Her heartbeat whispers against my fingertips, faint but steadily gaining strength with every passing minute.

"She's going to make it," Kade says with quiet certainty. "She's tougher than she looks."

I nod, unable to speak. The ice I've lived behind for years has melted completely, leaving me raw and exposed. My team, battered, bloodied, but still here settles into watchful positions around the medical bay.

Not leaving. Not abandoning their broken teammate or the woman who somehow cracked him open and showed him how to feel again.

For the first time in years, I'm not alone with my ghosts.

And Vanessa keeps breathing.