“Get some sleep, baby,” I say, backing out of the room. “Just get some sleep.”
I return to the hallway, close the door behind me, and turn around only to walk directly into Carol.
“What are you doing?” I snap, feeling foolish at once. “Sorry,” I say, head bowed. “I didn’t mean to . . . It’s just . . .”
“I know,” Carol says understandingly. “So, is it really him?”
“Yes,” I say.
We walk toward the breakroom, talking quietly.
“What are you going to do?” she asks, as we sit at the corner table, the TV playing some soap opera .
I shrug. “I have no idea, Carol. This has been one hell of a day, one crazy hell of a day. First I find out I’m pregnant, and now . . . I mean, this is mad, right? This is absolutely mad.”
Carol grins, but it’s a shaky grin. “Mad,” she agrees.
“What is it?”
“It’s just—” She hesitates, and then pushes on: “I think that gunshot was self-inflicted. Nothing about it looks right. The angle, the burning around the skin. Which makes me wonder, why would a man shoot himself in the shoulder?”
“And your conclusion?” I ask.
Carol stares down at the table, unwilling to meet my gaze.
“Maybe Roman is a criminal, Lily.”
I want to argue with that, but I find that I can’t; I don’t know the man well enough, not even close.
Chapter Seven
Roman
When I wake, morning sunlight is glaring through the window. I turn my head away from it, but that just causes my neck to ache like a motherfuck. My whole body is aching. Probably the pain meds, making me sluggish. Aching, but not in pain. The only thing that throbs is my shoulder, but I can’t exactly expect different when I shot myself in the shoulder, can I? I think back to last night, last afternoon, really . . . I talked to the cops, and even in my drugged-up state I gave them shit, and then . . . Was there someone else in my room? I try and think back, wondering who the hell would be visiting Roman the Assassin. I don’t have friends, or family. I have my work, and sometimes I go fishing and sometimes I watch football and I shoot guns at ranges and I read books when I find the time but my life isn’t one full of folks who’d want to visit me.
All I can remember, before sleep took me, was an angel-winged creature floating into the room, flapping her wings in movements so tiny it’s a wonder she stayed afloat. I remember a soft cherubic face. I remember long dainty hands. I remember full lips.
“So an angel,” I croak, my throat dry. “A fuckin’ angel.”
I push all that away. No friends, no family, and I saw an angel. Clearly the drugs just messed me up to the point where I was seeing shit where there wasn’t shit to be seen. I open and close my hands, curl my toes, twist my neck from side to side, smoothing out all the aches in my body. Then I look down at my shoulder. The bleeding has stopped, as far as I can tell: the bandage is clean; the hospital gown is clean. This gown should be against human rights. It’s crispy, stiff, itchy. It’s the sort of thing you think they’d put you in as a punishment, not when they’re trying to make you better.
I need to get the hell out of here. Les might’ve given me shit about Darius, but there are other links in the chain. Or . . . or . . . there’s something, isn’t there, about Les? It’s right there, lingering at the back of my mind.
When I remember, I’m on my feet in a second, yanking out the tubes and shit they’ve stuck into my body. Les was twitching. Les wasn’t dead, which means that somewhere in this hospital Les might be alive and breathing, ready to talk. The machines I’m attached to start beeping as soon as I jump to my feet, so I just grab a blanket, wrap it around me, and get out of here.
I close the door behind me, and then move down the hallway, blanket around my shoulders. Nurses and doctors and patients walk back and forth, but nobody pays me any mind. They’re all too busy, too rushed off their feet, to give a shit about a patient who is clearly well enough to take an early-morning stroll around the hospital. I know that’ll be different when they discover that I’m no longer in my bed, but I don’t plan on being around that long. I read the signs on the walls and head toward the supply closet. I need to get changed into something that doesn’t flash my ass cheeks every time I take a step, and then find Les, and then get the fuck out of here.
I’m almost at the supply closet when I hear, from the direction of my room, nurses shouting. I’m too far away and there are too many people in between for me to make out their words, but they don’t sound happy. A nurse with her voice raised, another nurse with her voice raised, both of them shouting at each other as though this is going to make me magically reappear in the room. Then they stop shouting, and I imagine them spreading out, only in my mind they’re dressed in SWAT uniforms instead of scrubs. Maybe I’m still high on those pain meds, I reflect with a rueful grin. When I get to the supply closet door, my grin drops. This is just one of many supply closets, but if this bastard needs a keycard, I have to assume that all of them do. The keycard slot, with a red light above it, makes me want to just kick the door in. But that’d attract too much attention.
Maybe I’ll have to give up on the whole getting-dressed thing. Maybe bare-assing my way down the hallway to Les’ room is the only thing for it. The problem is, I have no clue where Les’ room is, if Les is even up here with the living or down in the morgue with the dead. I don’t know where to start . . . I hate this. Usually when I go into a job, I know exactly what I’m going to be doing. I’m prepared. Right now, I’m fuckin’ lost.
