Twice Madison’s pressure collapsed.
Twice Lauren brought her back.
At 2:47 a.m., the bleeding finally stopped.
The anesthesiologist exhaled.
One of the residents looked across the table at Lauren.
“You just saved her.”
Lauren stared down at Madison.
The woman looked smaller unconscious.
Less glamorous.
Less threatening.
Just human.
Lauren had spent six nights imagining Madison as a faceless intruder who had entered her marriage and taken what did not belong to her.
Now she saw mascara streaked near Madison’s temple.
A diamond earring missing from one ear.
A bruise beneath her jaw.
And a thin purple mark around her left wrist that did not look like anything caused by a car accident.
Lauren’s gaze lingered.
“Photograph that injury for the chart.”
The resident glanced at it.
“Seat belt?”
“No.”
Lauren stepped back from the table.
Her daughter kicked hard.
Then harder.
A tightening moved across Lauren’s abdomen.
