Bolt

by Bryan Cassiday

He was starting to lose the feeling in his arm wounded by the archer’s bolt. He was tempted to yank out the bolt, but he thought doing so would cause the wound to bleed more freely as he withdrew the 125-grain barbed broadhead from his flesh.

  He decided he better get to the hospital. There was no point in staying here any longer. He needed a doctor. He didn’t know how to treat arrow wounds.

  Drenched with rain, he found his Mini in the driveway, climbed into the driver’s seat, fired the ignition, and backed out onto the road. His bolt-pierced left arm dangling at his side, he would have to steer with one hand. He could still move his left hand if he had to. It was a matter of putting up with the pain. Shifting gears would be difficult because his right hand would have to release the steering wheel to maneuver the stick shift, but he figured he could manage it if he bit the bullet when he steered with his left hand. The incessant rain wasn’t going to make the drive to the hospital any easier.

  Grim-faced, he plowed ahead through the storm.

  As long as he didn’t pass out from loss of blood, he believed he could make it in one piece to the hospital.

  He slowed down. There was an accident up ahead.

  A wayward car had jumped the curb into the trunk of an oak tree that skirted the road. The vehicle’s headlights were on, and the windshield wipers were humming and squeaking back and forth continuing to do their job of cleaning the window. He was in no shape to see if the driver needed help. Tooling past the wreckage he didn’t glimpse anybody sitting in the driver’s seat.

  Of course, the driver could have fallen into the foot well for all he knew, or he could just as easily be at a neighbor’s house calling an ambulance.

  Brody kept going.

  Chapter 120

  Brody was lying in the gutter with the guy in the dark, the drumbeat of rain flailing them. The guy was naked on his stomach and Brody was straddling him strangling him from behind. Brody had to kill the bastard. It felt like the guy went limp under Brody. Brody got off him as a car whooshed by, splashing a sheet of water over him, soaking him. He rolled the naked guy over and observed the guy’s face in the throes of death. The guy’s twisted face sprang out at him in the rain. In consternation he saw it was his own face.

  Terrified by his nightmare, he jerked out of his dream and snapped open his eyes, which bugged out of his head.

  Where was he? he wondered.

  Supine in a hospital room, he found himself lying in bed in a johnny. He could feel his naked butt pressed against the cotton sheet beneath him. He realized his wounded arm was swathed in bandages. The doctors had removed the crossbow bolt from it.

  He didn’t recall much after he had arrived at the hospital. Maybe they had given him a sedative so he could sleep.

  A flat-panel TV bolted to the wall was broadcasting the local news.

  According to the jolly, tanned, blow-dried fortysomething newscaster, the FBI and the DEA had mounted a drug bust against Nick Davis for cocaine trafficking and distribution. The two government organizations had had Davis under surveillance for some time for suspicion of drug dealing before the actual bust.

  The news showed a picture of Davis on the screen.

  Brody recognized Valerie’s boyfriend Nick.

  The coke-packed blue suitcase was in the hands of the authorities, decided Brody.

  Thinking of Valerie he jackknifed up in his bed. He had to find out how she was doing.

  He leapt out of bed, left his room, his gait unsteady, and moseyed down the hallway, unsure of where to look for Valerie. And Victor. Victor was here, too.

  Still woozy from the sedatives, Brody peered into rooms as he negotiated the corridor, lurching at times as he felt dizzy, hoping Valerie and Victor would be located near him since the three of them had suffered wounds inflicted by assailants. Brody managed to find Victor sitting in bed in his hospital room, reading a paperback thriller, his back braced against a pillow, his bullet-pierced leg bandaged.

  Brody enter Victor’s room. “How are you, Tonto?”

  “I’m still breathing, Kemosabe,” said Victor. “So I guess I’m fine.”

  “Do you know how Valerie is?”

  Victor didn’t answer, his face haggard.

  “Is she OK?” said Brody.

  “She didn’t make it,” said Victor, downcast. “She was DOA.”

  Brody had known her condition was touch and go, but he had hoped they would get her to the hospital in time. He could imagine what Valerie’s parents were going through.

  “The world’s a jungle,” said Brody. “Sometimes I wonder how any of us are still alive.”

  “You got that right. What happened to your arm?”

  “The archer put a bolt through it.”

  “I hope you nailed the son of a bitch for killing Valerie.”

  “I hope so, too.”

  Victor shot him a questioning look.

  Brody didn’t elaborate.

  “Are you saying he got away?” said Victor.

  “I shot him, but I couldn’t find the corpse. I know I hit him. I saw his blood in the backyard.”

  “Was he one of the CJNG gangbangers?”

  “I don’t know why he was armed with a crossbow. I don’t know any gangbangers that use crossbows. He was wearing a big silver crucifix around his neck.”

  Victor grunted. “A devout assassin. Nothing surprises me anymore.”

  “You might be interested to hear this.”

  “Hear what?”

  “The FBI busted Valerie’s boyfriend for trying to sell ten keys of coke in a blue suitcase.”

  “Ah. That takes care of that. The prize goes to the feds.”

  Neither of them felt happy at the feds’ bust. Valerie’s death cast a pall over the room.

  Brody prepared to leave. At the doorway he balked.

  “Lemme know if you ever hear about a naked man showing up dead some place,” he said, his face stony.

  Victor watched Brody with a baffled expression as Brody turned and left.

  Out in the hall, Brody felt his iPhone vibrate in his trouser pocket. He fished out the iPhone. The caller ID said Private.

  “Hello?” he said.

  “Caligula.”

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Bryan Cassiday writes thrillers and horror fiction. He wrote the noir psychological thriller The Payout. He wrote Zombie Apocalypse: The Chad Halverson Series. His short stories have appeared in anthologies, such as Shadows and Teeth Volume Two, which won the International Book Award for best adult horror fiction anthology series 2017. He lives in Southern California.