Page 28 of Vitamin Sea
A small smile involuntarily spread across her lips and her saviour’s expression turned from one of concern to one of astonishment and then a mirrored grin.
“I’m glad you’re going to be okay,” he said sincerely.
“Thank you,” she repeated, starting to regain her composure. “What’s your name?”
“Jack.” He smiled.
“I’m . . .” she took a deep breath, “Chloe,” she breathed out.
“Chloe,” he repeated.
Jack’s head turned to the side and relief washed across his features. She saw him wave.
Seconds later she heard voices and noticed three more people had joined them. Two appeared vaguely medical, and one was clearly Jack’s friend.
“Miss.” A man kneeled next to her and looked into her eyes. His dark skin was lightly wrinkled, and he had salt-and-pepper hair. “I’m Doctor Vargas.” He pulled out a small pocket flashlight and shined it into her eyes, one eye at a time.
As he went about his doctoring business, Chloe was cognizant of a woman doing other medical things to her. The woman lifted Chloe’s left hand and placed a blood oxygen monitor onto one of her fingers.
“Do you know where you are?” Doctor Vargas asked her seriously after he instructed her to follow the movement of his finger with her eyes.
“Costa Rica,” Chloe said a little hoarsely.
“Can you tell me what your name is?” he prompted her.
“Chloe.” Her voice was a little stronger now. “Chloe Ryder.”
“Chloe,” the doctor repeated. “Okay, I’m going to do a quick test of your reflexes.”
Her brain function had almost entirely returned to normal, and Chloe braced herself for whatever Dr. Vargas’s reflex test would consist of. Seconds later she felt a short, sharp whack to her knee and winced as her limb jerked in reply.
She was aware of Dr. Vargas and the woman, probably a nurse, speaking to each other in Spanish. Then she watched as the woman lifted up her left arm, wrapped a blue rubber band around it, and squeezed it tight. A sudden coolness swiped across her skin, followed by a sharp prick and seconds later Chloe felt the bizarre cold rush of saline course through her arm and into her system.
The adrenaline in her body started to wear off then as her brain finally realized she was no longer in danger. Which was good on one hand, but also bad because she began to feel the full extent of her injuries.
They were superficial of course—Dr. Vargas hadn’t put on any tourniquets to stop any bleeding—but she had a vague notion that one or two of the cuts might require stitches.
While Dr. Vargas and the nurse tended to her injuries and made sure she didn’t have anything internal going on, Chloe could hear Jack and his friend murmuring in the background.
Minutes later two more people appeared with a stretcher board, which they helped Chloe, who was moving gingerly, onto before buckling her in. Her body hurt with every step the medics took through the sand as she bumped along while strapped to the stretcher.
In addition to feeling pain, she was also starting to feel a creeping sense of embarrassment.
She was grateful that Jack had saved her from imminent death and thankful for the medical attention and appearing to only have sustained superficial injuries. But there was something mortifying about being strapped to a stretcher and carted down a beach by medics.
Her head was turned away from the sun and she squinted at the people lounging on the beach as they stared at her in curiosity. She felt like a circus freak—a sideshow for people to stare at and wonder what had befallen the bedraggled woman.
Suddenly, Chloe remembered her phone. What had happened to it? She had tucked it into the front pocket of her denim shorts when she set out on her walk. What were the odds that it hadn’t managed to get dragged out to sea during her near drowning? Her flip-flops were long-since forgotten—they had likely been ripped out of her hands the minute the wave had dragged her into the ocean.
A wave of pessimism suddenly rolled over her. There was no way it had stayed in the loose pockets of her shorts. And even if someone did find her phone, there was no way it wouldn’t be completely waterlogged. It was small in comparison to what she had apparently gone through, but she would be lying if she said it didn’t make her a bit upset. After all—while she was gainfully employed and financially sound, things were going to get tight after she moved out of Liam’s place, and she was once again living on a single income—something she hadn’t had to do in five years.
If nothing else, a small voice in her head told her it would be another fresh start. Her contacts, photos, files, videos, and voice recordings were all backed up to the cloud. The only thing she would have to worry about would be the tedious task of installing apps and trying to remember all her passwords.
Which was a chore and a half.
The ground beneath her suddenly changed to something more solid—she could tell by the difference in the movement and bumping of the stretcher.
Well, that and the surroundings.
