Monday morning, George met the heating and cooling guys at the office at six thirty—thankful they’d come out so early—and sighed with relief as her first patient arrived to a decent temperature.
Along with the cool air, her nurse’s return from vacation gave George the sensation of coming back down to earth after a few days spent someplace very, very strange.
Ah, boring normality—her wheelhouse.
Some people craved excitement and change, but George needed things to be the same, predictable. She preferred fine to good, nice to wonderful. Nothing to upset her status quo.
Let her patients be turbulent. George was the calm one. The island in the stream.
Who’d have thought that dermatology could be anything besides sedate?
Purnima arrived with that healthy glow she got every time she went home to India. George assumed it was the diet: real food instead of the hormone- and pesticide-filled crap that masqueraded as nourishment around here. But it was more than that, she knew. Purnima’s eyes looked clearer, her smile centered. God, how George admired that in her—how together the woman was. She might be George’s employee, but she’d always thought there was a ton she could learn from her.
“You’ve been busy, I see,” Purnima said from her spot in front of the computer. “I thought you said you’d take it easy while I was gone? Wasn’t there mention of a mini break or something?”
George just smiled and hesitated. Should she hug her? She’d been gone for three weeks, after all, and… No. Hugging was inappropriate.
“And then the A/C…” George said with a sigh. “You have no idea.”
“Feels good this morning. Did you call Carmichael’s?”
“Yes,” George said, her face reddening with shame. “I hated to call in a favor, but—”
“You caught his melanoma, George. He wants to help. People are happy to thank you, however they can.”
“Yes, but it’s my job.”
“Sure.” Purnima raised her hands, one on either side, like a scale weighing the difference. “Fixes A/C, cures cancer. I’m sure they come out even in the end.” The woman laughed and clicked a couple of keys before looking up and catching sight of George for the first time.
“My God, what happened to your face?”
“Oh, nothing” was all George said, self-consciously touching the bruise on her cheek. Thankfully, Purnima was discreet enough that she wouldn’t pry after being rebuffed. But then guilt won out, of course, because if it wasn’t safe for her, then… “I was attacked. Outside.”
“No! Who would do that?”
“It was the Fourth of July, and I think they were on drugs, perhaps? There was a scuffle and I intervened and… They were young.”
“What did the police say?”
“I didn’t call the police.”
“Whyever not?”
“I…” George thought about it, suddenly unsure. “I…I suppose I didn’t need to. Someone came to my rescue, and they left.”
Purnima’s brows rose at that, but George didn’t feel like going into it any further. She didn’t quite understand herself why she hadn’t called the police. Maybe something about Andrew Blane made her think he wouldn’t want that. No. He definitely hadn’t seemed to want that.
Whatever the reason, she felt shaky enough as it was today. She was done talking about it, which wasn’t something she cared to examine, especially after spending all day Sunday hunkered down at home, thinking—or rather not thinking—about him.
“So, no patients Friday afternoon, then?”
She debated how to answer but, as usual, gave in to the truth. “There was one.”
Purnima turned back to the screen and keyed through charts for a few more seconds, until she eventually turned back to her boss. And somehow, for some silly reason, George had to force herself, with difficulty, to look her nurse in the eye.
“I don’t see it on the books,” said Purnima.
“No.”
The woman’s brows rose.
“Pro bono?”
“I…” George swallowed, wondering when she’d ever been this conflicted about a patient. Never. Never was the answer. “Yes,” she finally whispered.
Uma popped into her head. She was the only other patient she’d had come in like that, off the street, looking like a victim. No, not a victim. A survivor, maybe.
And not weak at all. Andrew Blane was strong, frightening, compelling.
So compelling I can’t get him out of my head.
“Tattoos,” she said, a little ashamed at how curt she must sound but unwilling to feed the obvious curiosity in her employee’s eyes. “He needs them removed.”
Purnima nodded slowly, twice, before lowering her eyes to the screen. “Interesting” was all she said. As always, a mistress of subtlety.
As she continued down the hall to close herself in her office, George looked deep down inside and recognized an embarrassing truth: she didn’t want to discuss Andrew Blane with her nurse or with anyone. She wanted to hide her new patient away, to keep him all to herself in a way that felt shameful. There was something else warring with the shame, however: a thread of titillation or excitement or whatever buzzy spark of interest this was, vibrating through her body.
She had patients to see, but all her wayward brain could think about was that man. This wasn’t healthy, and it wasn’t right, but George couldn’t seem to stop counting the minutes until Andrew Blane walked through her door again. She glanced at the clock.
Maybe he wouldn’t come back at all.
* * *
Too many hours spent hunkered down in the motel room, trying hard not to drink, with only the shitty-ass TV to distract him, was more than Clay could bear. After weeks in the hospital, then months of PT and brain-numbing television, he’d developed a hatred for the device—especially shows that glorified the bad guys. Those were the worst. He’d destroyed his television the first time he’d come across one particular show on bikers.
That had led to his new rule: no vodka during the day, and no TV ever.
Breathing hard and still sore from running the past couple nights—that and beating the shit out of those two kids—he grabbed his keys and headed out the door, needing air, space, anything to distract from the new set of memories working through his mind on repeat.
The doc on the ground, rolled into a protective ball, those fucks kicking her. He’d wanted to kill them, had barely held himself back. Because, yeah, if he killed a couple of tweakers right now, he’d sure screw the hell out of the Sultans case.
But he was a Sultan, now, wasn’t he? More Sultan than cop, that was for damned sure. He’d seen the way everyone looked at him back at the field office after his discharge from the hospital. Jesus, his colleagues had eyed him like he was scum.
Course then Tyler’d caught sight of him, and everything had changed. What a shock it had been when they’d eventually stopped typing and set down their phones, and stood up for him. A few of them had even clapped. A huge case. With him at its center.
