by Emerson Rose
“Lana, shit, calm down. I don’t have cancer, and thanks for letting me know how you really feel about my appearance! I didn’t come here for treatment. I was sick but I’m doing better now, gaining weight and my fever is gone. Marcus is taking good care of me.”
“Why? You left him. I don’t know why because my best friend never thought it was important to tell me, but I know it must have been bad. Actually, you haven’t been including me in your life at all since Mr. Money Bags got his paws on you. I’ve missed you, stupid.”
“Oh, Lana, I’m sorry. I know I’ve been a shitty friend lately. And, yeah, Marcus has monopolized my life completely. He’s a force that I can’t remove myself from.”
Lana is uncharacteristically quiet for a moment.
“I love him, Lana, I don’t think I can live without him. Being separated from him feels like I’m burning alive.”
“Wow, I never thought, I mean I never figured…”
“That I would find someone and love them enough to let them in? Neither did I.”
“So why did you leave him? If you’re so head over heels, what’s the problem?” Now comes the part where I have to decide whether to confide in her or continue to keep her at arm’s length.
I’m going with my gut. I unload the whole story leaving out the part about him nearly strangling me to death. Lana would undoubtedly go straight to my parents with that information thinking that she was protecting me.
“Damn, Imani, you sure know how to pick ‘em. All that abstinence and goody two shoes business, and now you're fucking in churches and flying all over the world with a bazillionaire. You sure know how to fucking surprise a girl.”
Yeah, well, she’s not the only one surprised by my involvement with Marcus; I can hardly believe it myself.
“Imani?” Marcus’s voice startles me. He’s standing behind me with his hand on the back of my chair. “Who are you talking to?” He sounds pissed. What the hell?
“It’s Lana, just a second we were about to hang up anyway.” “No, we weren’t!” she yells, hoping Marcus will hear her.
“Shush, Lana. I’ll call you later, okay? I promise.”
“You better, every day, no skipping!”
“I will, I will.” I assure her, and she reluctantly hangs up.
Marcus has moved around to where he could see me, if he could see at all. When I read his body language and facial expression, a chill runs up my spine. This doesn’t feel right.
“Did you call her?” he asks. His tone is bitter and his face unkind. Where are my shadows? They’re supposed to be nearby or watching on the security cameras.
“Yes, she texted me and I called her. Is that okay?” I ask, using my calmest voice. I look up into his face, squinting in the sunlight. I put out my sensory feelers and try like hell to stay calm. Don’t panic, Imani.
“I can’t see,” he says.
“Yes, you haven’t been able to see for a few days now. Marcus, don’t you remember?”
“No, I don’t fucking remember, I think I’d know if I fucking went blind!” he yells. I jump knocking my iPad onto the floor causing the music to stop.
There’s no question now; this is the old Marcus and I need to get out of here now before he tries to hurt me again. Where the hell are Mr. Black and Elijah when I actually fucking need them?
Fifty-Five
My mind is whirling ten different places at once. My first instinct is to hop over the back of this chair and run. He is blind after all; I could probably make it to the safe room.
But my Marcus is still in there somewhere. No matter how scared I am I can’t leave him when he’s in trouble, even if it puts me at risk. I just can’t.
I’m going to try calm rational negotiating as long as I can get away with it or until Black and Elijah realize this isn’t a friendly conversation. I need to signal them, which you would think would be easy when the person you’re hiding the signaling from is blind, but this isn’t any ordinary blind person. He has a sixth sense that kicks in when one of the others check out.
I begin speaking to him slowly and casually while I unfold my feet out from under me.
“Of course you would know, how stupid of me. I’m sorry, Marcus. Would you like to sit down? Can I get you anything?”
I scoot to the edge of the love seat as quietly as I can. I want to put myself into a better position to run but only if it’s completely necessary.
He begins to pace a small path that follows the edge of a rug. Four steps down, turn, four steps back. He is using the fringe on the rug as a guide. He has one hand wrapped around the back of his neck, flexing it back. He’s in pain.
His fingers on his opposite hand twitch and I’m not sure if it’s nerves or something physiological, either way he’s wound up tight.
I’ve taken the last few moments to perch myself on the edge of my seat, ready for whatever he’s got planned. I’m sure I can make it out if I have to now.
“No. I want to know why I can’t see?” He's a bit calmer, irritable and angry but not as volatile… I think.
“You have a tumor in your brain.” He stops and stares straight ahead, and I continue. “It’s growing and pressing against your optic nerves, the pressure is causing your blindness.”
I’m speaking very softly, using all of my nursing skills, trying like hell to keep him calm.
“Why? Why doesn’t anybody help me?” he asks, and I think of Marcus and his sister, Elena, when they were little. I’ll bet they wondered that a lot.
My heart constricts in my chest and a bit of nausea hits my stomach out of nowhere. He’s so powerful yet so delicate at the same time. I want to go to him and comfort him but I’m still not sure what’s going on in his head.
“I am trying to help you, Marcus. I called a neurosurgeon this morning and he’s coming to see you in a few days. I’m doing everything I can to help you, alright?”
He nods, still holding the back of his neck. “Are you in pain?”
“Yes.”
