“Yes.”
“Oh my god…” Ginger put her hands on her cheeks. “You shouldn’t have.”
“Why shouldn’t he know? It was his baby too, and he should suffer—assuming he’s even capable.”
“There was no point in hurting him, Debbie,” she said. “It’s in the past. What could I accomplish by letting him know now?”
“I wanted him to suffer, too. It’s not fair that you’re the only one who had to deal with the whole thing.”
Ginger hugged her friend, touched by Debbie’s fierce protectiveness. Guilt pricked her heart—she’d burdened her friend with so much.
“Anyway.” Debbie cleared her throat. “I told him. I’m sorry if you didn’t want him to know.”
“Okay, well… How did he react?”
“He, um, sort of sank to his knees and fell over.”
“What? Did he fall down or something?”
“Uh, yeah.” Debbie bit her lower lip. “All the way down the stairs. One full flight.”
“Oh my god.” At least her unit was on the second floor. Shane would be bruised, but he should be all right.
“I totally panicked.” Debbie twisted her hands in front of her.
Debbie talked big and cocky, but she’d grown up in a moneyed, privileged environment. Seeing something like that would’ve been traumatizing. “Are you all right?”
“I’m not the one who fell down the stairs.” Debbie sighed. “There was blood.”
Ginger’s heart stopped. “What?”
“He… I think he hit his head. It was matted with blood by the time I reached him.”
“No!” Ginger jumped to her feet. Her mind blanked except for the image of Shane lying in his own blood. “Do you know which hospital they took him to?”
“Yeah, but Gin—”
“He’s my fiancé.” She threw on a shirt and shorts, then pulled her hair into a ponytail. “I want to make sure he’s okay. You should’ve woken me up.”
“I didn’t want to bother you. You were so tired you slept through the siren.”
Ginger shook her head. She’d been suffering from insomnia for the last few days, but that didn’t mean she was okay finding out about Shane just now. “Which hospital?”
Debbie told her. Ginger grabbed her keys and rushed out.
* * *
Shane was in a private wing. Ginger hurried along the antiseptic corridors until Vanessa abruptly stepped in front of her.
“What are you doing here?”
Being in her second trimester hadn’t seemed to slow her down. Shane’s younger sister was immaculately dressed in a sleek black and red dress and a pair of f
ashionable stilettos—the baby bump barely showing. “I’m here to see Shane, of course.”
“Don’t you think you’ve done enough?”
“Um… I’m sorry?”