Chapter 33: Chapter 33

Sleep was a welcome visitor as Bree rested her head back on the pillow, her eyes closed. The medicine was making her tired, so she decided to take a little rest while Trent was out calling her parents.

Reality and a dream state were starting to mingle. She thought she was back on the beach for a moment, Trent’s hand in hers as they stared at the waves, deciding they were going to be together forever. She thought she heard the door to the hospital room open, but she wasn’t sure, and then she heard the pounding of the ocean surf and the birds squawking overhead, and the sun on her face seemed more real than anything having to do with aching fingers and skin grafts.

The sound of footsteps brought her eyes open for a second. She hoped it was Trent, back to sit with her, but she saw it was a nurse. The woman was next to her bed, maybe putting something into her IV. Bree’s eyelids were so heavy, she didn’t puzzle over it, though it did seem odd that the woman was dressed differently than the other nurses who had worked on her. While they had been wearing scrubs, their faces uncovered, this woman had an outfit on that looked more like a costume than something an actual nurse would wear, and she was wearing a surgical mask.

Too tired to worry about it, Bree turned her head and concentrated on the ocean again, hoping she’d soon be back on the beach with Trent.

A warmth radiated up her arm. Was that the medicine the nurse had put into her IV? She didn’t remember the doctor saying anything about her needing more IV medicine. She wasn’t even sure why she needed an IV anymore. The warmth morphed into a burning sensation, and as Bree began to register perhaps something wasn’t right, she thought she heard the sharp whisper of, “Take that, bitch.”

Footsteps headed toward the door as Bree did her best to open her eyes, but something was definitely wrong now. Was that even a real nurse? She fought to get a glimpse of the woman, but the drowsiness and the burning inside of her arm were overwhelming. She couldn’t get her eyes to cooperate at all. Fighting to open her mouth, she managed to say, “Trent!” but her cry might not have even be loud enough for him to hear if he was still in the room, which he wasn’t.

Bree was certainly in trouble now, and there was nothing she could do to help herself. Like the pull of the moon on the ocean’s tides, she felt herself being dragged further and further away. Try as she might, she just couldn’t fight the urge to fall asleep….

***

Trent had only stepped away from Bree’s room for a few moments--probably not even two minutes. He’d only told her parents she was awake and doing fine and would be calling them after she took a little nap. But as he went back into her room, he had the strange feeling something wasn’t right.

He glanced down the hall, and someone caught his attention. A nurse, almost at the end of the hallway, dressed unlike any of the other nurses, with a familiar cadence to her walk, had his eyebrows arching.

He pushed through the door. “Bree, are you awake?”

She didn’t say anything, so he assumed she had fallen back to sleep, but the look on her face was concerning. She looked… pained. “Bree? Are you okay?”

Trent looked at the machines and noticed a few of them were unhooked. Something was wrong--very wrong.

Just then, the nurse from before came into the room. “What’s going on? Who unplugged her monitors?”

“I don’t know,” Trent said, stepping out of the way. “I went out into the hall to call her parents, and came back in to see…. Is she okay?”

The nurse looked at Bree’s face. “Bree? Bree?” she called, shaking her. “No, something’s wrong.” She pushed a button that Trent assumed called for help and then reconnected the monitors. It was clear that someone had done something to Bree. On the monitor, the beeping indicated her heart was racing.

A flood of doctors and nurses came running into the room. Trent didn’t recognize any of them. He stepped back, letting the experts do their jobs, trying to stay as far out of the way as possible, while still keeping apprised of what was happening.

They were shouting for different tools and medicines as the beeping on the monitor continued to speed up so that it was impossible to tell that there were any pauses between beats. The tone sounded like one continuous beep.

“I’m going to have to ask you to step out into the hall, sir.”

It was the nurse from earlier. She had her hands on Trent’s arms.

“What? No, I can’t. I have to stay with Bree.”

“Sir, I know it’s hard, but please, the doctors can work better without you in the room. It’s for the best.”

“I….” There was nothing more he could say. He did as she asked, but halfway out the door, he spun back to face her. “What’s happening? I don’t understand?”

“I’m not sure,” she said, but her eyes conveyed something more.

“Did it have something to do with that nurse I saw in the hallway? The one that was dressed like she was wearing a Halloween costume?”

The nurse’s eyebrows knit together. “What nurse is that?”

“I don’t know. I don’t even know if she was in the room or not, but when I was walking back in, I saw her down there.” He pointed in the direction where he’d spotted the women that didn’t seem to fit in, the one that walked a little too familiar….

“I can go back and check the monitor. There’s a possibility we’ve got someone on tape. Do you think there’s someone who might want to hurt Bree?”

“Yes! The same person who caught the hotel on fire last night to kill her!” He didn’t mean to scream at the nurse, but if Cat had been in her room, who knows what might’ve happened to Bree.

The nurse rushed off, and he saw her pick up a phone hanging on the wall. The next thing he knew, there was an announcement that the building was temporarily on lockdown. He looked through the window in the door to see the doctors working on Bree. Dr. Rook came rushing into the room, barely looking at Trent as she flew by. Once in the room, she did whatever the other doctor needed. She wasn’t a cardiac doctor, obviously, and whatever was wrong with Bree, it was her heart that was most concerning.

In the distance, Trent heard sirens. That wouldn't be too surprising at a hospital. But those weren’t ambulance sirens. Those were police cars.

Tuning all of the chaos out, Trent focused on the window in front of him and prayed that Bree would be okay. What would he do without her? Tears began to stream down his face as he prayed they’d fix her.