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“Of course, yes, come, follow me. He should be finishing up his lunch right now.”
I followed Donna down the hall, her bright orange hair reflecting some of the light from the long row of fluorescent bulbs above her. She stopped in front of a room with its doors open. Inside was a young man lying on a hospital bed, eating a cup of red Jell-O and looking up at the television on his side of the room, his brown hair tousled and damp with a little sweat. The other side was divided by a thin blue sheet, rustling a little from the breeze coming from the open window. There was a strong smell of chemicals that seemed to be originating more from the other side of the room.
“Hey there,” I said, waving and offering a smile.
Matthew looked to me and matched my smile, but his wavered and disappeared much faster than mine. “I’m not in trouble, right?”
“No, no, not at all.” I moved closer to the bed. “I’m here to ask some quick questions. I’m trying to hunt down the source of this Dragon drug before more lives are taken by it.”
“Right, right…” He looked at me, still a little wary.
“I’m Jonah,” I said, offering a hand. “The one you talked with over the phone.”
He set the Jell-O down on the tray table at his side and shook my hand. There was a light in those expressive brown eyes that I was glad to see wasn’t dimmed after all he’d been through. “I’m Matt.”
I had found Matt through a news article that reported his full name after doing a piece of the rise of the drug. It was an unfortunate mistake for the publication, but it was very useful for me. I used it to track down his hospital room and managed to call him, asking if he’d be willing to help me put a stop to the spread of Dragon. He sounded more than willing to over the phone, and I was glad to see that attitude hadn’t gone anywhere.
“What can I do to help? What do you need to know?” Matt’s chin rose, and his upper lip stiffened. “I don’t want anyone going through what I went through.”
“How did you get it? Do you remember who you bought it from?”
“That’s the thing! I never bought it.”
My head cocked to the side. “What do you mean? How’d you end up taking it?”
“I don’t really remember.” He scrunched his thin brows, covered his mouth for a cough. “I remember getting invited to party in the VIP section—”
“By who?”
“Dylan. The owner of the club. I was surprised when he pulled me aside by the bar and asked if I wanted a private party. He brought me into the VIP section, which I thought would be packed, but it wasn’t. It was only me, Dylan, his two partners, and some other guy.”
This was news to me. “What did the other guy look like?”
“He was smaller, a little more reserved than the others. Didn’t seem like he fit in all that much. Almost like he was there out of obligation or something.”
“Did he have curly brown hair?”
Matt took a moment, raking through his memories. I noticed he still had the club’s golden wristband around his wrist, the letters “VIP” printed in bold black. “Yeah, yeah I think so… or was it black?”
It was most likely Walter, the assistant to Dylan and the guys. Interesting that he’d be at the party, and it sounds like he was working an overtime shift.
“Did one of them offer you the Dragon?”
Matt shook his head. “I don’t… no, I don’t think so. I was so drunk by that point, I can’t remember a lot of it. I know some of the guys left the room at one point. Most of them did actually. And then I remember falling to the floor, someone calling for help, and the other guys running in. Then I passed out and I woke up in this hospital bed, feeling like my veins were on fire.”
Whoa, okay, this was big. If what Matt was saying was true, then that meant someone was lying to me and Fox. Dylan and his partners seemed avidly against the drug, so how did it get in Matt’s hand? Who gave it to him?
“Have any of them said anything to you since? Followed up?”
“Nothing. And I don’t think they will. I’m considering opening up a lawsuit. I think one of them drugged me.” A flicker of anger lit up in Matt’s tired gaze. “I never do drugs. Never. So how the hell did this get into my system? Even if I was blackout drunk, I don’t think I would have ever said yes to taking it.”
I believed him, which made this situation a thousand times more complicated. By believing Matt’s account, that meant my attention was locking inward, toward Dylan and the guys. Something was going on here. Was Dylan trying to become the next big drug kingpin and using his own club as a launchpad for his new career? Or was it a group effort between the three of them, possibly four if the assistant was involved…
