The Cocky Hockey Captain

Chapter 32 ● Carlota's Anatomy

"Hello Carlota, I'm Dr. Alexis Cree and I was your surgeon last night."

My head spun. "Wait, surgeon? Last night?"

Meanwhile Dean asked, "Carlota?"

We all looked at him. Under his breath my dad said coño de la madre. I agreed.

The doctor didn't notice the sudden drop in temperature. She flipped the chart open and used big words that I couldn't process. When I asked for a more mundane explanation she said that a bullet had pierced my left shoulder clear through, and I'd been lucky it had avoided anything key. She was able to retrieve the bullet in full. There had been no fragments left inside. And that she also repaired the damage pretty damn well. Her words, not mine.

"In short," she said, looking impressed. "You're very lucky. The bullet mostly grazed you and the biggest damage is just muscular."

My bottom lip started trembling uncontrollably as the gravity of what happened finally hit me.

I could've died. What was I thinking?

"What probably saved you was the fact that this young man here," and saying this she tipped her head towards Dean. "Applied pressure on your wound and stopped the bleeding pretty well until the paramedics arrived."

"What's the recovery like?" Dean asked, not acknowledging what the doctor had said.

And I remembered what I'd been thinking. Saving him. 

I was glad I did save him.

"It's hard to tell with gunshot wounds," the doctor said. "We'll be draining the wound and applying antibiotics for the next few days. Right now we need to prevent an infection. When you get discharged you'll be looking at a lot of pain and a pretty useless arm until you're able to start physiotherapy. For something like this," she said as she shrugged. "Probably a few months' recovery on the physical side of things."

Dad held my good hand and squeezed. I burrowed into the pillows with a sigh.

Yeah, mentally was going to be a whole different story.

Every person in the room was startled when I suddenly laughed.

"Oh, don't worry, doc. I was already touched in the head before this."

She chuckled. "I'm sure you were, to jump in front of a bullet like that." She sobered up after that and looked at my dad. "Speaking of, now that she's awake I can't really hold the police back from questioning her."

"Leave them to me," dad said, his businessman voice back in place. He looked down at me, hand still clasped around mine, and asked, "Will you be okay here for a while, chiquita?"

I nodded. "Yes, dad. I'm not going anywhere any time soon."

Dad leaned down and gave me a kiss on the forehead. I couldn't remember when was the last time he'd done that.

"Anything else I should do for the kids, doc?" the guy asked. I realized belatedly that he was the nurse.

"Check with the boy's doctor but Carlota should be fine."

They turned to leave and I gave them a wobbly thanks for everything. My eyes heated up just before streams of tears started trickling down the sides of my face. My chest convulsed with a sob.

I opened my eyes as the bed dipped and saw that Dean had perched himself on my good side of the bed. He grabbed my hand in his bigger and warmer one and stayed like that as I let it all out. Snot, ugly hiccups and everything. His thumb ran circles across my hand, warming me.

For a while after, the only sounds in the room were coming from the beeping machines. Dean was really serious as I met his eyes and said, "Hi."

"Carlota," was all he said. I flinched. He hummed from low in his throat. "That sounds awfully girly to me."