by Hamel, B. B.
“Right, since you’re a doctor, killing would be easy for you.”
“Maybe not. There are other options though.” He turned toward the bedrooms and walked into the hallway. “For now, let’s call it a night. I doubt they’ll try anything again tonight.”
“This is going to be a nightly thing?”
He shook his head. “Probably not, but we’d better be prepared.”
I sighed and followed him. He lingered outside of his bedroom door and looked back at me. For a second, I thought he might invite me in with him, invite me into his bed, and I knew I’d say yes. I’d sleep with him, touch him, curl up against him and feel his warmth in the middle of the night—or I’d let him keep me up late, teasing me, using me, whatever he wanted.
Instead, he gave me a tight smile, then stepped into his bedroom and shut the door behind him.
I let out a frustrated, almost disappointed sigh, then went into my own room, curled up under the blankets alone, and tried to not to think about Gavin’s tongue between my legs—or the knife between his ribs.
15
Gavin
The next few days were tense. I kept thinking about Erica’s taste on my tongue, the way she moaned my name as she came, her gorgeous body, her full pink lips—but the problem of what to do about Cosimo and her mother kept plaguing me.
I knew this wouldn’t be easy. I hadn’t walked into this situation thinking I could make it all right in one easy moment, but I was still frustrated with myself for being unable to fix things without resorting to violence. The days slipped past quietly, but I remained on edge—ready in case of anything.
Most days, Erica came with me to the hospital and sat with her mom. She read books and played around on a laptop I bought for her. I knew she was frustrated and bored and felt helpless, but I was swamped with patients and couldn’t take enough time off to be with her.
I tried my best. We ate lunch and dinner together. I asked her about growing up, about her life with her mom, about her father, about what movies and TV shows she liked, all that stuff. We found we had more in common than we expected. I lost my parents young and essentially raised my sister for a while, which made my life difficult—and she had a tough upbringing with her unstable father. We liked the same shows, the same movies, and even liked the same music, although we were nostalgic for different stuff.
I felt our bond grow stronger over those days, and it was almost surreal, almost strange. That night when I got her off drifted between us like an unspoken secret, but we didn’t so much as kiss after that, and she seemed to want to keep her distance. I wasn’t going to force anything on her that she didn’t want, and yet I couldn’t help catching glimpses of her during our days together, glimpses of her walking through my apartment in a skimpy outfit, lounging on the couch, leaving her bedroom door open as she got changed. I thought maybe she wanted me to look— but didn’t ask her about it.
One afternoon, the problem of what to do with her mother drove me particularly crazy. I found myself in the neurology wing after dealing with a patient, and drifted over toward the offices. I knocked on the door of Dr. Dean Coarse, another young doctor that started around the same time as me.
“Come in,” he called.
I poked my head inside. He looked buried under paperwork but gave me a tight nod and a smile then gestured at a chair.
“Hey, Dean,” I said. “You busy?”
“Not too busy. Take a seat.”
I walked in and sat, stretching my legs. Dean was around my age, maybe a couple years older, with salt-and-pepper hair cut short, a trim beard, and light blue eyes. He looked tired and overworked, and I knew he pretty much single-handedly ran the Neurology Department. He was considered some kind of prodigy, and if I was the golden boy destined for leadership roles, then he was the tortured genius content to rule over his tiny little domain.
“I’ve got a patient I could use a consult on.”
He nodded, finished whatever he was writing, and leaned back in his creaky old chair. “What’s up?”
“You know about that accident patient that came in about a week ago, older woman, in a coma?”
He shrugged. “I heard there was someone like her.”
“She suffered some serious trauma.” I reached into my jacket and took out a copy of her chart and handed it over. He frowned as he paged through it. “I can’t figure out why she’s still under. We have her intubated and on machines at the moment, and she’s stable as far as I can tell.”
“Interesting,” he murmured. “I see some bleeding on the brain stem. Might’ve been a massive stroke.”
I leaned forward. “Show me.”
He pointed out a very slight shadow and I shook my head. “That could be nothing.”
“Or it could be something. She’s in a coma, after all.”
I grunted and sat back. “All right, so what do you think?”
“If you’re asking me if she’ll wake up, you know my answer.”
“Fifty-fifty at best?”
“Pretty much.” He shrugged and made an apologetic gesture. “What can I say, it’s just how these things go.”
“What about moving her?”
He tilted his head. “Risky proposition. Is Maria kicking her out?”
“No, but she tried.”
“Ah, what’d you do, threaten to walk?”
I laughed. “God, the rumors in his place are crazy.”
He grinned at me. “I know you married the daughter too, in case you were wondering.”
“Yeah, well.” I let out a sigh. “Things don’t always turn out how you think, right?”
“Sure.” He pushed the chart back over to me. “If you want my professional opinion, I’d say you shouldn’t move her. It’s a risk either way.”
“How big of a risk?”
“It all depends on whether or not she’ll breathe on her own once you remove the intubation. If she can breathe, chances are good. If not—” He shook his head and didn’t need to elaborate.
