There was a pause, a moment really, in which the knife wielding attacker ceased his repetitious burying of the blade into her face, neck and body. Amidst the shock of the surprise attack, and the single -purpose -focus of a motherly drive, protecting her unborn baby, she became aware of a distance between them.
Wiping the blood from her face, she noticed he had stepped a few feet away, and for a moment, it seemed like it was over.Through the blur of blood tinted vision, their eyes met. Eerily silent, his gaze toward her conveyed the gut wrenching message, “You’re not dead yet?”
Jessica’s merciless attacker returned and began to stab her many more times. An action that wouldn’t stop until the attacker was shot and killed by the responding police officers. The actual number of stab wounds unknown until officially charted in her emergency room record.
One would think my 20 years of researching the subject, and interviewing survivors of violent on the job assaults in healthcare, would have prepared me for what came next…