Wounded Hearts

Prologue

Tears flowed freely from Ronan's grey eyes, soaking his wife's dark hair as he clung to her body, desperately begging her to come back to him. He smoothed her hair from her face which was a mess of cuts and bruises. He begged her to open her eyes…. He was desperate to see the sparkle that had always shone in their brown depths but the heart monitor beside him was telling him that he would never again see it.

"Come on, Ronan, she's gone." his father-in-law said his own heart breaking as he grabbed Ronan's arm and tried to pull him away from his daughter. Five long days Ronan had been at her bedside begging her to come back and clinging to hope that Amelia would wake up. Bruce had known his daughter would not wake. Her body had been too damaged from the car accident and Bruce was convinced that only her sheer strong-willed stubbornness had kept her heart beating as long as it had.

Ronan shoved his father-in-law away from him and climbed into the bed pulling Amelia's broken body into his arms. Bruce felt tears running down his own wrinkled cheeks. He knew the pain that Ronan was feeling because Bruce had felt it when the cancer had taken his own wife four years before. Now Bruce's old heart was breaking anew as he looked at his son-in-law clinging to his daughters body.

"Wake up, Amelia, honey." Ronan said desperately. "Penelope needs her mommy to come home. She needs you, baby. I need you." As Ronan rocked her in his arms the room filled up with nurses to unhook the various machines and tell Ronan there were forms that needed to be signed. Ronan ignored them and laid down in the bed with Amelia's body in his arms. He wished he could just die with her… Just lay here and never have to live another second without her beautiful smile.

"Ronan, come on son we have to go." Bruce said his voice breaking through Ronan's pain filled thoughts. "Penelope needs her daddy with her right now." Only the thought of his beautiful daughter needing him made him pull his body out of that bed and away from Amelia. Ronan signed the forms the doctors put in front of him without knowing what they said. His body was on autopilot while his mind was still trying to wrap around how he was going to carry on with his life without Amelia… How he was going to tell his beautiful three year old daughter that her mommy was not coming home?

Ronan let Bruce drive him back to Bruce's home where Amelia's older sister was watching Penelope. Ronan fell to his knees as Penelope ran from the house, her dark pigtails swinging and her chubby legs pumping as fast as they could. She laughed happily and jumped into his arms. He breathed in the scent of her. She smelled like chocolate chip cookies. She was already talking about how much fun she'd had with her aunt Abigail and Ronan sent up a silent prayer of thanks to God that he still had this beautiful baby girl. With her he would make it through this. Or at least he hoped he would.

He would dedicate the rest of his life to his daughter. He would live it only to protect and provide for her. He vowed there would never be another woman in his life. Amelia had been his one and only.