“All right,” I said softly. It wasn’t what I wanted to hear, and what I already knew more or less, but it was good to get a second opinion. I stood up and stretched then nodded to him. “Look, I appreciate the advice, and I’d appreciate some discretion.”
“We never spoke.” He smirked at me. “I’ve gotta ask though. Why’d you get married?”
“Being a bachelor’s not all it’s cracked up to be.”
“Suits me okay.”
“For now.” I walked to his office door. “See you later.”
“See you.”
I left and strode down the hall, mind working. If we could remove her breathing tube and she could breathe on her own, then moving her would be a lot easier. If we could move her, we could leave the city, and maybe we’d have a chance.
I sighed and stopped in the alcove near the elevators. A small bench was set into a recess in front of the window, and I sat down and stretched my legs out. Sunlight came in at an angle and it felt warm on my neck as I thought about Erica again, about the way her muscles shook and she groaned. I licked my lips and wondered exactly how many people in the hospital knew about my situation.
Probably everyone. And probably only Fiona knew the whole truth.
Goddamn it. I needed to think smarter if I was going to get out of this. Cosimo didn’t seem interested in negotiating, but I needed him to come to the table if I wanted a chance to buy him off. I didn’t know how to get in touch with a mobster, short of driving around the city yelling out his name until someone came and tried to kill me. Or maybe I could just wait for them to come to me—but they’d probably come armed, and again, try to kill me.
But then I remembered a patient I’d treated a year back. His name was Antoine Benoit, a small-time thief. He came into my ER with a stab wound, a pretty bad one, and I cleaned him up and saved his life—and didn’t rat him out to the cops when they came around asking about him. I figured he still owed me one, and really he was the only person I had any connection to th
at might be able to put me in touch with Cosimo.
I pulled out my phone and found his number in my contacts. I shook my head, smiling to myself, as I remembered him giving it to me. At the time I only added it to be polite, and forgot it was in there entirely afterward, but he insisted that I call if I ever needed the favor repaid.
So I called and let it ring. I didn’t expect anything—until he picked up.
“Who the hell is this?” he barked.
“Is this Antoine?” I asked.
“You’ve got one second to tell me who the fuck you are before—”
“Antoine, this is Dr. Majors. Do you remember me?”
A short pause. “You’re the good doc that stitched me up and didn’t rat me out.”
“That’s right. You gave me your number in case I ever needed a favor.”
He barked a laugh. “Goddamn, doc, I never thought you’d call me.”
“I didn’t either, but you always remember a favor when you’re in my line of work.”
“Yeah, you get a lot of guys like me owing you shit?”
“I get a lot of people owing me a lot of things.” I smiled a little and looked around to make sure I was alone. “Listen, Antoine. I need help.”
“What’s the problem?”
“There’s a man I need to get in touch with, a mafia type guy named Cosimo.”
Antoine grunted. “I don’t know the name, doc.”
“Come on. You’re connected, right? You have to know something.”
“I really don’t, sorry, doc. I’m an independent contractor, you know what I mean? I work for a lot of folks. Sometimes I get mafia jobs, sure, and I do what I’m told— but I don’t meet the bosses.”
“Do you know anyone that could help?”
He was silent for a few seconds. “I know one guy you might be able to talk to.”
“What’s his name?”
“We call him Dr. Chen.”
I hesitated. “Is that for real?”
“He’s a real doctor, as far as I know. He takes on work for the mafia, you know, cleaning up their guys when they don’t wanna go to the hospital. Unfortunately, he costs a fuck-ton of money, or else we never would’ve met.”
“Can you give me his contact information?”
He cleared his throat. “I can dig it up for you. And when I do, after that, me and you are square. You understand? Whatever I send, that’s it.”
“All right, Antoine. Fair enough. Thanks for doing this.”
“Yeah, whatever. I’ll text you what I got.”
I felt a surge of hope. Maybe it was stupid, but if this was a real doctor then it might be someone I know or at least someone I can deal with. Maybe he’ll be able to help us out, or at least put us in contact with Cosimo.
“Before you go, I’m curious,” I said. “How do you have insurance? I keep wondering about that.”
“Fuckin’ Obamacare. Can you believe it?”
I laughed. “I guess I can.”
“Fuckin’ Obamacare. All right, buddy. Good luck.”
He hung up the phone.
I stared down at the floor for a few seconds, trying to process. I had a lead, even though it wasn’t a good one. Antoine would come through for me and send whatever he could—I had to hope he would at any rate. He was a thief, but hell, thieves had to have some honor.
I got up and headed into the elevator, riding it back down to continue my rounds. I thought about Erica, about her sitting in that room with her mother, and decided to try to do something nice for her.
16
Erica
I was staring at Facebook for the hundredth time that day when Gavin came into my mother’s room. He had a bag tucked under his arm. I sat up straight and smiled at him, feeling a strange flutter in my heart.
