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I tip my head at him in acknowledgment, unable to speak around the ball of emotion clogging my throat, before settling down beside Nora.

Once the doors are shut and we’re on our way, I take her hand in mine, rubbing my thumb softly over her knuckles. “I promise I’ll never leave you, Pip. I promise.”

The secondwe're in the hospital, my promise to not leave her side goes out the window. They need to take her for scans and tests, and I'm not allowed to go with her.

Even worse, they insist I get looked at, too.

After a whole lot of hurrying to wait, I finally prove to them I'm no worse for wear. Which doesn't feel like much of a win when they relegate me to the waiting room.

Where I wait... and wait... and wait.

Eventually a shadow falls over me, making me jolt in the hard plastic chair.

Hope soars in my heart as I glance up, hoping for an update.

“Do you have an update?” I ask, only to slump back into my chair when I realize it's two uniformed officers standing before me, instead of someone with news about Nora. “Oh.” The defeat and disappointment in my tone hang heavy in the air between us.

“Atlas Wallace?” the taller cop with a bushy mustache asks.

“That’s me.”

“I'm Officer Johansson,” Mustache says before nodding toward the other guy. “And this is my partner, Officer Lewis. We're hoping to ask you a few questions and get a statement from you while it’s fresh in your mind.”

I heave out a deep, weary sigh. “Might as well get it over with.”

They both nod, and then settle into the chairs on either side of me.

Officer Lewis flips open his leather folder and clicks his pen twice over the blank sheet in front of him. “We know it’s been a long and stressful night, so we’ll try to make it as brief as possible.”

I lean back in my seat, tipping my head toward the ceiling. “Go for it.”

And go for it they do, asking me question after question after question.

Why I was at the cabin, what's my relationship with Nora, what do I know of her history with Rand, what made him turn the gun on himself, did I try to stop him?

I answer each and every one with surety and not a stitch of guilt in my heart over how everything played out.

If anything, he got off easy.

It feels like hours have passed by the time they finally decide they have enough information from me, even though it’s probably been thirty minutes tops.

“Thanks for your time,” Officer Lewis says, standing and tucking his notepad away.

Officer Johansson also stands and produces a business card from his front pocket. “We'll want to talk to Nora as soon as she's feeling up to it.” He extends the card toward me. “The sooner the better.”

I take it and nod, not trusting myself to say anything else. I’m beyond exhausted, my head is pounding like someone took a jackhammer to my brain, and I feel like I’m about to crawl out of my skin with the need to lay eyes on Nora.

I’ve never considered myself an anxious person—until now. But there are just too many variables in play. The unknown of it all has my every muscle tensing with the desire to bolt out of this stupid plastic chair and demand answers—to do something,anything.

But there’s no point. The only thing acting like an ass would do is get me kicked out—and possibly a criminal charge, which I’ve already miraculously avoided once tonight.

And so, with my elbows propped on my knees and my head in my hands, I settle in to wait.

And wait, and wait, and wait.

CHAPTER 43

NORA

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