Didn’t matter that he didn’t feel like a hero.
In his truck, he looked both ways before pulling away from the downtown area, where traffic had thickened only slightly during what passed for rush hour in Blackwood.
Ahead of him stood the first small foothills before the slightly grander line of the Blue Ridge Mountains. He knew, looking at the beauty of their bluish-purple crests, that he should feel something. He’d spent so much time in slums and projects, filthy biker clubhouses and run-down police stations that he hardly recognized the power of beauty anymore. Maybe it was gone forever—that ability to see the good in things.
He drove on, unsure where this road led, and enjoying the lack of control. Well, not entirely that, maybe, because lack of control was something he’d felt time and again in situations where some psychopath held the reins. That wasn’t what he sought.
No, what he needed right then was to feel like anything was possible.
Up he drove, over asphalt, then gravel, then just dual, overgrown tracks in the dirt leading higher and higher.
Finally, long past the End State Maintenance sign, he parked, truck facing back the way he’d come, and got out. Up a path he walked, ignoring the way his steel-toed boots rubbed his feet with every step, until the trees thinned, the trail grew rockier, and finally, finally, he emerged.
It was high here—the top of a mountain. The air had lost some of its oppressive humidity and heat, and here…oh, here, he could breathe.
And the view… Jesus Christ. He turned around 360 degrees, an action that forced him to take it all in until he couldn’t do it anymore and had to bend, drop his hands to his knees, and breathe.
Just breathe.
Survive.
The polygraph had been about survival. Animal instinct and training had gotten him through that. Later, they’d given him his colors, the Sultans patch sewn onto the sleeveless leather cut he and the other guys wore every single day of their lives. He remembered the feel of Handles’s arm around him—fatherly, welcoming, warm. Jesus, that was almost the worst part, how good it had been to have brothers—a family. The only thing that had come close in years had been finishing Special Agent Basic Training with Tyler. They’d been like family back then too.
Nothing like Handles and the club’s acceptance, though. The cut, the rides, the way he could do no wrong with them, now that he’d beaten the box, survived the hazing, accepted his patch with tears in his fucking eyes, gotten his ink, and been proud—truly proud—of it.
Jam had hugged him, hard, and Clay had felt it deep in his soul. Brothers. Family.
He remembered Ape’s scowl when the asshole had taken him in back for his club tat—the big one on his back. But while the dude had always hated him, he sure as fuck had enjoyed tattooing him. Jesus, Ape loved that shit, didn’t he? The light in his eye confirming he was one hundred percent sadist.
Ape, who’d disappeared the night of the raid—one of a handful of guys they hadn’t managed to pin down. How the hell had he known?
On a deep sigh, Clay pulled his brain back out, let himself see the mountains instead of memories.
He wasn’t sure how long he stayed up there, ignoring the majesty of his surroundings and just trying to locate a new well, a new vein of hope he could tap into. It took some time for him to realize he’d just about used it all up. He was all dried out. It would take one hell of a dowsing rod at this point to locate unplumbed depths he was pretty sure he didn’t have.
No. Focus. Find yourself here.
Clay drew in a big breath and opened his eyes to the view and… Whoa. As far as the eye could see, a hazy, blue-and-gray landscape, surreal like some kind of painting. Artsy shit you’d see tattooed on the arms of hipster kids who didn’t know better. Lush, yet almost colorless in the cloud-covered morning. The details smudged out, the edges softened like the view after a couple of beers or that first hit of weed.
Above him, a bird flew—big, dark, huge wingspan. A hawk, he thought for a second and then knew, somehow, that it wasn’t.
A vulture. The perfect addition to this colorless, gray panorama. It landed on a lone, brittle-looking tree fifty yards away and regarded the world around it with quick, unimpressed moves of its head.
A hawk or an eagle, he could have gotten behind. A symbol of hope or something.
But a vulture?
And then it hit him, with an ironic twinge of humor, how right it was.
He stood straighter, like that scavenger on the branch, wanting to feel above it all.
So, fine, Clay Navarro was no eagle. But there were other things he could build on. His strength had always been his ability to see past people’s exteriors and get a line on what it was they really wanted. Not what they showed the world, but the petty things that made them tick. In recent months, he may have lost that ability, seen it drowned out by the constant white noise in his head, the pain in his body. But it was clearer up here; this high, he could even trick himself into thinking he’d get it back one day.
Like that creature up there, his career had flourished off the flesh of others—on what they’d left behind, untended. So, he’d just have to view himself the same way and live on the bits of rotting meat still clinging to his bones. The shitty bits still left after all the good was torn away—vengeance, hate, anger. Yeah, he had lots of that. Enough to fuel an army, in fact.
And that thought, that realization, sent Clay back down the mountain, into town, with the strength to keep up this charade of a life. For the time being, at least.
* * *
This time, George was ready when he arrived. Sort of.
It had been a busy day spent trying to catch up on Friday’s missed appointments, which was good, since her mind had spent an uncomfortable amount of time going back to him. All day, she’d fended off questions about the bruises and anticipated his arrival with the most unwelcome combination of excitement and apprehension, building it up so that, by the time his form blocked out the low evening sunlight, she had decided more or less how to proceed. No casual talk and no mention of Saturday night, besides a well-deserved thanks. Professional, strict.
That, of course, translated to stiff, which probably only made her seem nervous. A complete failure in bedside manner.
“Evening, Doc.”
George shivered. That voice. Rougher than she was used to, lower, without any hint of local Virginia twang.
“Mr. Blane.” He loitered in the doorway. “Come in, come in.” Great, now she sounded like a little old woman, enticing him with tea and cookies. Or something.
“How you feeling tonight, Doc?”
“Wonderful.”
