Without speaking again, I slipped on my boots, and picked up my evac-grab bag, with my finger one button away from dialing the emergency contact number on my cell.
I looked through the peephole in my door but couldn’t see anyone; I listened carefully but couldn’t hear anything. I was well aware that someone could easily be waiting for me out of my sightline.
I took a deep breath and yanked the door open: the corridor was empty. Which meant the phone call could very well be genuine and not a ruse. I hurried down the stairs, avoiding the elevator, and made my way to the reception area.
A young man in a heavily embroidered vest over a loose, white shirt was sitting at the desk, half asleep. As I approached, he jerked awake.
“Venzi?”
“Ao,” I replied. Yes.
“Phone call,” he said, pointing at the telephone on his desk.
I picked it up tentatively.
“As-salaamu’ alaykum. This is Lee Venzi.”
“Caroline. At last! It’s David.”
“David?” What the hell was my ex-husband doing calling me in the middle of the night? Was he drunk?
“What’s the matter? How did you find me, David? Are you alright?”
“Caroline, listen, I don’t have much time. I’m at the field hospital at Camp Bastion. It’s Hunter.”
“Sebastian?”
Oh no, please God, no.
“I’m sorry, Caroline: he was brought in five hours ago. I’ve been trying to find you.”
I felt sick and cold, and my knees gave way. I slumped into a chair, clattering the legs against the front desk and making the young man jump.
“What’s happened? David, please tell me!”
His voice crackled at the end of the line.
“They’re still trying to establish the facts, but off the record, it was another green-on-blue attack: sniper and a suicide bomber, they think. Caroline, you can’t report any of this.”
“I don’t care about that, damn it! How’s Sebastian? Is he… is he hurt? Badly? How badly?”
He hesitated long enough for my world to end.
“Yes, it’s pretty bad.” He paused briefly, then snapped into doctor mode. “He has a gunshot injury that has induced a pneumothorax – a collapsed lung. We’re not too worried about that as the exit wound is clear and the bullet passed through cleanly, although there may be some nerve damage to his left arm resulting in limited fine motor skills…”
All the breath left my body.
“But he has a Category A…” he paused again, before continuing slowly. “He has a severe injury to his right thigh with multiple debrided shrapnel wounds. They’re taking him into surgery now – they’ll decide then if the leg is viable. If not, it will be a trans-femoral amputation…” he paused again, “an above-the-knee amputation.”
There was a long silence and all the light in my world poured into a deep, dark hole.
“I’m sorry, Caroline… I thought you’d want to know.”
I held my hand over my mouth, as if I could press back the fear that was threatening to choke me.
“Can I see him?”
He sighed. “At the moment the answer is no. You’re not… Look, I’ll try and get you access, Caroline, but you’d have to get yourself here and I don’t know how easy that will be. I’ll see what I can find out… but it’s a long shot. I can’t promise anything.”
“I see.”
Breathe. Breathe.
“Thank you, David. Will you let me know… if the situation changes.”
“Yes, of course. I…”
Whatever he wanted to say died as he tried to speak, and the words remained unspoken.
“I’ll be in touch,” he said, quietly. “Goodbye, Caroline.”
The phone line went dead and I stared at the receiver.
Oh, God, no.
No. NO! They were not going to stop me seeing Sebastian. I didn’t care if I’d have to fight the whole damn US Army. My love needed me, and no force of hell on earth could stop me being with him.