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Chapter Twenty-One
Emerson
The machines in the hospital room beep steady at a low volume. There are three separate monitors in here, each for a different thing. They all have their own rhythms. A green line rises and falls like the waves by my house.
It’s clean in here. There are worse things than hospital detergent and sanitizer.
There are worse things than sitting by my father’s hospital bed.
He’s asleep, a white sheet and blanket pulled up to his chest. One side of his face is dark with bruises, and his arm is fairly fucked up. When I hit the van with my SUV, he was thrown through the windshield. The accomplice who was conscious after the collision tried to flee the scene and ran over his arm. His injuries also include a concussion, cracked ribs, and a broken nose. The police have handcuffed his less-injured wrist to the frame of the bed.
He doesn’t look much like a monster now. Just an old man in a hospital bed.
I’d have difficulty mustering up real fear right now regardless of the cuffs.
Daphne went into shock after I broke the zip ties. She clawed at her coat and her snow pants, frantic, digging in with her nails. Once they were off I saw how badly the zip ties had hurt her, and the gun. She had blood around her wrists like bracelets. A deep bruise covered her knuckles.
“I’m fine,” she said, shivering in her base layers, and then she doubled over to throw up in the snow. I caught her hair just in time.
My little painter kept insisting that she was fine all the way back through the woods. I realized about halfway through that she couldn’t say anything else.
“I’m fine,” she murmured against my neck. “I’m fine, Emerson.”
“I love you, too, little painter.”
We emerged from the forest to find the road in ruins, strewn with debris from both vehicles. Four cop cars had surrounded the crash site. Two ambulances. And Daphne’s brother.
I saw him see us.
Both hands went up to cover his face, and then he dropped them and ran in our direction.
Leo was the one to usher us to one of the ambulances. I only caught every other word. Something about my brothers. My phone. Arrests. My father in the second ambulance.
The paramedics were standing by, waiting for Daphne. One of them pointed to a stretcher in the back of the ambulance.
That was when all the panic I’d been trying not to feel hit me head-on. There was silence from me and barked orders from the paramedics and finally Daphne’s brother standing in the way, blocking them from touching her until he could successfully convince me that they were, in fact, trustworthy.
I don’t remember much of the ride after that, largely because one of the paramedics found my vitals so concerning that he wouldn’t stop fussing unless I agreed to some kind of intervention. For a variety of reasons, I refuse to rely on benzos. I made an exception for Daphne. I wanted all their attention on her.
So.
For the moment, I’m fine, except for a nasty bruise in the shape of my seatbelt and bandaged knuckles. Sin and Will arrived at the hospital shortly after we did, thankfully with dry clothes. It’s one thing to be hounded in a hospital. It’s another to do it in nothing but a torn wetsuit.
My father stirs.
I don’t get any particular satisfaction from the way this played out. It must have felt like the world was caving in when I hit the van. The part of me interested in vengeance agrees that he deserves it, but, on the whole, I’m beyond it.
He won’t have a chance to fuck up again. This is probably the last time we’ll be together. The promise of an ending gives me patience, but it’s Daphne who brought me back to humanity enough to know that he shouldn’t wake up here alone.
This is certainly not how I thought the day would go. If I had my way about it, I’d have engineered a better introduction between my brothers and Daphne’s family than what actually happened, which is that the Morelli who attempted to kill me called them to say that I’d driven my car into a van stuffed with criminals and run off into the woods.
Ah, well. We can’t always have everything.
My father will end up with nothing, unfortunately for him. Two officers have been posted outside the door, and he’ll be transported to jail when he’s well enough to go. Between my testimony and the Morelli influence, he won’t be released again.
When he opens his eyes, it’ll be the last time I see him wake up.
My father’s return to consciousness was a source of dread for me. It was better for him to be asleep, even if I was in the closet. It meant the door wasn’t going to open, and I still had time.
