Her Darkest Secrets

Chapter 5

Annie POV

I'm finally out of that living h.ell. Melissa kept her promise, she made sure to take me out of there with her. Watching her try to hold it together before she finally gave in while we were in the car on our way to the hospital made me start to cry as well. I haven't met anyone that would have helped me the way she did, and I have a feeling she was trying to be strong in front of me. But I don't need her to do that, I'll never be able to repay her for what she's done and even though she wasn't there as long as I was, or some of the other girls, she went through h.ell too. We're just getting to the hospital when she passes out and her husband rushes to carry her inside. Brandon helps me out and I go to follow them.

"Oh no," Brandon says taking my hand and gently pulling me towards another area of the hospital.

"Why not? I just, I want to make sure she's okay."

"And we will, but you need to get checked out too. You can barely stand without support, and if you think I didn't see the marks on your arms, you're crazy. Come on, let's find someone that can help." I just nod and follow him, because he's right, I should get checked out, and not just for the marks you can see.

"We need some help over here," Brandon says to one of the nurses. She looks from him to me, and back in his direction again.

"I'm sorry but you're going to have to go back into the waiting area and check in."

"No, I don't think so," Brandon says, pulling me closer to him. "The woman that was just brought in with her husband and taken back, was rescued from a trafficking ring today. So was she," he pulls me up closer to him. "We left ahead of everyone else, but the police and some folks from a women's shelter will be here any minute now with dozens of other women and I don't think any of them are going to be able to wait in a crowded emergency room surrounded by strange men. If you can accommodate us, as well as the others that will be arriving soon, that would be best."

"C.rap," the nurse says blowing her hair out of her face and giving me a look filled with sympathy. "We got a call to be on alert about the influx of women being brought in. Come with me, we've cleared out a waiting area and some rooms for you. I'll get you checked in and then we can go ahead and get you in a room. We've set aside as many rooms as we can but you'll still probably have someone else come in your room once the others get here." She turns and starts to walk away but must realize I'm not following her because she stops and looks back at me then Brandon.

"Will you come with me?" I ask him in a small voice. I hate how weak I sound, but I feel safe with him. I don't know what will happen if I end up in a room with a male doctor, or an orderly, or something. I've even come to distrust women over the past couple weeks. I know that some of them recruit for the trafficking ring, some of them act like your mom to get you to do what the men want, and some of them will sacrifice you in any way to save their own skin.

"I'm not sure that's a good idea," the nurse says. "We've been informed of what happened and we had an influx of female doctors and nurses volunteer to come in. There won't be any male doctors attending to you, or any of the other women. But the others might feel unsafe seeing a rather large man with you."

"Well they'd be wrong. It's really great that you were able to find all these women, but after everything I've been through the last few weeks, I've seen that women can be just as bad as men when it comes to trafficking. Brandon makes me feel safe. He was one of the men that helped rescue everyone in that house. He's the only other person I know I can trust right now and I don't think I can go back there alone," I'm almost yelling at this point but I couldn't get the words out. It didn't feel like they were coming out of me and now that they have I can't breathe. Why is it getting so hot in here? Why can't I breathe? Am I dying? I think I might be having a heart attack.

"Look at me," a voice says as strong arms grip my shoulders and stand me up straight. "Look at me," the voice says again. I look up and into his eyes. I know his eyes, "good job, now breathe with me. In through your nose, out through your mouth." It takes me a minute but I finally start to do what he says and the haze in my vision starts to go away. My heartbeat starts to calm down, maybe I'm not dying. "That's it, good job, just keep breathing with me." We stay like that, breathing, for a few more minutes before I finally feel like myself again.

"If you're feeling better, why don't you come with me and we can get you situated." The nurse says, she says it kindly but I feel like she's trying to rush me and I don't like it.

"She's not going anywhere without me. I won't let her have another panic attack for no reason. If you don't want me around the other women, that's fine, and I get that. Put us in a private room then, but she needs medical attention and she's not going alone."

"O-okay, fine, I'll see what I can do." The nurse finally stutters out, I feel bad now, she's just doing her job. But I can't face this alone, and even though I just met Brandon I can't stomach the thought of him being out of my sight. We follow her to a room that looks pretty private, there's only one bed and no divider curtains. "I'm just going to get your vitals and get some information into your chart before the doctor comes in, is that okay?"

"That's fine," I sit there as she takes my blood pressure, temperature, oxygen, and a few other things. By the time she's getting all the equipment put away an older, stern looking woman in a white coat walks in.

"Hello," she says softly, which is at total odds with the way I expected her to sound. "I'm Doctor Hanna, but you can call me Betty if you'd like. I'd like to go over your medical history if that's okay and then talk a little bit about what you've been through. I know that may be rough, but it's necessary to make sure we run the right kinds of tests and get you the right kinds of medicines. By the time we finish your health history one of our hospital psychiatrists will be down as we go over what you've been through. If, at any point, you start to feel uncomfortable, or need a break, you just let me know. You're in charge okay?"

"Okay, that, that sounds good," I tell her, and she gives me a kind smile. Then she looks at Brandon and her eyes narrow.

"My nurse has informed me that you have refused to leave her side, if you try to interfere in her treatments or our discussions I will have you thrown out. And if I feel like you are a threat to her at any point, instead of the savior you claim to be, I will have you removed by security and taken directly to the police." The tone she's using now is definitely more of what I thought I'd hear from her. But Brandon is only doing what I asked. I'm about to tell her that, but he beats me to it.

"I respect that you want the best for your patient, I can assure you I would not be here if she didn't want me here. I would never interfere with anything that would help her get the best help possible."

"I-it's true. I asked him to be here, he rescued me and I just, I couldn't face the thought of being back here all alone."

"Okay then, we're on the same page. Now let's get started." We go go over my medical history which isn't much. I've had a few colds and things like that growing up but nothing serious, I've never broken any bones, I'm virtually the picture of health. But I know this is the easy part, after we finish going over my medical history she calls the psychiatrist down and I know I'm going to need all my strength to get through this next part.