John smiled. “Well, you were unconscious. Would’ve seemed like a lot longer if you were awake.”
Nick’s eyes had been drifting shut, but the doctor spoke in a firm voice. “Mr. Aster? Are you in any pain?”
“Little. Wanna sleep.” His eyes were closed.
The nurse injected something into the IV line. “How are you feeling?”
“Sick. Sleepy.”
“Are you nauseated?” asked the doctor.
“Yeah. Lemme sleep.”
“We will,” the nurse assured him, administering something else.
Nick tried to shift position, but was too drugged to do much beyond turn his head. John realized Nick was trying to move closer to him. He reached out to touch the cheek being presented him, and Nick closed his eyes. A few moments later, he was asleep with the side of his bruised face pressed firmly into John’s palm.
Next time Nick’s eyelids fluttered, the doctor urged him awake again.
“Any pain?”
“No. Thanks.”
“Nausea?”
“No.”
“I need to do a quick check,” said the doctor. “What is your name?”
“I am Rochragnoroff, God of fine wine and bad toilet paper,” said Nick with a perfect deadpan expression and voice. He looked sleepy, annoyed, and bored.
“What day of the week is it?”
“It is the day of the final dawning of potassium chloride and that day upon which the glory of industrial space heaters shall be mine.”
“Who is the president of the United States?”
“Rochragnoroff, God of astrophysics and Twinkies.”
“Um - sir, are you messing with us?” asked the doctor.
“Plunger.”
“It’s a software glitch,” said John. “Happens every so often.” He tapped the side of Nick’s skull. “I’ll grab the Nick-resetting hammer.”
Nick glared at John. “Nick Aster, Monday, Donald Trump, plunger.” His eyes drifted shut again.
“I think Rochragnoroff is sleepy,” said John. “Gods of minor consumer goods get that way.”
The doctor ventured a barely-amused smile. “Patients get loopy coming out of anesthesia. Some of the drugs can have a disinhibiting effect.”
“Why can’t I move?” asked Nick.
“You can,” the doctor assured him. “Wiggle your hands and toes. You’re just weak from the drugs still in your system, and blood loss.”
Nick did. And reached for John, tugging him by the sleeve in a weak grip. John scooted closer to the bed, and put his free hand on Nick’s upper arm.
“I got you,” John assured him. “Not goin’ anywhere.”
Nick didn’t respond. He was sound asleep, or unconscious. John glanced at the nurse in concern. His only barometer for this was seeing Nick drugged after an undercover op led to an “interesting” incident in a bar.
Uninhibited, sweet, trusting drugged Nick wasn’t completely new to him, and wanting physical contact to ground and reassure him after what he’d been through wasn’t out of character. But was he supposed to be out like this so soon after waking up? Shouldn’t he be goofy, slurring his words and trying to sing show tunes?
“It’s fine,” the nurse assured him. She double-checked all of Nick’s vitals. “Agent Aster’s on quite a bit of pain medication and the anesthetic hasn’t completely cleared his system. He’ll be in and out for a little bit, and it’s normal for him to be a bit confused. After a traumatic attack like this, he’ll probably find it very reassuring to wake up being touched by someone he trusts.”
A number of times, Nick woke up, opened his eyes with worry on his face, and then instantly relaxed when he saw John. He would press his face even more firmly against John’s hand and then go to sleep. It was as if he kept waking up to see if he was safe.
The nurse left, and John sat with Nick, who with great caution began to wake up. When his eyes were open, they looked anxious.
“It’s okay,” said John. “It’s over.”
Nick’s expression darkened. “Why, when something awful happens, people always say it’s okay? It it were over, I’d be on my balcony with coffee and a paper and it wouldn’t hurt to breathe.”
John touched Nick on the arm, and Nick’s expression softened. “We’re projecting what we wish were true.”
“How was I stabbed?” asked Nick. “That’s the sorta thing a guy tends to notice.”
John grimaced. “Remember that big skinhead guy punching you?”
Nick nodded.
“He was actually stabbing you.”
Nick raised his eyebrows in surprise. “It did hurt an awful lot.”
This was too much the Nick Aster he’d picked up from prison years ago. Stress aging his face and making it look hard-edged and sunken, anxiety in his close-drawn eyebrows, and a tense, trapped look in his eyes. An alien toughness on a face born to be elegant and playful.
John thought about Nick, pacing with his face wrinkled up in distaste at a murder scene. It was genuine. Nick hated seeing violence. He himself was physically brave. But the empathy he showed for the victims of violent crime spoke of an intimate knowledge of the damage it did.
This was fearless, brilliant, daring criminal Aster who not only survived five years in prison but mastered it. Who never flinched at the danger of FBI work. It was also the Nick who showed genuine distress when faced with a murder victim, and befriended the man who caught him, and who whined about bad wine and looked like a fashion model.