“That’s quite a shiner you got there.”
“I’m fine,” she snapped, tired of explaining the thing all day and not wanting to relive it with him right now, either.
The man moved inside, limping—which reminded her that he’d run back to the motel the other night—and finally pulled off his glasses, baring sharp, assessing eyes beneath two bright red, puffy lids, greased up.
At least he followed directions.
He stepped forward, hand out, and George hesitated, thinking for a second that he might… What? Kiss her? Hug her? Lord, she was messed up.
“I owe you some money, Doc.”
“Oh. No. Thank you,” she said. “You saved me from…from a world of hurt. I can’t accept your money.”
“Look, Doc, I—”
“Mr. Blane. Please,” she said, her breathing loud in her ears.
His eyes flicked between hers, measuring, weighing, and finally, apparently, deciding she wasn’t bluffing.
He gave in, lowered his chin in a single quick nod, then asked, “Where d’you want me, Doc?”
“Come on back,” she said, trying so hard to sound like the doctor she was, suddenly wishing she hadn’t insisted on seeing him this late, all alone, with her staff long gone.
As she led him to the last exam room on the right, George pretended he was just another patient—an urticaria needing steroid cream, a full-body skin check, or a mole to biopsy. When she turned back at the door, though, and caught him eyeing her bottom or her legs, hidden though they were by her trousers, her body reacted in a way that showed it knew the difference between him and everyone else, even if her mind didn’t care to. Just that look, that slide of his eyes over layers of clothing, dragged her into a morass of sexuality that she’d managed for years to avoid.
His gaze went up to her face, and she saw his eyes change, watched their warm brown darken to black, and the muscle in his jaw tighten. “Didn’t realize they’d got your face so bad.”
“Oh,” she said, her hand flying back to the telltale bruise. “It really is fine. No big deal.”
“You call the cops after I left?”
“No. No, I didn’t.” And then, because she didn’t want to talk about it any longer, she said, “Your eyes look good.”
“You call this good?” He shook his head wryly. “You’re one weird lady.”
“I know it hurts, but it’s doing what it should. Red, blistering. Now, let’s get your shirt off, Mr. Blane,” she said, dodging his gaze. And that sentence—her stupidly chosen words—heightened her body’s fall into unwanted sensuality.
Wonderful. Just great. After all her careful planning and preparation. Rather than look at him as he stripped, George busied herself prepping the already-prepped room, her mind hunting for words that didn’t contain subtext within subtext, with even more subtext lurking beneath.
“Remembered the burning hair last time, Doc.” Behind her came the sound of clothing being removed. “So I shaved my chest.”
Oh, that did it. Her eyes, evil creatures, bypassed her brain’s directives entirely and slithered right to where her body wanted them—on that chest. Good Lord, that chest. She’d spent all weekend thinking about that chest. Below his clavicles, he was so unfeasibly flat and broad, she’d need a half-dozen hands to span it. And strong. Still lower, the muscles curved out, hard and male and sexual in a way that pectorals shouldn’t be—they really shouldn’t. And then the thought of her bare hands, right there, touching his freshly shaven skin…
George swallowed audibly in the quiet room and reached for her gloves. A barrier.
“’S that okay? You hadn’t mentioned body hair last time, but I figured it’d make it easier.”
“Oh, yes, that’s wonderf—” Another attempted swallow over dry, dry throat. “I mean, you did the right thing. In fact, I should have told you.” Her throat clicked again, and before her tongue managed to talk her straight into some sort of absurd 1980s porn scenario, George threw the switches on the machine. It would drown her out. And him, thank God.
* * *
He’d blocked out the memory of that fucking noise. Louder than the sound of Ape’s tattoo machine and just as insistent, like being too close to an airplane right before it takes off.
The doctor put a hand on Clay’s arm, and he sighed.
“Sorry. Kinda forgot about that sound.” The motherfucking sound.
“Need a minute?”
He shook his head. They’d done this just a few days before. He could do it again.
Her hand lingered on his shoulder for another beat, and he willed it to stay there. To touch him, ground him, make him real.
That didn’t happen though. Instead, she moved, handed him a pair of big, dark glasses, which he slipped on, and picked up that laser thingy.
“Okay, so. Chest today.” She sounded as breathless as he felt.
“Yeah.”
“Great.”
The clicking started, and Clay closed his eyes, girding himself for the pain. When it registered, though, he opened them again. He needed to see what was happening. There was nothing worse than being blind to your fate.
She held the metal arm contraption out, focusing the point on his skin, and pulled the trigger mechanism. With her head down, with those glasses on, the woman looked focused, serious, professional.
Fuck, that hurt. And not one big pain, but a series of tiny, minute burns, one after another, like rubber bands snapping, snapping. He watched his skin change in the laser’s wake, a hazy, slightly puffy white frost overlaying his ink. He’d been disappointed to see from his last session that the white disappeared eventually. False hope that the process would be faster than expected. But no. Once the white burn faded, the ink was still there, only—
Oh, hell, it hurts.
“I’m so sorry. That was your…” The woman cleared her throat. “Your nipple.”
No shit, he thought, pasting on a smile for her benefit.
“The rest should be easier.” Again she hesitated. “Your stomach and…hips.”
Clay’s eyes stayed glued to the doctor. What the hell she must think of him, this big creep with his contradictory stories scrawled all over his outside—and his one, drunken attempt to rid himself of the worst of the ink.
Yeah, he bet she was impressed by that. Her expression, though, was hidden behind those ugly-ass glasses, so he had no clue. No fucking clue. She bit her lip, leaned in, and went to town on his belly, one hand resting lightly on his. Clay closed his eyes at her touch—soaking up the pain the way his bloodstream would soak up the particles of pigment—and let his mind go away.