It’d been like that ever since the night after dinner. Nothing else had happened between us, no more kisses, no more caresses, even though I’d sent him as many obvious signals as I could: walking around in skimpy clothes, leaving the door open while I got changed, even stepped out of the shower right as he came down the hall once. He didn’t take the bait though, and I could tell he was preoccupied at work.
Still, every time he came around, I felt a pulse of excitement. Not because I thought he was going to touch me, although of course I wanted it—but because the more often we were around each other, the more I realized how much I actually liked being with him. He was smart and funny and we liked all the same stuff. He was older than me, but that didn’t seem to matter to either of us. There was a strange level of comfort there, and I wanted to grab onto that, hold tight to it, ride it through the storm of my life.
“You busy?” he asked, smiling back.
“Oh, tons busy. My mom and I were just having a great conversation.”
He laughed a little. It was a morbid joke, but we’d gotten comfortable enough that he knew it was okay.
“How about you come with me for a little bit? I’ve got a surprise for you.”
“Yeah?” I closed my laptop and stood up. “I hope this is a work-appropriate surprise.”
He smirked at me and nodded. “I think it’ll be okay. Come on.”
I followed him out of the room and down the hall. Fiona waved as he passed though she was engrossed in something on her computer. I caught other nurses smiling and waving to Gavin and I had a strange pulse of jealousy, although of course it was absurd to be jealous—we might’ve bene married, but nothing about our arrangement meant he owed me anything. There was still an odd entitlement, or maybe an excitement to the idea that he was a wanted man, someone other women wanted to be around, and I had him, at least for a little while.
“It’s a nice day out,” he said as we took the stairs down to the ground floor. “I thought we might eat outside.”
“What, like a picnic?”
“Exactly like a picnic.” He patted the bundle.
I laughed and skipped down the steps. “I don’t think I’ve ever been on one.”
“What, really?”
“Sure. I’m a city girl, remember?”
“You can have a picnic in the city. All you need is a blanket and food.”
“City girls don’t do blankets and food. Nature is the worst.”
He laughed as we reached the ground floor and walked through the lobby. People were jammed into the waiting chairs and the nursing staff looked overwhelmed but still calm and in charge.
“Fairmount is one of the biggest freaking parks in the area, and you never bothered going?”
“City girl,” I repeated again. “I don’t know how many times you need to hear it.”
“You’re nuts.” We walked out onto the sidewalk and he turned, skirting along the front of the building, then walked up a set of short stairs. A small grassy area with some benches and a fountain was set off to the side, a cute little park in the shadow of Mercy General.
He opened the bag and spread a blanket out on the grass. I sat down, crossed my legs, and looked around. A guy with ratty jeans and a stained sweatshirt leered at me from a bench and a couple stood nearby arguing about something.
“Real nice,” I said.
He rolled his eyes and gave me a little box. It was takeout from the nearby deli, my favorite sandwich, and a small bottle of water. I drank it, dug into the sandwich, and leaned back on my elbow to watch him eat.
He caught me looking. “What?”
“I’m just wondering why you’re going out of your way like this.”
“I know you’re bored. I feel bad.”
“You don’t need to feel bad.”
“It’s not pity, it’s more… there’s not much you can do right now, and I want to do my best to take care of you.”
“Chivalrous and handsome. What a man.”
He laughed. “All right, fine, you don’t have to accept my kindness.”
“The thing is, I know your kindness tends to come with strings.”
He gave me a little look and put his food back. He wiped his hands on th
e blanket then leaned back and met my gaze. “Okay then, maybe I do have an ulterior motive.”
“I knew it.” I nodded at him. “Go ahead, spill it.”
“I’ve been thinking about what to do with your mother.”
I raised an eyebrow. “I thought she was staying here.”
“She can, for a while longer at least, but it won’t be forever. We need to plan for the future.”
I shifted a little, feeling frustrated. Every time I thought things were settled, he managed to pull the rug out from under me and make things difficult. I wanted my mom to stay where she was, right where there were nurses to take care of her. Fiona was so kind and patient, and I kept thinking that if mom stayed in Mercy with Fiona and the rest, then maybe she’d wake up one day, if only she were somewhere comfortable.
“I thought we had planned.” My voice must’ve come out harder than I intended, because his expression closed and he looked away.
“I spoke with a colleague. We agree that if we remove your mother’s breathing tube, and she breathes on her own, then she’ll be fairly stable and we’d be able to move her wherever we wanted.”
“Remove her— you’re being serious?”
He nodded. “It might not work. There are risks.”
“Gavin.”
“As your doctor, I think you should consider it.”
“You’re not her doctor anymore, remember?”
“I know, but—”
“I’m not taking out her breathing tube. I’m not moving her.”
“Erica, please. I know this is hard, but if we take this risk and she can breathe on her own, then there’s a better chance she might wake up.”
I stared at him and tried to let the words wash over me, but I didn’t quite believe him. He never said anything about this before, never mentioned her breathing on her own as something that could help. I got the sense that he was lying to me, or at least exaggerating a claim to get me to do what he wanted—and I resented the hell out of that.
“I want her to wake up,” I said softly, “but I don’t want to take risks with her life.”