So. Aster could handle this, survive it and bounce back from it. Nick was also suffering, and sad and hurt.
“Let me see you through this, ‘k?” asked John.
Nick frowned.
“I know you felt what was just done to you,” said John. “Not just the pain. Don’t lock me out, let me be with you.”
“Nothing you can do,” said Nick.
“You ever had someone to lean on when you’re hurt?”
The sad, lost look in Nick’s eyes answered plainly, though his expression didn’t waver. John stroked Nick’s wavy dark hair, pushing a stray bit that was tickling his eye. Nick’s face relaxed.
“You don’t like violence.”
Nick shook his head.
“You know what it does to people, that it’s not just about physical pain.”
“Yeah.”
“This was a violent crime. We both know how hard it hits. Let me be there.”
Nick reached for John’s hand and squeezed it.
“John?”
“Yeah?”
“If I go back to prison - please, still talk to me. I don’t think I could handle if you weren’t my friend any more. Please don’t - abandon me if they put me in a cage.”
Never had he seen such a heartbroken, pleading expression on Nick’s face. In his heart, he would care about Nick wherever he was. As Nick’s handler, he’d always wanted to keep Nick afraid that he would lose John’s friendship if he crossed the line. But that was clearly a pain too deep to inflict.
“I won’t abandon you, I promise.”
Tears stung Nick’s eyes. “I love you, John. I don’t think you know that.”
John took one of Nick’s hands in his and tucked it under his chin, closing his own eyes to hide the emotion in them. “Of course I know.”
“This reminds me of being locked away - with no one to see how much that hurt. Prison - wasn’t all that bad. But it does hurt, being exiled and told - that you deserve to be punished for years on end with no way to say you’re sorry.”
John stroked the side of his arm. “I saw your pain, going into that. I felt for you, thought about you a lot in there.”
“Yeah?” Nick gave him a faint, wistful smile. “That’s oddly comforting.”
I love you, John? I don’t think you know that?
John frowned. Why would Nick say that? They’d adored each other for most of the three years since Nick had been put on work release as John’s criminal consultant.
Unless....
No.
Could Nick be professing romantic love, in drug-induced honesty? Nick was bisexual.... technically. He flirted nonstop with women, fell in love with women.... Men were an afterthought, and only if pretty and shiny. Above all else, Nick was a sucker for all things that sparkled; especially diamonds.
John was not shiny. His wife thought he was dashing, but she didn’t have a lot of company. He was a law school burnout turned FBI agent and his only designer suit was the one Nick had given him for his birthday.
Nah. Nick was probably just feeling insecure.
He leaned forward and hugged Nick. “You are loved more than you know. There’s a whole crowd out there in the waiting room worried sick about you.”
Nick gulped. "There's also someone willing to pay thousands of dollars for my brutal murder. It's what you call a trade-off."
CHAPTER NINE
Cortext
JOHN
Another nurse entered. “Agent Aster? It’s time for your MRI, and after that the neurologist will meet with you.”
Worry twisted John’s stomach again. Those both sounded serious. “You’re checking him for....”
“Traumatic brain injury from the beating. The neurologist will also be assessing nerve damage from handcuff injuries.”
Nick and John exchanged glances. “They said before I went into surgery that I’d need to do this,” said Nick.
“Don’t worry too much,” the nurse assured them both. “Agent Aster’s CT scan looks good, there were only minor indicators that we need to follow up on with an MRI.”
“Give us a sec?” asked John. The nurse departed, and John turned back to Nick. He was still groggy, and looked anxious.
“I’m trusting you to go through all this without your anklet,” said John.
Nick looked confused, and then startled. “I’d never repay this by running.” The look in his eyes was more and more distressed by the second. “Never. I’m not gonna run, John - I’m not. Please-”
John held up his palm to stem the flow of words. With mention of the anklet, he’d gone from friend to agent of law enforcement. Nick had just been given reason to view being in custody with pure terror. “I trust you. Right now, I trust you. You are safe, and I believe you.”
Nick blinked over and over again, fighting through trauma and powerful narcotics to process John’s words. “Not - gonna cuff me to the bed?”
John shook his head. “You’re Agent Aster, remember?” That coaxed a tiny smile from Nick. “And why would you be afraid of that anyway? You’re an escape artist. You’d be loose in, like, thirty seconds.”
Nick looked sheepish. “Sorry. That wasn’t the most rational reaction I’ve ever had.”
John squeezed Nick’s hand. “Nobody expects rational right now. I’ll be waiting for ya', and not as the guy who puts you in anklets and yells at you. As your friend.”
"I'd rather have an anklet and a good yelling at than an MRI," said Nick.
John gave him an evil grin. "Plenty of time for both."
