They Chose Their Adopted Daughter, So the Real Heiress Walked Out novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Awakening
Talia wakes to her brothers arguing over who the hospital saved, walks out on all of them in front of the nurses, and learns her cards are frozen.
I woke up to my brother Clark lecturing my other brother in the hallway, with my door open and two nurses listening.
"You went too far today."
His voice was low and calm, the way it always was.
"A stranger gave blood to keep her alive. A stranger. Do you understand how that looks?"
"There was one unit left," my other brother said. "Our sister was crashing."
"Talia was crashing too," Clark said.
I lay still and counted what hurt.
Left ribs. Right wrist. A stitched cut over my eyebrow.
The old man who raised me taught me to do that before I ever tried to stand up.
Nobody had told me I was awake yet, so nobody was being careful.
"I'm not saying you chose wrong," Clark said. "Mom and Dad would have chosen Chloe too. I'm saying you don't do it where Talia can find out."
"She was unconscious."
"She won't stay unconscious. And when she hears, she'll make it ugly."
One of the nurses shifted her feet.
"Here's what we do," Clark went on. "I'll talk to Talia. A quiet dinner, a few days to cool off. She always comes around."
I turned my head on the pillow.
A man was sitting in the chair by the window. He wore a navy paramedic's jacket, and a square of tape held a cotton ball in the crook of his elbow.
He had been looking at me for a while.
"Hey," he said, very quietly. "You're okay. Your brothers have been out there for an hour."
"Who are you?"
"Caleb Devlin. I was upstairs visiting my grandfather's old friend when they paged for B-negative donors."
He nodded at the tape on his arm.
"Yours was the only chart that matched."
"They had one unit left?" I asked.
"That's what the nurse told me. One unit, and two girls."
He didn't look away when he said it.
"Which one got it?"
"The other one."
I sat up. Pain went through my ribs, and I waited until it passed.
Then I pulled the tape off my hand, took the IV pole by its handle and walked to the door in a hospital gown.
Eli saw me first.
He is twenty-four and six feet tall, and he took a step back from me.
"Talia. You shouldn't be up."
"Did you pick her?"
"I picked the one who was dying."
"I was dying too."
The hallway had gone quiet. A man with a mop stopped mopping. Both nurses stood where they were and pretended to read a chart.
Clark stepped between us with his hand out.
"Talia. Sit down. We'll talk about this at home, in private."
"You said I always come around."
His hand stayed where it was.
"You heard that."
"I heard all of it."
I looked at Eli.
"Say it to my face. Say you'd pick her again."
Eli opened his mouth, and Clark touched his sleeve.
Eli closed it.
That was my answer.
A gurney rolled up behind them with a nurse at the head of it. Chloe lay on it with a collar on her neck and a bandage across her forehead.
She turned her face toward me and her eyes filled.
"Talia, I'm so sorry. I didn't know they'd decide it like that."
The nurse brushed Chloe's hair back from her cheek to tuck it under the collar. Behind Chloe's left ear was a little crescent-shaped mark, like the one behind mine.
I didn't think anything of it. A lot of people have birthmarks.
"Please don't be angry at Eli," Chloe said. "He was scared. You're shivering, take my cardigan."
She held it out to me in her good hand.
I wanted to take it, because I was cold.
I didn't.
I turned to the nurse at my door.
"I need a release form. I'm signing myself out."
"Honey, you have three cracked ribs. The doctor wants you overnight."
"Then the doctor can tell me what to watch for, and I'll watch for it somewhere else."
"Talia," Clark said softly. "Don't do something you'll regret."
"I regret the three years I spent trying to be what you wanted."
I said it plainly, at a normal volume, in front of everyone in that hallway.
Then I went back in, put on yesterday's torn jeans and signed the paper with my left hand because my right wrist was wrapped.
Caleb was holding the door.
"I can drive you wherever you're going," he said.
"I don't know where I'm going."
"That's all right. The truck's warm."
I took his offer, and I did not look back at Eli.
In the parking garage I pulled out my phone, and found two texts waiting.
The first was from Clark, sent while I was still signing the form.
Dad froze your cards. Come home Sunday, apologize to Chloe in front of the family, and I'll fix the rest.
The second was from my bank.
Your available balance is $41.00.
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