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“Oh, thank God, she’s come around.” Secret nudged her husband out of the way and stood in front of me. It was surprisingly bright around her, given that we’d just been in an all-black room.
In fact, the lights were so bright I found myself squinting to focus on the faces around me. The wall of sound that hit me next was all it took to tell me I wasn’t at the memorial anymore.
Mechanical beeping, shouted instructions, and a cacophony of voices rose to meet me as my senses started checking in one at a time. The small of disinfectant wrinkled my nose, and old blood lingered just beneath it.
Overhead fluorescent bulbs cast everything in an ugly blue light, and it finally dawned on me that we were in a hospital.
The wall of pain I ran headlong into in that moment was probably a good indicator of why.
I started to cough spasmodically, retching, the memory of Mercy’s ashes coating the back of my throat was all I could think of. I reached for my neck as if I might be able to clean her out of me that way, but was only reminded of how she had almost ripped out my windpipe Roadhouse style.
Secret had placed a hand on each of my shoulders as I shook violently, and she said, “Get a doctor.”
She was only able to hold onto me a moment before Wilder pushed her gently out of the way. His shirt was soaked dark red with aging blood and his hair matted with the same, looking several shades deeper than his usual dark blond.
“Breathe, Princess. Just breathe for me.”
I locked my eyes on his, finding it hard to focus with the film of tears that had formed in the wake of my violent coughing, but I took one shaky breath, then another, never letting my eyes leave his. He smiled softly once he realized I had calmed down.
I let out a trembling breath.
“How did we get here?” I asked when I was sure I could speak.
Secret spoke over Wilder’s shoulder. “We brought you here about an hour ago, after the police cleared the memorial. Callum is already on his way here to help Desmond deal with the publicity, but you know how these things go. No humans were hurt, so they’ll sweep it all under the rug. Desmond has had to promise to pay a considerable amount of money to the memorial to clean up the mess we left behind.”
“Is everyone okay?”
Secret and Desmond exchanged a quick glance that said something I didn’t quite understand. “Dominick and Lucas were pretty banged up, but they’re going to be fine. We were most worried about you.”
“What happened?”
“After you… did whatever you did to Mercy, you just went catatonic. You wouldn’t move, wouldn’t speak, we thought something had happened to you but your vitals all seemed fine, except for the fact that whatever clicked off in your brain also managed to stall out your healing abilities. You should have been fixed by the time we got you here, but instead they had to bandage you up. I had to bodily stop them from giving you stitches, but what a goddamn mess that would have been when your healing did kick in.”
She was right, if I’d been given stitches my skin would have healed over top of them and I’d need to be cut open again to remove them. Not exactly a pretty scenario.
“Where did Morgan go?”
“Morgan?”
Secret looked at Wilder, then Desmond. “Genie, what are you talking about?”
“Morgan was there, she pushed Mercy into me. She’s the reason I…” I wasn’t sure how to explain to them what had happened. Would they see anything weird about sucking up a big lungful of my own mother? Even now I didn’t know if it was a really big deal or just exceptionally gross. Still, Morgan had done it for a reason, and that was enough to make me wary.
“There wasn’t anyone else there with us,” Secret insisted. “I think I’d remember. Especially if it was Morgan.” These last words were thick with contempt.
This didn’t make any sense. She’d absolutely been there, I’d seen it with my own eyes, I’d looked right at her when I’d started to choke on the ashes. No way in hell had I imagined all that.
But Secret still insisted we’d been alone up there with Mercy.
I decided it might be best to stop arguing.
A doctor appeared and made Wilder and Secret step back. She methodically checked my pulse, shone a light in my eyes, and poked at all my open wounds. “Looks like her healing factor has come back. I’m seeing some very basic restoration on these, and we should see complete healing in a few hours. Eugenia, how are you feeling?”
“I’ve had better days.”
A thin, humorless smile was my reward for that comment. The doctor, seemingly satisfied with my progress, turned her attention towards Secret with brutal intensity. “Now you, Ms. McQueen. I agreed to let you go untreated until your sister regained consciousness, but I would be remiss in my sworn duties as a doctor if I didn’t insist we get you taken care of immediately.”
Secret gave me a sheepish smile, but the doctor was on a roll.