Ape, marching him into the back that day, surrounded by their brothers. But what could he do? What could he fucking do, with the entire fucking multi-agency task force poised outside, waiting to descend on the place?
Into the back, the stress of that quick stop in the head, whispering into the wire and those ridiculous Hail Marys as he waited for Ape to pop his eyeball. Because when Ape wanted you in back, you fucking went, and you let him ink you. Brotherhood and all that.
“Mr. Blane? Andrew? Are you okay?”
“Mmm?” Clay shook his head. It was fuzzy, wrong.
He opened his eyes to find that the noise had stopped, which was better, since it meant no more tats. Ape nowhere in sight. Or behind him with a fucking ax.
The quiet left a hollow in his head, a vacuum where he should have found relief, but instead he seemed to have lost sight of himself.
From the hazy depths, he saw a woman’s hand on his. He frowned at it, the way the fingers looked over his dark ones. She was talking to him, and he tried nodding, wanted to smile.
Be a cop, not a biker.
Stuffing the biker deep, deep inside of him, Clay attempted to listen to what she was saying.
Her other hand reached out and touched his shoulder lightly before trying to pull away, but he stopped her, grabbed her, held her against him, hard.
“Stay here,” he slurred. Was he drunk?
“May I…” A thin, white hand hovered close to his face, and he almost flinched before she reached out and removed the foggy layer covering his eyes.
Oh. Oh, right. Glasses. Protective glasses. He blinked in the bright, sterile room and let it come back to him. Or rather let himself return. Shit. The doctor. Had he hurt her?
“I’m…I’m sorry, Doc.”
He should thank her.
He would. In a second. Just as soon as he got out of this fuzz. He sat back on the table, sank down, heavy. Shit, he’d done it again, hadn’t he? Gone somewhere ugly, from the looks of it.
“Did I…?” He closed his mouth, trying to get enough saliva to speak. “Are you okay?”
“Am I…? Oh, I’m fine, Mr.… I’m fine.”
The woman, clearly not in her right mind to trust him, reached out, and he caught those gloved fingers with his, almost brought them to his mouth, but saw the freakiness of that before it happened. The arm of his protective glasses snagged between them, hard edges pressing grooves into his flesh.
“Thank you,” he said in a voice that wasn’t even remotely his. It was too low, too grainy, too breathy and bare.
For a handful of seconds, she squeezed him back, and all he could see were the kaleidoscope layers of her eyes.
It took some time for him to come out of his haze, the air still snapping with electricity.
“You Irish?” he asked, and she squinted, not seeming to understand. “Green eyes,” he explained.
“Oh. Right. Actually, yes. I’m half Irish,” she finally answered, and he nodded. And there were their hands again, still pressed together into a stark, spidery sculpture of black examination gloves, tattooed fingers, and dark glasses. The longer he looked, the less it felt like him. He squeezed and felt nothing. After a moment, she squeezed back, and that, that he felt, like a vise. A warm, solid vise. He let a finger loosen, ran it over hers, and shivered when she again tightened her hold. He moved his eyes back to her face, and she looked—what? Shocked? Scared?
Don’t be scared.
“Are you okay, Mr. Blane?”
Blane? His mouth groggily attempted to correct her, but the woman talked right over him.
“Is there someone I can call to come get you?”
He chuckled at that. Just a half laugh, which eventually turned into a real one, strong enough to finally pop this goddamn bubble.
Clay needed to stop this. Now. He considered calling the shrink, whose wrinkled card lay back in the motel, at the bottom of his duffel bag. He wondered if he should, in fact, be taking the meds that had been given to him—and then shook his head.
“No. No, Doc. There’s nobody to call.” He had to smile then at the woman’s concerned expression. How was this person so nice? Couldn’t she see that he was absolutely the last person on earth she should be bothering with? Had she no survival instincts whatsoever?
“Well, I could bring you—”
He swung his legs over the side of the table, wincing as his thigh got to that crucial angle, and then covering up the expression as he realized what Dr. Do-Good’s reaction would be. He let go of her hand, immediately wanting to take it again, then hopped down, ready for the pain this time, and reached for his shirt, which he pulled over his head.
“Oh. I haven’t applied the petroleum jelly. You need—”
“I’m fine.”
Her eyes roamed his chest in a way he could almost feel, and fuck, he hated slimy crap, but he wanted her to spread that shit all over him. “You should really let me…”
Fuck yes, touch me.
“No,” he heard himself say. Firm almost to the point of rudeness. “I’m fine, Doc. Seriously. I got it.” He smiled at her again, made the expression hard and self-sufficient. “When can I come in again?”
“Oh. I’d better look at the…” He caught her eyes, let his gaze take in the smooth skin of her face, broken only by the unnaturally rosy flush of her cheeks and that fucking bruise that made him want to kill.
Farther down, her lab coat blocked his view of the rest of her, but he knew. He remembered, from those brief, stolen snatches, her pale legs in that dress and—
He glanced back up and found her watching him watch her. Her words had trailed off, and there was awareness here between them. Awareness he might not have given her credit for before. She looked so innocent that he’d thought she might be oblivious too. But the flush crept farther up her ears, and he knew she’d gotten at least a tiny bit of what his thoughts were.
Clay considered stepping forward, doing something inappropriate. He considered it and then threw it away, because his track record with ladies was pretty grim. Not only that, but this woman was the only person he’d found who’d take care of him. And that was the priority.
Priorities. Right.
“Can you take me tomorrow? For my back?” he asked, cutting through this absurd fantasy they appeared to be sharing. Synchronized hallucinations. Folie à deux, he remembered a psychiatrist calling it once on the stand, and he’d gone and looked it up—shared insanity. That was what this shit felt like.
