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For once, Jody met her eye instead of his usual habit of examining the walls when conversation made him uncomfortable. “So, are you going to tell our guardians?” He already assumed she wouldn’t have yet. “And I guess I shouldn’t ply you with any more of this...” He lifted the nearly empty bottle of Gentleman Jack off the coffee table, where it had taken up residence since Beth had become his houseguest, and put it back in the cabinet.
Even though she wasn’t a liquor drinker, Beth was aware she’d been responsible for polishing most of it off. What adverse effects had that had on the baby? She was suddenly spooling back through all the things she’d done that would have been harmful, but the trauma of the collision and the assault afterward seemed to eclipse everything. It was a miracle Beth was still alive, and now she’d been given a reason to believe she’d survived for a purpose. “I won’t tell them until I’ve made my own mind up about things.”
Jody turned from the cabinet, censure in his eyes. “Don’t tell me you’re even considering...”
She was surprised and touched by Jody’s barely concealed outburst, and it wasn’t until that moment that Beth knew for sure it wasn’t an option. “No. I want it.” It was good to hear herself say it. She saw the relief register in his eyes. “I just don’t want any parental interference until I’ve wrapped my head around this.” She seated herself on the edge of the chair and Jody settled on the arm of the couch.
“How pregnant are you?”
“Luc and I hadn’t... been intimate for a while. But when we were in Normandy...”
His eyes shifted from hers.
“I was in the coma for eight weeks and convalescing for another two. I’ve been out of hospital for nearly three. I make that about thirteen weeks.”
“So, at this stage...” He reached for words that weren’t part of his vocabulary.
Until then, they hadn’t been part of Beth’s, either. “It’s a fragile time. Anything could happen, particularly after what I’ve been through. I don’t want to alarm anyone unnecessarily. Except for you, obviously...” She found herself smiling grimly.
“I’m glad you felt you could confide in me.”
It was a very un-Jody like thing to say, but Beth realised she really had no idea who her brother was. They’d both got on with separate lives, been absent from each other’s adult development. He was certainly more mature than the last occasion they’d spent any significant time together.
“Whatever you need, just let me know.” He wrung his hands as if trying to get the circulation back into them.
“Any luck finding a way of splicing those clips?”
He raised his eyebrows and mouthed “clips” and then realised he should have known what she was talking about. He regarded Beth as if she were insane. “Shouldn’t you make an appointment with the doctor? I can start looking up some more relevant information sites about... y’know, parenthood. I do have an expectant mother to care for.” He smiled behind his beard then; it was chary and brief, but for a few seconds, she realised he hadn’t been able to control his excitement.
Beth realised she hadn’t made any enquiries about his relationships. She’d assumed he was a happy bachelor. Did he crave a woman to share his life with? Did he want children? It was the first time she’d seen him genuinely smile. Maybe her landing back in his life wasn’t the inconvenience she’d thought it was. But she still couldn’t feel even a trace of the tentative elation he’d displayed.
“Are you not just a little bit excited?” He appeared to have read her mind.
“I will be.” But she didn’t know if it was a promise she could keep. “Let’s just take it one moment at a time.”
Jody nodded and surveyed her as if looking for some physical change.
She interrupted before he could open his mouth: “Please don’t tell me to put my feet up and take it easy.”
Jody frowned. “However you want to do this is fine by me.”
*
Mimic opened his eyes and was looking up at a strip light on a white-tiled ceiling. The knowledge of who he was and what he did was as instantaneous. If you were a killer, it never escaped your waking mind. It pushed to the front of the line, but that was the way it had to be – any delay in recall could have dire consequences. He’d learned that in the military.
His back throbbed, but he was instantly sitting upright and assessing his surroundings. He wasn’t in a police station as he’d first suspected. He was in a section of a hospital ward segregated by a green curtain to his left and was rigged up to a monitor. His jacket had been removed and lay on top of a tall flip can to his right. He could hear plenty of activity but couldn’t see anyone.
He quickly removed the sensor from his finger and slowly peeled off the velcro that held the blood cuff to his arm. Its ripping sound made him grit his teeth as he tried not to broadcast its removal. He swung his legs from the bed and found his black leather shoes on the floor. He quickly slipped his feet into them and pulled on his jacket at the same time.
He peered around the curtain. Hospital staff in blue scrubs attended to other patients on the right side of the ward while their colleagues used a bank of pristine keyboards and monitors at the station to the left. Mimic strode as casually as he could towards the other end of the room where he assumed he’d find an exit.
He was in ER, and family members were mixed in with the staff and milled around patients that had recently been admitted. The aroma of faeces and disinfectant wafted into his nostrils, but it was the other familiar underlying scent that he could differentiate.
He encountered it all the time in his line of work. Humans didn’t need to rot before he could detect it. It was the stale smell of vacated space, like a room gets when nobody visits it. The odour was instantaneous with humans. Although the hospital wing looked clean and new, the essence settled over everything like malign dew.
As he turned into the corridor and looked down the line of faces attending their loved ones on gurneys, as they waited to be allotted a space on the ward, he speculated how close he’d been to adding the bouquet of his own death to the atmosphere. He knew not everyone got a warning shot. For some it was wham-bam, keel over in the shower, ma’am.
How had he arrived there? Mimic couldn’t remember anything beyond trying to leave the house. Had he got outside? He had a vague recollection of making it there, but knew he hadn’t driven himself to the hospital. Someone must have rung an ambulance. It was a good job he hadn’t been carrying a firearm. He had a lot to thank the sick fuck with the ketchup bottle for. Whoever had summoned the emergency services, it looked like they’d saved his life.
He wondered if they would have, if they’d known that perpetuating his would mean an end to others. And then he considered that it actually could have been his target, Marcia O’Doole, who had made the call.
