The Heiress He Underestimated novel Chapter 221

Chapter 221 I Will Not Let Go

A long, continuous, piercing BEEEEEEEEEP.

The green line on the heart monitor went flat.

For a second, everyone froze. The sound was so final, so absolute, it seemed to stop time itself.

Elera’s clinical detachment shattered.

“NO!” The scream was torn from her throat, raw and primal. She shoved Dr. Evans aside and climbed onto the bed, straddling Drakonius, her knees on either side of his hips. She laced her fingers together, placed the heels of her hands on the center of his chest, and began to pump.

“One! Two! Three! Four!” she counted, her voice a harsh gasp. She threw her whole weight into it, the compressions deep and violent. Crack. A rib gave way under the force. She didn’t flinch.

“Brenda, epi! One milligram, push it now! Evans, get the paddles! Charge to two hundred!”

The room erupted into controlled pandemonium. Brenda injected the adrenaline directly into his IV line. Dr. Evans slapped the paddles onto Drakonius’s bare chest. “Clear!”

Elera leapt off the bed. The body jolted.

They all looked at the monitor.

Flat line.

“Again!” Elera shouted, scrambling back onto him. She resumed compressions, her hair sticking to her sweaty forehead. “Don’t you do this! Don’t you dare! You promised me a future, you miserable, beautiful man! You don’t get to break a promise to a Nethys! We hold grudges!”

She was crying now, tears and sweat mixing on her face, dripping onto his still chest as she pushed, counting, begging.

“Charge to three hundred!” Dr. Evans yelled.

“Clear!”

Another jolt. Another agonizing glance at the monitor.

A single, lonely blip.

Then another.

Then a weak, stumbling rhythm began to trace across the screen. Beep… beep… beep…

√ D

Elera collapsed forward, her forehead resting on his sternum, her body shaking with sobs she couldn’t contain. The violent, frantic energy drained out of her, leaving her trembling and hollow.

“Sinus rhythm restored,” Brenda announced, her own voice trembling slightly. “BP coming back up Fitty over thirty… sixty over forty…”

14

1:31 am

Chapter 22 Will Not Let Go

Slowly, Elera pushed herself up. She looked at Drakonius’s face. He was still impossibly pale, still unconscious, still dependent on the machine to breathe. But he was there. The line was no longer flat.

She climbed off the bed, her legs like water. Clara was there instantly, wrapping an arm around her waist, holding her up. Elera leaned into her, too exhausted to stand on her own.

Frost’s hand landed on her shoulder, a brief, solid weight. “He’s fighting,” was all he said.

Xan just stared, his face ashen, looking like he’d seen the gates of hell swing open and shut.

Dr. Evans ran a hand through his hair, looking at the now–stable–but–still–critical numbers. “Well,” he said, his voice shaky with his own adrenaline crash. “That was… harrowing.”

Elera gently disentangled herself from Clara. She went to the sink and splashed cold water on her face. She looked at her reflection in the small metal mirror above it. A stranger with hollow eyes, smudged with exhaustion and fear, stared back. She dried her hands and walked back to the bed.

She placed her fingers on the side of Drakonius’s neck, feeling the frail, rapid flutter of his pulse. A pulse she had literally forced back into existence.

She looked at the cellular activity monitor. It was still flat.

The graft had failed. The cure, in this final, crucial hour, had been rejected. His body had chosen death over the fix.

But his heart was beating. For now.

She turned to the others. Her voice, when it came, was hollow, stripped of everything–hope, fear, even grief. It was just a fact, stated plainly.

“The procedure failed. The graft is dead. The cytokine storm is back, and it’s worse because his system is weakened from the trauma and the suppression drugs.” She looked at Drakonius’s peaceful, sleeping face. “His body can’t fight it off this time. Not without the graft taking over.”

Clara’s hands flew to her mouth. “But… but you brought him back. His heart is beating.”

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