“Yes,” she said without hesitating. And he liked that. He couldn’t help but enjoy that she wanted him to come back, but he also knew it was bad. Attachments were bad. Anything that distracted from his goal. Anything that risked his cover, his anonymity. “We’ll need to numb your back. You’ll need an injection.”
“No.”
“It’s too big a surface, Mr. Blane. The pain—”
“It’ll be fine. No injections.”
“Then we’ll do one section at a time.”
“I want to get it out, Doc. All of it.”
“There’s so much solid black. I really can’t…” She stopped, appearing to reevaluate. “Fine. We’ll use a numbing cream. The treatment won’t be as effective. The research proves it. But I won’t do it otherwise. Not with that much ink.”
“Got it. You’re the expert.”
“See you tomorrow, then?”
“Yes, ma’am. Although”—he glanced at the door—“maybe I should wait for you to finish up here. Walk you to your car.”
“Oh, no. I’ll be fine.”
He wasn’t sure he agreed, but her expression didn’t leave much room for argument.
“See you tomorrow, then. Same time” was all he said, before turning and limping out the door.
As he made his way up the hall, through the waiting room, and out into the hot, humid evening, he considered, not for the first time, what his future consisted of.
And, try as he might, he couldn’t get past the first few steps: federal court, testify, put those fuckers in prison for life. And then… Christ, he didn’t know. He tried to picture his next gig. Tried and tried and…nothing.
There was nothing for him but empty road.
* * *
George didn’t follow him out, didn’t lock the door behind him. Hands shaking, she pulled the paper off the examination table, wiped everything down, and walked the trash straight out back, since everything had already been cleaned out once that evening.
Outside, the air was rank with the stench of a week’s worth of summer sun beating on the Dumpster—and no rain. A glance farther down showed the lights on at the MMA school. Time to head home to her crew. Leonard would no doubt be angry.
Still her pulse beat like a jackhammer, and she refused to think about why. Why did she feel so compelled to comfort that man? Why couldn’t she keep her damned hands to herself?
She had no answers.
George had hung up her lab coat, grabbed her keys and purse when her phone rang. She fumbled it out and to her ear, almost expecting… What? Him to be on the other end?
“Hello?” she said, out of breath.
“Dr. Hadley?”
“Yes?”
“Hi there,” replied the chirpy voice. “I’m calling from the Charlottesville Regional Reproductive Medicine Clinic.”
“Oh.” She stopped, heart thumping harder. “Yes?”
“Dr. Sternberg took a look at the ultrasound, and everything’s ready to go. He’d like to put you on the books for a week from Wednesday. The…uh…fifteenth.”
“Oh. Wednesday the fifteenth. Okay, great.”
“How does five sound?”
“Wonderful. Five. Perfect.”
“Did you have any questions about the intrauterine insemination procedure before you come in?”
“No, no, I’m good.”
“And you’ve got the HCG injection for Monday?”
“Yes, I’ve got it ready to go.”
“Great, well, we’ll see you next week, then.”
A week from Wednesday. Somehow, through the ultrasounds and endless medications and self-administered shots, George had managed not to think about what she was preparing her body for.
They’d take her dead husband’s sperm and put it inside her cervix, and she would, hopefully, get pregnant.
Treatment. Pregnancy. Baby. Child.
She should be excited, over the moon, but something was missing here. The husband, perhaps, to go with that vial of washed sperm the lab had kept on ice this past decade? A vial of sperm that she had to use or lose at this point? A daddy for the baby she planned on bringing into this world? Someone to love her?
For almost a decade, she’d let that vial sit, an unexpected second chance left untouched in that sperm bank. A decade spent picking up the pieces of her shattered life, creating the perfect nest for the baby she’d one day have, putting it off and putting it off. A decade spent eschewing fun in favor of responsibility. Because this was what she wanted: her clinic, her house, and now her baby.
Why on earth didn’t it feel like enough anymore? She didn’t trust it—this feeling that suddenly there might be more to life, just out of reach—but she had no idea how to make it go away.
* * *
Clay let his eyes scan downtown Blackwood, taking in the cars parked nearby. The martial arts place next door to the skin clinic was holding a class for women. He squinted, watching the ladies go slowly through a series of defensive moves before practicing them on a couple of guys. He surveyed the rest of the block—it was quiet, so quiet he had a hard time trusting this place. Time and again since he’d gotten here, he’d had to remind himself that it was a small town. Quiet was the norm, not the other way around.
Except it wasn’t like that, was it? There was bad everywhere, people like those junkies who’d attacked the doc. Because under the quiet, in every bumfuck corner of this godforsaken country—probably the world—evil lurked.
Back to the martial arts place, where the women were beating the hell out of the guys. Or pretending to, because Clay knew from experience that big guys like himself, like the giant inside, could take a woman down with one hand tied behind their backs. It wasn’t some half-assed fist block that would make a difference.
Cynical. So fucking cynical.
Farther along, he spotted the sign for the town’s one and only bar. It looked kind of old-fashioned, with lettering that should read Ye Olde Pub. Instead, it read The Nook, which made him think of dim lights and knitting. He watched as a group of people pulled open the door and went inside, laughing.
Minutes passed, and Clay’s pulse slowed to normal. As he watched the self-defense women, they wrapped up their class and started spilling out onto the sidewalk, which felt like his cue to leave—best not to be accused of being some kind of creep. Surefire way to get his ass kicked out of town.
Just as he turned the ignition, the clinic lights went out, the door opened, and Dr. Hadley stepped outside. She locked the door without looking up once—Jesus, even after the other night, the woman had no sense of self-preservation, which drove him completely nuts. Didn’t she know she was a sitting duck for all kinds of predators?
She needed to take that class. Because, although the moves were pretty Mickey Mouse, they’d at least teach her to look before heading out into this fucked-up world. He’d seen the shit people did to women. He knew.