I’ll just have to ditch this place, find Les later when I can do some proper scouting. Gritting my teeth, I turn around—and there she is. Not an angel now, but she was the angel last night. Something clicks in my mind the moment I see her. She looks tired, her cheeks dull red now instead of bursting red, her hazel-brown eyes half-lidded, her mouth set in a flat line. Then I look down her scrubs, to her waist, to the keycard which dangles there from a clip. I pace to her, take her by the arm, and then lead her to the door. I do it gently, and she’s so stunned—or scared, maybe, though I don’t like to think I’m scaring a lady—that she doesn’t say a thing. I swipe the door open, and push us both inside.
As soon as the door is closed, Lily advances on me. She lifts her hand. For a second I think she means to hug me. But then she slaps me across the face, slaps me with way more strength than I’d credit to a petite woman like her. She then steps back, staring at me with flaring nostrils. I touch my face, the spot where she slapped, and look around the room. Needles, tubes, all sorts of hospital stuff, and there, on the top shelf, scrubs.
Lily makes as if to slap me again, and I can’t help it. I laugh.
“Nothing is funny about this,” she says, her voice a vicious whisper.
She looks so full of rage that she might explode. I shrug at her, and this infuriates her further. At some point—maybe when she slapped me—I dropped my blanket. Now I just stand here, in the hospital gown, which is almost transparent when lit by the too-bright electric bulb of the store cupboard. It’s a big room for what it is, but it’s still a cupboard, and Lily is standing closer to me than she might like . . . or, yeah, I watch as her eyes move to my arms, my neck, my face, and then down to my cock, pressing clearly through the fabric. Maybe I misread her. Maybe that isn’t rage in her. Maybe it’s something else.
I take a step forward, watch as she breathes in a deep, steeling breath: a breath that is meant to give her the strength to slap me again. But she doesn’t slap me, and her eyes are ravenous. And goddamn, she’s more beautiful than I remember, even dressed in stale scrubs with a flustered face and her hair in a ponytail so tight it’s like her hair is painted onto her scalp. There’s somethin’ so goddamn lively about her, as though the energy of three women lives inside of her, bursting to get free. She fidgets with her fingers, taps her feet, and her chest rises and falls dramatically. I take another step forward, for a moment forgetting about Les, Darius, the
fact that anybody could walk in on us at any moment. I lean over her. Lily doesn’t shrink away. She glares up at me, lower lip trembling.
“Did you miss me?” I ask, grinning at her.
“N-no,” she says, her voice quivering. “I’m just surprised. That’s it.”
“Just surprised?” I raise an eyebrow. “Are you sure that’s it?”
I take another step forward. Now I am pressed against her. Damn, just being this close to her, smelling her perfume mixed in with the sweat of a long shift, and that other scent—that animal scent of lust—and just looking into those eyes again . . . all of it is getting me hard, really hard, so hard that I know she can feel it against her belly.
“This is hardly the time,” she says, but even as she says it, she lifts her hand and places it flat against my chest muscles. “Or the place.”
“No?”
I lean down. I can’t stop myself. She’s too beautiful, too fuckin’ perfect. I’ve never done this before: put off a job because of a woman. I’ve never let myself get distracted like this. I’ve got no clue what’s happening. Only that I want to touch her again, only that the memory of the night we shared is nowhere near enough, even if I thought it was. Not now, it isn’t, not when she’s right here in the flesh. She tilts her head up at me. I lean down further, searching for her lips, but then she turns her head and my lips come to rest against her cheek instead.
“I—I can’t,” she says. “There are things you don’t know, and this really isn’t the place or the time, is it? I want answers. And I would like you to step away from me, please.” Her voice is strained as she says this; I can tell she isn’t quite sure she’d really like that. But fuck it, I’ve got a job to do. Maybe it’s for the best one of us is strong.
I step away.
“I need you to hand me some scrubs that’ll fit, and then I need you to take me to the man who came in with me. His name is Les—”
“I know his name. But why should I do any of that? What possible reason would I have for helping you? My colleague thinks your gunshot was self-inflicted. She thinks you’re a criminal. The way you’re behaving right now certainly supports that. So tell me, why should I do anything but scream at the top of my lungs for help?”
I sigh. “If you scream, I’ll be forced to gag you,” I say. “There’s a reason.”
“What—am I your prisoner now?”
“Pretty much,” I say. “But once you’ve handed me those scrubs and taken me to Les’ room, I’ll let you go.”
She stares at me in disbelief, mouth falling open. “You’re shameless,” she says.
“What has shame ever won anyone, eh?” I ask, shaking my head. “Look, Lily, I like you, but I also have a job to do.”
“What sort of job?”
“There isn’t time!”
