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“I’m here, Teag. You’re gonna be okay.” She reached for the cup on the side table and helped him take a drink.
“How are you feeling?” she asked once she’d settled him back on his pillow and adjusted the head of the bed up a little.
He tried to think of a witty response, but fatigue and painkillers dulled his thoughts. He opted for honesty. “Like shit.” It still hurt to force the words out of his raw throat.
Maria gave a half-hearted laugh. “I’ll bet.”
Teag glanced around the room. Cam Taylor was, in fact, leaning against the wall, with his arms crossed over his chest and a scowl on his face. When Maria caught Teag’s puzzled expression, she squeezed his hand. “Do you remember what happened to you?” she asked, her voice soft and eyes filled with concern.
When he tried to make sense of where he was and how he got there, it was like the memory had been submerged in a murky pool. He could sense the shadow of it hidden under there, but he couldn’t pull it from the cloudy depths.
He shook his head, and something stopped him from asking Maria for the answer. Warning bells blared in his head. His heart raced and his skin prickled, as if his body remembered exactly what his mind had hidden from him.
“Your mom and Annabelle will be back soon,” Maria said, giving him an obvious reprieve. “They just went to get something to eat. Fiona’s on her way too. She’s barely left your side. The guys want to come, but they’re going to wait until you move out of the ICU. There’s already too many of us here.”
At that moment, a nurse stepped into the room, interrupting Maria’s uncharacteristically nervous rambling. “You’re awake,” she declared with a bright smile. “I’m Leanne.”
With economic movements, she checked his IV line and vital signs. “It’s time to change your bandages,” she announced, shooing Maria and Cam from the room.
Leanne had a gentle touch, but even the slightest movement sent streaks of white-hot pain through Teag’s body. Before the petite nurse finished re-dressing his wound, he’d broken out in a cold sweat.
“It would have been cleaner if it’d been through and through, but since the surgeons had to dig the bullet out, there’s more damage. I know this is uncomfortable,” Leanne said apologetically.
Bullet?
Teag fixated on the word, and on the fact that apparently a bullet had recently been inside him. He felt the memory hovering just out of reach again, like a moving shadow behind an opaque curtain, but he couldn’t grab hold of it.
“All finished,” Leanne said, tucking the sheet back up around Teag’s chest.
She placed something in his hand. “Press here to dispense more painkillers, and don’t be a hero. It won’t let you overdose.”
He pressed the button.
When the nurse left, and Maria returned, the pleasant warmth of the narcotic coursed through his bloodstream, dulling the pain.
Teag blinked, now high as a kite, his words slurring when he spoke. “S’up beautiful. I think I got shot. D’you know anything about that?”
Maria’s eyes widened. She bit her bottom lip and nodded slightly. “Yeah, Teag, I know something about that.”
“Wanna tell me?” he asked. He tried to interpret her expression, but he couldn’t hold up his too-heavy eyelids, despite his best efforts.
“Why don’t you rest now, and we’ll talk when you wake up again,” Maria said softly.
He wasn’t sure he answered before sleep pulled him under.
**
When he woke up again, bright morning light filtered through the window. He didn’t know if he’d been out for an hour or for a day, but he did know exactly what’d happened in the hotel room in Miami.
His mother sat on a recliner, paperback in one hand, reading glasses perched on her nose. Otherwise, the room was quiet and empty.
“Mum,” he whispered.
She looked up from her book and smiled.
“Is Maria here?” he asked.
His mother’s smile grew even wider. “No, but she’ll be back for her shift later today. Lovely young woman. Very concerned about you.”