Clay watched as she stepped off the sidewalk, not appearing to even notice the women walking out next door, moved to her car—unlocked, which sent his blood pressure through the roof—and finally drove off.
From somewhere close by, an engine fired up, and Clay almost jumped out of his skin.
Breathing too hard, he waited a few seconds for his anxiety to dissipate and, when it didn’t appear to abate at all, put his truck into drive and followed the doctor at a respectful distance.
Too many women had suffered because he’d given them space or looked the other way. He was done looking the other way. He didn’t care how small a town this was—there was evil everywhere, around every street corner. He’d seen it in guys he’d taken down; he’d seen it in the smiling eyes of psychopaths; he’d seen it in the eyes of men he’d called brother.
God, he knew how fucking weird this was, following the doctor home. He couldn’t stand to see another woman get hurt on his watch. Especially one this soft, this caring.
Creeped out was better than dead.
* * *
George wasn’t generally one to partake in excessive alcohol. Not that she hadn’t back in her wild days, when she’d let herself get coerced into situations by bad boys, done wild things, and gotten pregnant in the process. She regretted those times, the manic fun, the stupid decisions made out of sadness and desperation. Bad boys, tattoos, and all the rest of it, she reminded herself, were nothing compared to adult decisions and everything else that had eventually made partying seem not quite so fun anymore.
Bad boys were a bad idea.
Andrew Blane was a very bad idea.
And so was stopping by the fancy country store on the way home to buy herself a bottle of something. Anything would have satisfied her, but she wound up getting a six-pack of cider, because beer felt too casual and champagne too expensive, but she wanted a drink, something to cap off this strange, strange night.
What she really wanted was to call someone—a friend would be nice—and tell them what was going on. She wanted to spill everything. Her need to have a baby—a family. Someone to call her own. Her fears that she was doing something very wrong here. That this wasn’t how these things were meant to happen. And D-Day just a week away. It was all too much, this last-chance pressure.
Added to that, the entire weird story about the big, broken man who had suddenly encroached on her every waking thought, his rough hands holding her so tightly, leaving her afraid for rather than of him. And she wanted that friend to understand. That was the toughest part, beyond obvious things like ethics and HIPAA violations. More than anything, she wanted to be told that she wasn’t absolutely out of her mind for feeling the way she did about him, which was…unclear.
Pulling into her driveway, she glanced at the house next door—it had been empty for the past six months, but Jessie and her son appeared to have moved in yesterday, which was good. Neighbors were good. Someone she could count on when she ran out of sugar. Or whatever.
She smiled at that. Sugar? No. She wouldn’t run out anytime soon. George didn’t run out of things.
On her way inside, she cast another glance at the cottage and thought about the six-pack of cider she held. She wouldn’t mind sharing…
Down the relative coolness of the long hall, into the kitchen, six-pack in the fridge, then straight through the back door and out into the hot, hot humidity of a Virginia summer evening.
The usual sounds of home greeted her: calm clucking, which meant her patching job on the fence had worked; lazy birdsong, gaining in intensity at this time of day—like children at bedtime, the creatures got worked up before the bats took over as kings of the night sky. Beyond that, she heard the far-off drone of a mower. Always mowing in Virginia. Lord, with the in-laws’ grass to do every weekend, she had enough mowing to last her a lifetime. George preferred livelier plants, their bursts of color and meandering stalks much more her speed than flat, boring plains of green. And here was the sound of crickets. Loud and intense, but somehow always in the background. Although…no. She cocked her head.
Not crickets. These were cicadas.
She remembered a discussion she’d overheard that day in the office. Cindy and Purnima had come in from lunch talking about the insects’ seventeen-year cycle and the noise they’d make this year—not to mention the empty exoskeletons they’d leave behind. George hadn’t lived in the area for the last cicada visit, and she didn’t seem to have any around her place, so she could only guess how loud it would get.
Someone had left a copy of the Gazette in the waiting room, and George had read through the feature, headlined CICADAS: SEVENTEEN-YEAR ITCH. She was fascinated. To live for such a short time, only to plant your seed for the next generation and die off…
A wave of sadness overcame her, heavy and familiar. A glance at her watch showed it was too late to call the in-laws.
Somewhere close by, a car door slammed, and she heard voices. Jessie and her son. It must be, since nobody else lived that close by.
Behind her, Leonard announced his arrival with a trilling meow before butting his head against George’s leg. She bent to pick him up just as the cottage screen door squealed open, then slammed shut, only to open again before someone went barreling out into the yard next door.
A second later, the door opened, and a woman’s voice called out. “Gabe! Put your shoes back on! The yard’s a mess!” George craned her neck to see past her landscaping and the tall wooden fence. There was no response. “Gabe Shifflett, you get in here right now, or I’ll… Oh, whatever.” The woman’s voice trailed off, and as she turned to go inside, she glanced at George’s place. Their eyes met with recognition. “George?”
“Jessie!” George called. “You all moved in?”
“Hey, yeah! Wait, this is your house? I thought you were farther down. I thought this place was—” The woman interrupted herself, and George wondered what she’d been about to say.
“This is me.”
“What’re you up to? Wanna come over for pizza? We can sit on the porch and watch it not rain.”
“Well, I…” George searched for something to say, some reason to refuse. And then, suddenly, it occurred to her that she didn’t have to. Jessie was nice. This could be good. A friend. A wish come true. “Why don’t you come over here, instead? I imagine you’re not all unpacked and… Oh, hey, I’ve got cider!”
“Cider?”
“Hard cider. Like beer, only”—George shrugged—“for lightweights.”
“Can I bring my monster?” Jessie asked.
“Of course!” George said through a bubble of excitement.
