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Back The Runaway Heiress Save as PDF
Chapters (75)
  1. Cover
  2. PRAISE FOR MEG TILLY AND HER NOVELS
  3. TITLES BY MEG TILLY
  4. Dedication
  5. PROLOGUE
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  68. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
  69. Excerpt from SOLACE ISLAND
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  74. ABOUT THE AUTHOR
  75. What’s next onyour reading list?

When they’d arrived at the hospital, the ER doctor deemed her wounds not life-threatening. Instead of treating her injuries immediately, the doctor called in a forensic nurse. Sarah stood on a piece of paper in a freezing-cold room and dropped her clothes, one by one, which were then labeled and stored. Photos were taken of the bruising around her neck, her damaged hand, the abrasions and powder burns on her abdomen. Her fingernails were scraped. Adhesive stubs collected gunpowder residue from her hands and her abdomen. Finally, Sarah had been given a thin hospital gown, a robe, and slippers and was led to a bed in the emergency room with a pale-green curtain for privacy. The nurse returned with a couple of warm blankets. “To keep away the cold,” the nurse had said as she wrapped them around Sarah’s shoulders. “You’re shaking like a leaf.” And then she was gone. But the kindness of that small gesture remained, warming more than her shoulders, and Sarah needed to momentarily close her eyes.

*   *   *

“You were lucky,” the ER doctor said as she sewed the torn flesh between Sarah’s thumb and index finger with neat black stitches as if she were sewing on a missing button. Sarah’s hand had been numbed, but she could still feel the tug. “Merely a surface wound across your abdomen where the bullet skimmed you, and the damage to your purlicue is not extensive.” The doctor’s hair was pulled back in a haphazard ponytail, and she looked tired, as if sleep was a commodity she couldn’t afford. “Which is fortunate. If the bullet passed through a centimeter inward, there would have been significant nerve and vascular damage, as well as tendon disruption and multiple fractures.”

Sarah nodded. “That’s good,” she replied. She was dog-tired. “I’m glad.” Lucky, the doctor said. Yes. I am. And Sarah had had a hand in creating that luck. By grabbing the barrel of the firearm and controlling its trajectory, she had been able to mitigate the damage her ex had been able to do. And Kevin is in police custody. Thank God. Hopefully all the evidence they had collected would ensure that he was incarcerated for a very long time. Adding to her blessings, Mick was in the waiting room, and Sarah held on to that thought as she fought back waves of weariness and pain. Used the image of him to keep her grounded in the present, instead of sliding back into unconsciousness. Watched the delicate hand of the doctor, the needle puncturing her flesh and the thick black thread pulling tight. Mick is in the waiting room safe and sound. And the joy of that knowledge made her weak-kneed with gratitude and relief.

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