Mark pulled up in his rental car at the address his mother-in-law had given him before she took the children to New York. It was just after three forty in the afternoon and the sun was bright. He could hear laughter coming from inside the house and his heart was in his throat as he got out of the car. He grabbed his crutches and winced as he put pressure on his broken ribs. They were still sore, as were the cuts on his face, and his broken arm rested in a sling. He leaned on the car door as a voice came from the passenger side of the car.
‘Eh Señor, you are a supposed to be letting me ‘elp YOU!’ El Toro pleaded.
He raised his eyebrows at Mark disapprovingly as he tried to be independent. He never had been a good patient. He smiled at remembering the way Marie tried to look after him when he had flu. Mark smiled at El Toro’s attempt at a caring nature as he reluctantly agreed. Mark limped up the small steps to the front door and, looking at El Toro for encouragement, knocked on the door.
Benjamin opened it and turned to see his father stood there. He shouted for Hope and his grandmother, who came running to the front door to see what all the fuss was about. The three of them embraced Mark, who shouted in pain as his mother-in-law looked at him and burst into tears at the state of his shattered body.
The children squealed with delight and relief as they danced round and round their father shouting and hugging him. ‘Daddy, daddy you’re back, you’re back!’
‘Ready to be a father again?’ asked Wendy, smiling. Mark nodded and smiled.
‘Is he… I mean… are they…?’ Wendy stumbled, almost too afraid to ask.
‘Yes,’ he said sharply, ‘all of them.’
Then they noticed El Toro and Mark beckoned him in. Hope looked at her father.
‘Daddy, who is this?’ she asked, holding Mark’s hand and pointing to El Toro. Mark replied, smiling at El Toro.
‘This is a friend. Uncle Toro.’
El Toro smiled at Mark and put his arm round them all as they all walked into the house, shutting the door.
Monitors beeped and nurses came and went, monitoring their patient intensively. The patient had sustained massive internal injuries and the hospital were not sure if he would make it through the night. Wherever he had been, whatever he had been involved in, these injuries were life-threatening. He was intubated and on dozens of monitors and machines and the injuries spoke for themselves. Outside the theatre doors, two men in suits and earpieces stood watching half a dozen staff treat this injured man, waiting for a verdict on what the prognosis was.
One lead nurse spotted them and went to address them. They explained who they were and why they were there and she turned to go back into the theatre. One of the two men in suits left to make a phone call, while the other stared into the theatre, wondering if this guy would survive.
‘We’ll know more in the morning. He’s been in surgery for hours and this isn’t his first operation. We’re trying to save his legs but it’s touch and go. We’ll do what we can,’ a nurse said to the man in the suit as she left the theatres.
The man nodded and looked grim-faced.
‘How long before we can officially question him?’ he asked. The nurse looked regretfully at him.
‘Another twelve hours at the least,’ she replied, ‘he fell from quite a height. If it hadn’t been for his car breaking his fall, you would have been looking at him in a body bag. I don’t know how he managed it, but he has lasted this long.’
The monitors continued to bleep and buzz as the patient laid in a medically induced coma, face slightly contorted and looking old. His old eyes were darting backwards and forwards inside their lids, looking like he was dreaming or in some torturous nightmare from which he could not wake.
The men stood around the bed, watching, as this man defied the odds and continued to live. With the sound of the monitors echoing around the room, they looked at each other gravely. Outside, a nurse stood watching through the side room window, wondering would happen to the patient and who he was. Whoever it was, many people were interested in his recovery and he had a large group of bodyguards, all armed.