Inside, her eyes took in her house, wondering what someone like Jessie would think of the bright-colored, barely controlled chaos. It’s fine, she decided, ignoring the self-doubt. Her house was hers, and if people didn’t like it, they didn’t have to come over. On that thought, she pulled out a cider, searched frantically for a good minute and a half for something with which to open it before realizing that her can opener had the right attachment, and took a calming swig.
Okay. You can do this. You can have someone in your house. You can be friendly. It doesn’t have to be a big deal.
No big deal, she thought, throwing seed packs into drawers, straightening up random piles of catalogues and medical journals, in a frenzy of last-minute activity. No big deal having actual friends and an actual life after so many years without. Only it was a big deal.
Having a life—being alive, in fact—was a very big deal when you’d put a husband in the ground and had assumed you’d live the rest of your days alone.
* * *
The liquor store was still open. Clay breathed a sigh of relief.
“Can I help you?” the cashier asked when he made his way inside, and Clay tried his hardest to appear innocent.
“Vodka?”
“Sure. Back corner,” she said in a voice that was friendlier than he’d expected.
He grabbed the biggest, midgrade bottle he could find—just one bottle, he decided; he’d stop after this one—and headed back up front, head low and cap down to shield him from the cameras above the register.
“That it, baby?”
Baby? Clay glanced up in surprise. Nothing, just mild friendliness. Christ, he’d never get used to the South.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Thirteen oh seven.”
He handed her a twenty and watched her chubby hands deftly handle the change, despite the half-inch false nails tipping her fingers. He’d never understand stuff like that—why someone would purposely handicap themselves. His eyes flicked to her face, round and bland-looking, then up to sprayed-up blond bangs, then back down over a lumpy body. So, decoration. Harmless peacocking from a woman who hadn’t been dealt the best hand. With a mental shrug, he took his change and gave her a smile.
Making the most of what you had. Yeah, he could relate.
“Night, baby.”
“Good night, ma’am,” he responded, waving in response to her bright “Take care” before pushing back out into the night.
Back at the motel, his room stank of mold, despite the frigid temperature. He checked the A/C, which he’d left on low but which appeared to have a mind of its own and had taken the room to glacial. Damned thing.
Hit by a sudden wave of uncontrollable…something…he punched it, hard, his knuckles still suffering from Friday’s laser removal. It didn’t dent the machine, of course, which looked like a throwback to those prehistoric units he remembered from elementary school, but it felt good to hurt.
Am I fuckin’ crazy? he wondered as the burn all over his front throbbed in time with his knuckles. Not to mention the rest—his thigh, his back. Those hurt pretty much all the time. Especially with this humidity, although it was nothing compared to the way he ached before a storm.
“Goddamn weather vane,” he muttered as he grabbed the vodka on his way to the bathroom. Shit, he should have bought bleach. This place was gross, the grout black with fuzzy mold. He glanced at the booze, considered using that to clean with, and decided he was better off using it for its God-given purpose. Fuck all that Valium crap the shrink had given him. Vodka worked just fine.
It didn’t matter what the shit tasted like anyway, did it? As long as it did the trick. In fact, he’d taken to drinking the clear stuff because it didn’t hide behind smoke and caramel or any of those other cushioning screens. No, he drank the closest thing to rubbing alcohol that he could find—it wasn’t about pleasure, after all. Far from it.
Take your meds, Clay.
Girding himself for what he’d see, Clay unbuttoned his shirt before pulling it off and peeling away the T-shirt beneath. Oh fuck, it hurt as the cotton unstuck. Not at all like a fresh tattoo. Hot and raw. More like a burn. Which was pretty appropriate, considering what that friggin’ laser had done to him. He stretched his hand at the ache there, ignoring the pain on his eyelid, and stared at himself, hard. He’d put another coat of Vaseline on in a second.
Every fucking inch of the man before him was ruined—by experience, by life, by choice. Yeah, I chose this.
He’d chosen some of the ink, at least. The arms, the story they told of his family tree, stunted by the early death of his baby sister. There was the Santa Muerte, symbol of a vengeance he was close to reaping. Farther along was the Inca death mask, in honor of his dad’s people in Peru, whom he’d never get to meet, and their ancestors. Then there was the first tattoo he’d gotten—the one he’d never let anybody touch. Mercy, it said, and he stared at it to hold on to the good parts of his life. Carly—whose spirit had kept him going all these years. After a couple of seconds, he had to look away from it and return to the shit he’d done to avenge her.
He’d have done anything. Anything. To get her back? Fuck, he’d sell his soul.
* * *
“Oh my God, I can’t believe you punched him!”
“Punched him? Are you kidding me, George? I bitch-slap—” Jessie broke off, hand to her mouth, before noticing her son’s closed eyes, where he lay in the corner of the wicker sofa.
“He’s down,” said George. She sat back with a sigh, reached for her bottle, and was surprised to find it empty. “Oh my God, I never drink. This is…”
“Fun?” finished Jessie. “This is fun. Thank you for having us over. And…I don’t think he’s fallen asleep that easily in ages. Not to mention the fact that he ate carrots and salad without argument, which is a minor miracle. We’re coming over every night.”
“I wish you would.”
“Once a week, at least, just to get his veggies in. The pediatrician said that’s all you need, really. I’ll be golden.” They smiled at each other for a second or two, a little dorky, a little embarrassed, until Jessie went on. “No, but seriously. He’d be lucky to have someone more like you for a mother,” she said, her face losing all trace of humor.
“He’s a wonderful kid, but you’re a good mom.”
“Nope. Can’t take credit for that. That’s all him.”
It was loud where they sat out on the porch, night creatures chirping from the dark garden beyond the screens. In here, they were enveloped in a warm, orange candle glow, with the occasional tap of insects trying to get in. Funny. George must have had those candles for years, and this was the first time she’d lit more than one or two—the first occasion special enough to warrant a larger glow. Geez. It felt almost ceremonial and was most decidedly silly.
