Pulling up a chair, he sat beside her bed.
In his mind, he had imagined so many times what it would be like to get Grace back, but none of them entailed sitting in a hospital room beside her unconscious body. He had pictured laughing and hugging which logically made no sense because he knew that when they got Grace back, she would be damaged somehow.
Damaged but not broken. Never broken. His sister was too strong to break.
He sat there for a long time.
Hours maybe.
Just sat and stared at her, transfixed.
Adjusting his position, his chair scraped across the floor, and Grace’s eyes flew open at the sound.
Elijah opened his mouth to reassure her, but as her eyes met his he found he couldn’t speak.
They just stared at each other.
Grace’s gaze was unwavering. Her blue eyes exactly as he remembered them, and yet at the same time, they were almost unrecognizable.
She stared so long and so unblinkingly that he began to worry that she had forgotten him. Matthew hadn’t mentioned memory loss, and she had been able to give a partial statement, but she was just lying there not speaking.
Although he supposed he was doing the same thing.
This whole day had been surreal, he could only imagine how much more so for Grace.
Before he could force his lost voice to return, Grace slowly lifted a hand to his face, her fingertips tracing his features.
“Elijah. You're really here.”
He pressed his hand over hers and squeezed. “I'm really here.You'rereally here.”
Grace all but launched herself at him, wrapping her thin arms around his neck and clinging to him with a strength that belied her fragile appearance. “I thought I would never see you again,” she whispered.
“We were so scared you were gone forever,” he whispered back. Concerned he was hurting her injured back, he loosened his grip and pulled back a little to study her. There was pain in her eyes, physical and emotional, but there was a strength there that he had never seen in her before. Grace was the baby of the family, a little spoiled, she was sweet and somewhat naïve, but that wasn’t the woman he saw looking back at him now.
Of course they had never been going to get back the same woman who had disappeared, but still seeing his sister looking not quite like his sister was disconcerting, and he knew they were all going to have to find a new normal.
* * * * *
3:34 P.M.
It was an odd feeling leaving the hospital. Matthew felt like he left something behind.
As he got out of his car and went to meet up with his partner so they could do a thorough search of the house where Grace and Barbara Lack had been kept prisoner, he reminded himself that he had to forget about Grace. Well, not forget about her as far as this case went. For as long as it took to find the kidnapper, she would be a part of his life. They’d have to interview her at least one more time, probably more, and then there would be the trial. But that was all, Grace was nothing more to him than a victim in one of his cases.
That was it.
So why did it feel like he was lying to himself?
How was it possible to get attached to the woman in the few hours he’d spent with her?
Especially when he had been turned off relationships after destroying the ones he had with his family. If he couldn’t even hold onto the people he was bound to by blood, the people who were supposed to be there for him no matter what, how could he expect to make any other relationship last?
Matthew already knew the answer to that question.
It was because Grace was different. There was a strength about her that seemed near impossible. Did he think she would be able to hold it together indefinitely? Of course not. Sooner or later the woman would be in for one major breakdown, she was only human, it was inevitable, but he admired the fact that she had answered his questions without complaint, to the best of her ability, and all before she’d even had a chance to be reunited with her family after such a long time being held captive.
Grace Bennett was something else and he was going to have to find a way to get rid of that tingly feeling he got in his stomach every time he thought of her. She’d just been rescued after years of being held prisoner by a maniac, even if she really hadn't been sexually assaulted the last thing on her mind was dating.