“Is it your head?”
“Yes.”
“Would you like to sit?” I move very slowly to stand and glance around trying to figure out where the cameras are located in this room. I should have asked him about that, damn it.
“Okay,” he agrees, and I hesitantly reach out to touch his arm and guide him toward the couch. He shuffles like a zombie while I guide and when we arrive, he surprises me by lying down on his back.
I grab a pillow before his body meets the cushion and tuck it under his head. His eyes are squeezed shut. The pain must be intense.
I raise my arm over my head slowly and hold it there, wiggling only my fingers, trying to capture someone’s attention on camera. Marcus opens his eyes and stares blankly at the ceiling.
“What now?” he asks.
“Now you rest.”
I take a deep breath and the air in the room feels cold. The sun slips under a cloud and the room darkens. The atmosphere in the room changes and dread grips my chest.
It’s like a vibration in my muscles, a chill on my skin and instinctively I try to move away from Marcus but he grabs my wrist and pulls me roughly to my knees next to the couch.
“You think you’re just going to walk away from me, you little whore?” he says in a voice I do not recognize.
I try to yank my arm away and feel the sting of the carpet burn on my knees where they hit the floor, but it’s a futile struggle. He’s got me and he’s not letting go.
I stutter a few words defending my reasons for asking him to lie down. He thinks I’m tricking him so I can run. And, actually, it had crossed my mind but I’m not going. Somehow, I need to get that message across to him.
“I’m not leaving you, no matter what, never. Do you understand?” I cross my fingers that will convince him. But it doesn’t.
Before I can say or do anything else, he yanks me onto the couch with him by my wrists and log rolls me under him.
I can’t move, he has me pinned down. I was talking a brave t
alk but now I’m fucking scared as hell.
“You’re a sickly looking little thing. You need some meat on your bones but I could still fuck you.” He says looking at me with eyes as cold as his words.
He has ahold of my arms at my sides keeping me in place and indeed he could fuck me if he wanted. I have no strength to fight him off, he’s twice my size. The memory of my attack courses through my veins, and I feel like I might vomit.
I can’t believe this is the same person I was just daydreaming about moments ago.
“Please, please, don’t, Marcus. I love you, please don’t hurt me, please...” Flashbacks of being raped and held hostage flicker like a horror movie in my mind.
I beg and shake my head back and forth, tears roll down the sides of my face into my hair and ears. A little sob follows my plea and when he doesn’t respond, I start to believe I’m going to be subjected to rape again. But this time it would almost be worse because this time it would be at the hands of the man I love, who is currently not the man I love but a horrible stranger.
I hear the sound of feet hitting the floor in the hall outside the living room, fucking finally! What is it with these assholes? They’re there when I don’t want them to be and nowhere to be found when I really need them.
Marcus hears them too and presses my head into the cushions when he smashes his mouth on mine, banging our teeth together and biting at my lips.
I try to cry out but his mouth muffles it when Black and Elijah enter the room. They rush toward us, yelling at Marcus to stop.
Before they reach us, Marcus's body stiffens from head to toe and all of his weight is suddenly crushing me into the couch. I can’t breathe!
He’s not with me anymore. I can’t sense any mental connection between us, evil or otherwise. His body is convulsing on top of me, he’s seizing. Fuck, he’s having a goddamn seizure! I push as hard as I can but there is no way I can move him; he’s dead weight.
Just then my supposed bodyguards pull him off of me and down onto the floor. I gasp for breath while the two men stand frozen, watching Marcus seize.
“Roll him onto his side. Elijah, grab a pillow and put it under his head. Mr. Black, call his doctor and run get that huge fucking medical first aid thing he has.” I speak calmly and with authority as my nursing skills take over.
They quickly burst into action, following my instructions. Elijah helps me move him to his side and Black takes off running out of the room.
Now we wait. Elijah and I look up at each other and our eyes lock. Marcus continues to twitch between us, and I watch regret, horror and concern play across Elijah’s face.
“All we can do is wait for him to stop and keep him from hurting himself.”
“That’s always been my job, Imani. I’ve been trying to keep him from hurting himself for years.”
I reach out and place my hand on his shoulder, “I know, Elijah, I know.”
Fifty-Six
Black returns with the enormous medical kit, a gurney and an oxygen tank. Are they running a hospital here or what? What have they been expecting?
No time to ask questions right now. Marcus is still seizing, and it’s been at least five minutes. Something needs to be done or he’s going to develop further brain damage. I throw open the kit and grab a mask for the oxygen and tubing, hook it up and carefully apply the mask.
“Crank it up all the way,” I tell Elijah. He quickly figures out the gauge and oxygen begins to flow.
“Watch him, keep his airway clear,” I instruct and turn my attention to the box of supplies. God, I hope there’s something here to stop a seizure.
“When’s the doctor coming?” I ask, while I rummage. I’m starting to feel frantic, we need to get this seizure stopped.
“He’s on his way. How long can he do this?” Black asks.
“Not much longer. Fuck, isn’t there something in here for seizures? Damn it!” Then I see what I’m looking for; it’s the right medication just not in the form I expected it to be.