“Of course you can, Jessie. You’re his mother.”
Jessie sighed loudly, unapologetically, dramatically.
“You’ve built a life for the two of you. I’m impressed by how together you are, after…everything.”
“So, you’ve heard my story?”
“Not really. Uma admires you. She told me you’d had it rough. I remember she said you were a fighter.” George giggled, lifted her empty bottle, and reached across the coffee table to clank it against Jessie’s. “Which appears to be true.”
“Yeah, literally!”
George stood. “One more for the road?”
“What the hell. Why not?”
George walked inside to the kitchen for another pair of ciders, her bare feet avoiding the squeaky boards out of habit, but the rest of her floating on an unfamiliar cloud of happiness.
She opened the bottles and stepped back out, handing one to Jessie—her new friend.
“You wanna know what she said about you, George?”
“I don’t know. Do I?”
“Yes.”
“Okay. Go on, then.”
“She said you’re a…vampire.”
“Wh—”
“Just kidding.” Jessie lost her smile and caught George’s eye, held it. “She said you saved her life. Ive was there for her too, I know, but she says you’re like this rock, and she couldn’t have done it without you.” George lost a bit of her breath on a dry huff of air. “She said you’re the kindest, most selfless person she’s ever met and—”
Jessie stopped herself, and George waited before prompting. “And?”
“And she’s worried.”
That hit George in the gut. A hard weight in her middle that tried to fold her in half. “W-worried?”
“She wants you to be happy and doesn’t think you are.”
Something occurred to George. “Is that why you came to get me at the party?”
“No! Jesus, George. You’re delightful. It’s been awesome hanging out with you.” She looked around. “But this place…man.”
“What about it?”
“It’s…” Jessie opened her arms to encompass the house behind them, the dark garden beyond the screen door. “I guess… Don’t take this the wrong way, but I figured some old lady lived here, you know? The chickens and all the furniture and the garden and the cats and… Geez, how do you even have time to do all this with your job?”
George shrugged, feeling the truth of it—the weight of her existence. Add to it the baby she was going to make and—
Overwhelming. It was overwhelming.
Jessie leaned forward but turned to look at the snoring boy beside her. “I don’t get out much, either, you know. Nine-year-olds aren’t exactly conducive to active socializing.”
“Yeah. So what’s my excuse?”
Jessie lowered her brows at her and leaned even farther. “Uma said you switched to dermatology halfway through med school. She also mentioned why.”
George gulped. She didn’t realize Uma knew. How did she know about Tom?
“Pediatric oncology? I can’t believe you were even considering that.”
“Oh.” George gulped, unsure if she was more relieved or disappointed. “I couldn’t take all the babies dying. After seeing my husband go that way.”
“And yet you’re offering your services free to people in need. You can’t help but do good.”
George shrugged at that. “My parents were old. They had old-fashioned values or something.”
“Yeah. Not mine.” Jessie smiled. “That’s probably how I ended up in my job—I was brought up kicking and fighting, so I figured I’d continue my rampage by fighting for the underdog.”
“You’re the first probation officer I’ve ever met, Officer Shifflett. Do you carry a badge and gun and all that?”
“A badge, yes. Don’t carry a weapon, though. I own a handgun, but…”
“Oh, I thought—”
“Some people choose to. That’s not the type of probation officer I want to be. Less force, more psychology.”
“So you’re more of a hand-to-hand combat kind of gal.”
“Indeed.” Jessie narrowed her eyes at George and cocked her head. “Wanna take my class?”
“Self-defense?”
“Yeah. Monday nights. You should come. You can close up shop and just swing by next door. I know you don’t wanna talk about those bruises, George, but…whatever happened to your face is—”
“Independence Day insanity,” George replied. “A couple of kids. I thought they were hurting each other and got in the middle and…” She pointed at her black eye. “Well, this happened. Anyway,” she went on, thinking of Andrew Blane in her office earlier. She wouldn’t have been able to see him tonight if she’d done the class. Stupid, stupid thought, since it wasn’t like they were “seeing” each other anyway. He was a patient. A patient, George. “I don’t think self-defense is really my thing.”
“You sure?” Jessie tipped her bottle to her mouth with a wicked smile. “You’d get to kick my brother’s ass.”
With a laugh, George sat back and soaked in this woman’s company and conversation, the back of her mind still caught up on a memory of fathomless dark eyes, heartbreakingly battle-scarred skin, and the way his hand hadn’t wanted to let go.
* * *
There was nothing better, as far as Ape was concerned, than the wind in your face, the hot rays of the sun setting on your back, and the highway under your tires. Especially when you added all that to the satisfaction of a job well done.
Tying up loose ends felt good. Better than good. It felt right, like this was exactly what he’d been born to do. Him on the road, taking care of business with a few good brothers behind him. Guys like Jam. Brothers you could count on.
He shoved back that itch of irritation at Handles. The guy’d had everything, as president, and he’d gone and let cops into the club.
No way that would have happened on my watch.
Ape hadn’t trusted either Indian or Candy Land from the moment they’d started showing up at the bar.
Man, Handles had fucked up. A lot. It made Ape wonder, once Handles got out, what other mistakes he might make. What if Handles wasn’t the right guy to head up a club like the Sultans? Maybe it took someone harder, more decisive.
Someone like me.
He glanced back at the two guys behind him and gave a nod before pulling back on the throttle and passing the row of slow-moving cars hunkered down in the right lane, like sheep. Man, it felt good to leave those fuckers in the dust.
Things would feel even better once he’d taken care of Agent Clay Navarro. And they were close. So close he could smell it.