Nick swatted him.
JOHN
“Sir? I’m Dr. Lana Patton. I’m a neurologist, and Nick Aster has requested that you be present when I meet with him.”
John stood and sucked in a deep breath. As nervous as he was about this, he couldn’t imagine how Aster felt. The doctor led him down a series of tan hallways whose bleak institutional layout and antiseptic odor started reminding him of a prison. They boarded an elevator, and finally John got up the nerve to ask.
“He okay?”
Dr. Patton looked at John evenly. “He’s a criminal, isn’t he?” She didn’t use the word criminal with disdain.
“He’s my partner,” said John.
Patton sighed. “I get why you’re protecting him, and I admire it. And he’s a lovable guy. But I need you to answer my question, here, in private. He’s a criminal?”
John decided to trust her. Nick was going to like this woman, with her crisp, intelligent blue eyes, straight black hair, and kind face. She carried her head high and looked at John with absolute confidence.
“He's got a white collar felony conviction,” said John. “He’s serving part of his sentence as a consultant for the FBI. He’s my best friend, my co-worker. He’s a wonderful and valuable human being who just went through a horrific assault.”
“Has he ever been diagnosed as a psychopath?”
“What?” John’s blood pressure spiked in rage. “He’s not a psychopath!”
“I just asked if he’s ever been diagnosed. Even wrongly,” said Dr. Patton, taking a step back and positioning her tablet between them like a shield.
John drew in a deep breath. “A BAU agent told me he was. After he was convicted, they gave him the PLC-R evaluation. He was labeled a psychopath, and sent to a maximum-security prison for white collar crimes partly because of that wrongful diagnosis.”
“Think about the typical profile of a psychopath, and describe your friend,” she said gently.
“I know he fits most of the criteria. But Nick - is absolutely lacking in cruelty or violence, explosive or otherwise. He doesn’t have or understand many social attachments, but he has fallen in love very deeply, and he’s shown me love, loyalty, and trust. The capacity's there, he’s just never been in an environment that encouraged it.”
Dr. Patton nodded thoughtfully and put a hand on his arm to steer him down the hall and into a private room. It, too, reminded John of a prison cell. Sterile, stark, with a TV bolted to the ceiling and a high window that barely let in natural light.
“Hello again, Nick,” said Dr. Patton when they entered. Nick was still hooked up to monitors and an IV, but he was looking more - alive.
“Hi,” said Nick. It was John that Nick’s gaze sought out. He looked terribly anxious. John sat on a chair beside his bed and rested a hand against Nick’s upper arm.
“I got your back,” John assured him.
Dr. Patton put several brain scans up on a monitor mounted near Nick’s bed. “Nick. I understand you’ve been mistakenly evaluated as a psychopath in the past.”
“I have, and I’m not,” said Nick.
Dr. Patton nodded. “Are you aware of the basic traits of a psychopath?”
Nick nodded. “Fearlessness, extreme charm -”
John broke in. “Pathological lying -”
“Easily bored,” countered Nick.
“Grandiose sense of self-worth,” said John.
“Criminal versatility was always one of my favorites,” said Nick.
“Poor impulse control -”
Nick gave him a mock glare. “High social confidence....”
“I see your high social confidence and raise you reckless excitement seeking and disregard for others,” said John.
“Flaunting of authority,” said Nick with a proud smirk.
“Eating the brains of your enemies?” suggested John.
Dr. Patton was chuckling. “Okay, boys. You’ve got the idea. Mr. Aster here has a few indicators of psychopathy.”
“Minus the cruelty and explosive violence,” said Nick. He gulped and turned his head to John, giving him a pleading look. “Only when you’re supposedly a pathological liar, nobody believes that bit.”
“I do,” said John, squeezing his hand. Nick squeezed back. It appeared they were both nervous about what this might all be leading up to.
Nick took a breath and looked at Dr. Patton directly. “I know how closely I fit the profile, but I dislike violence and I hate cruelty even more. I do care about other people. And by the way, I didn’t wet the bed, start fires, or torture animals.”
“PLC-R?” asked Dr. Patton.
Nick nodded.
“No actual medical diagnostics?”
“No, just being flung into a cage with murderers without warning, which is a really bad set of circumstances under which to prove you aren’t insane,” said Nick dryly.
“I need to interject here,” said John. “Nick is kind. He loves deeply if infrequently, and s
acrifices for people in his life. Psychopaths lack empathy, Nick has it in spades. Even for the FBI agent who caught him, even for his prison guards.”
Dr. Patton smiled. “I love having smart patients. Are both of you aware of the role prefrontal cortex damage plays in psychopathy and impulse control problems?”
Broken Blue Lines: Love. Hate. Criminal Justice.: An FBI Crime Drama / LGBT+ Love Story Page 7