We usually use IV meds on our patients, but this is the same thing in an injection. I snatch it up, great, it’s in a pen, even easier. I bite off the cap and jab the damn thing into his thigh through his jeans.
Elijah almost grabs my hand to stop me, instinct I guess. But he pulls back his hand while I push the medication into the muscle.
I hear the door open and close, voices working their way toward us. Marcus begins to relax and I slump and blow out a breath I didn’t know I was holding.
Enrique, Elena, and Doctor What’s-His-Name from the ER rush into the room, and I’ve never been more relieved.
I drop back away from Marcus’s body and lean against a chair behind me. I watch as things seem to unfold in slow motion.
Elena is kneeling beside me in seconds with her arms around my shoulders in an embrace that I don’t return. I’m hollow, disconnected somehow but grateful the seizure has stopped. Enrique and Doctor - damn, I can’t remember his name - surround Marcus and roll him to his back, checking his pulse, listening to his heart, looking into his pupils.
It’s an assessment I’ve seen a million times but this time is different, this time I’m emotionally invested. Hell, I’m not simply emotionally invested, I’m all in.
Where he goes, I go; nothing can separate us, not even death. Elena shakes me and gently takes ahold of my chin to look me in the eyes. Things shift back to real time and the men are lifting Marcus onto the gurney.
“Imani, Imani, honey, are you OK?”
“Huh?”
“Let’s get you up so we can go with them. Come on.”
Elena pulls me to my feet, but my legs feel like Jell-O and I stagger. She supports me and we begin to follow the group.
“Wait, I need my shoes.” I stop to go back but Elena continues to pull me along.
“You won’t need shoes, just come on.”
It’s cold out, what’s wrong with her? I need my damn shoes but I’m not getting them, I guess. I’m expecting them to take a right toward the front door where I assume they have an ambulance waiting in the driveway. But they don’t. I stop and watch as they continue down the hall.
“This way, Imani, come with us. We have everything we need here in the house. Marcus’s never been in a hospital before his car accident. He wouldn’t have taken you to one either but for the fact that it was closer to Aunt Angelica’s house and he was so worried about you. You have no idea what it took for him to go into that hospital. He wouldn’t do it for anybody but you, believe me.”
I am so confused.
“So, where are we going?”
“The west wing has accommodations, you’ll see. Follow me.” Accommodations? What?
“What happened back there? Mr. Black said you were signaling to them and then he went down.”
“Well, sort of.”
“Sort of? What do you mean?”
“He was having an episode.”
“An episode? He didn’t hurt you again, did he?”
She stops and spins me by my shoulders to face her, checking me up and down while they roll Marcus to the end of the hall where an elevator opens.
I don’t remember that, I don’t remember this part of the house at all actually. Fucking mansions.
“I’m OK. Come on, I don’t want to get separated.” When she’s convinced I have no injuries, she releases me and we hustle toward the elevator and sliding in right before it closes. I don’t think this thing is meant for seven people and a gurney, but we squeeze.
I glance down out of the corner of my eye at Marcus’s pale face lying next to me. I don’t want to be separated from him but I also don’t want to see him this way.
It was different when he was my patient in the hospital. I didn’t know him then. I felt the invisible thread that holds us together but no memories were attached to him then; no love or adoration, no desperate need to have him beside me forever.
All of that came along quickly, like a tsunami, when he woke from a coma and pierced me with his fi
erce commanding psyche.
Now panic takes over and my body starts to shake from the shock. That was one hell of a seizure and what lead up to it was, well, I don’t know what the fuck that was.
“Imani,” Elijah says sternly, and I turn wild eyes in his direction.
“He’s going to be OK, do you hear me? I see it on your face and you have to stop. I mean it. Get a grip… for him. I know you can do it, shake it off.”
Deep breaths in and out, in and out. I shake my arms at my sides like a boxer before a fight. I can, I will, get my shit together… for him.
The doors slide open and Enrique pushes Marcus into a full-fledged hospital room.
And not any ordinary hospital room, surgery could be performed in here if need be.
“What the hell is this?” I whisper mostly to myself but Elena is standing next to me.
“Marcus has an interesting past. He had this put in years ago, just in case.”
“Just in case what?”
“I’ll talk to you later about it.”
Enrique takes his blazer off and looks to me.
“Do you think you can get an IV in him?” Of course, I have the skills to do it, but I’m kind of a mess right now.
“Might give you something to focus on,” he says when I hesitate.
“Okay, yeah, I can. Where is everything at?”
Elijah begins opening cupboards to show me what I need. How does he know what I need? And why does he seem so familiar with this setup? I grab a pair of gloves and start looking for a vein.
Marcus is in pristine physical condition despite his brain tumor and he usually has awesome bulging nurse porn veins but not postictal.
All his blood has been shunted to his vital organs during the seizure so starting an IV is going to be difficult. I get it in, and we work for an hour as a team getting him to look better, not awake but better. He has some color to his skin; his lips aren't ashen and blue, but I won’t be satisfied until he opens his green-scolding eyes.
“Okay, his vitals are stable. He’s just got to wake up now. Nothing else to do for a while,” says Doctor What’s-His-Name, and Enrique agrees.