Part of me wishes Lily was a man so I could crack her in the nose. But she’s a woman. Not only that, she’s a woman I’ve been with. Not only that, she’s an innocent, too. I can’t hurt her. I sigh, calming myself down, and then lean in close to her, so close I can smell the panic, smell the fear. It’s a smell you get to know damn well when you’re in my line of work, a smell that’s welcome when it comes from your enemy but depressing when it comes from a woman you’re attracted to. I’m makin’ her scared. Well . . . that’s my lot, ain’t it, scaring folks?
“Listen,” I say, “let me just tell you this. If you don’t take me to Les’ room, there’s a very real chance that thousands of people will die.” The fucked up this is, this isn’t even a lie. Darius has already killed tens of thousands through his chemical weapons sales; letting him run free will undoubtedly kill thousands more.
“Wait, what?” Lily looks me up and down as though seeing me for the first time. “What are you talking about?”
“There isn’t time,” I repeat, “but listen to me. If you take me to Les, there’s a chance that you could save those lives, alright? Now hand me those scrubs and let’s get going. Afterward, I’ll let you go.”
She watches me for a long time, perhaps to gauge if I’m lying, but she’s a nurse so of course she wants to save people, even if the saving is vague and confusing. After around half a minute, she turns around and grabs a large pair of scrubs, and then shoves them at my chest.
“Let’s go, then. I’ve got to get back to work.”
Chapter Eight
Lily
I have never felt like an intruder in the hospital. If anything, this place is my home, where I spend most of my time. I always feel comfortable here, even when I feel uncomfortable. If I’ve just been splattered by a particularly nasty wound, at least it happened in my hospital, and I know the quickest route to the nearest store cupboard, and there are friends and colleagues around me to console me. Now, as I lead Roman down the hallways, I feel like I’ve just broken in. Roman walks a few steps behind me, so it doesn’t look like we’re together. There’s nothing stopping me from just running to the nearest nurse or doctor and explaining what’s happening.
So why don’t I? Between the store cupboard and Les’ room, we pass three nurses I am relatively close to. It would be no great effort to quickly run over to one of them and tell them everything, point at Roman, and then call security. I am being kidnapped. Roman may not have his hands on me, or rope, or a binding of any kind, but I am technically being kidnapped. But that is naïve, and I know it. There’s something else to Roman, something that has nothing to do with being a madman in stolen scrubs. When he looked at me with those wolf-blue eyes and told me I could save people, I believed him. God help me, I really believed him. Maybe I’m going mad.
When we get to Les’ room, the hallway is deserted. Even the desk is deserted. It’s like a fire alarm has cleared everybody out of the building, but I didn’t hear any alarm. I turn to Roman. His face is knitted as he glances up and down the hallway. “Something isn’t right—” His eyes go wide, looking at something over my shoulder, and then he grabs me and rushes me into Les’ room. The windows are shut, the smell of a sleeping, sweating man potent in the air. Roman’s hands are firm on my shoulders. I am reminded, absurdly, of how firm they were that night over a month ago. I force that away, as he forces me into the adjoining bathroom to Les’ hospital suite.
“What are you doing?” I hiss.
“The police were sent after me,” Roman says, pulling the door almost completely shut, but leaving it open a sliver, “and now the same man who sent the blue fuckers after me has cleared this wing and sent some more fuckers after me—or Les.”
“Jesus Christ,” I say. I bring my hand to my chest, feel as my heart beats in a series of convulsions, which get quicker when I hear the footsteps: heavy footsteps, boot footsteps, just outside the room. “How did he clear the wing?” I mutter, mouth suddenly dry. My belly is a tight knot. I swallow down sick, try not to look at the toilet. If I’m sick, whoever is outside that door might hear me, and then . . . I swallow again.
“Be quiet,” Roman whispers.
I join him at the crack in the door. He is tall, so I have no problem finding a place. Through the crack, I can see Les’ bed and not much else, as though this is a movie and the director has framed the bed alone, highlighted it for effect. But what effect? I wonder. What possible effect could be produced from this? The footsteps get louder, and then the door creaks open, a long whine, a reminder that this hospital desperately needs new doors. The whine lengthens, so surely somebody will hear, surely somebody will come and stop this, whatever is about to happen. But if anybody hears, they do not come. The man enters the room and shuts the door behind him. He is not rushing by the sounds of it. That is the scariest thing. He is taking his sweet time.
Les is sleeping calmly in the bed, a vulnerable-looking ginger-haired man sweating through his gown with thin sheets draped over him and tubes sticking out of him, his heart monitor going beep-beep-beep, a sound so familiar to me I barely notice it until the possibility of this stranger ending it enters my mind. The stranger is still out of frame, but his foot
steps are so loud now, so confident, that I barely hear the pounding of my heart: even if the pounding has reached my head now.
When the man finally comes into view, I mistake him for a machine. I am tired after a long shift, after a day and a night of madness, the pregnancy, seeing Roman passed out with a gunshot wound. And so my tired, tired mind cannot accept that a man would be covered in so much metal. I see him, and immediately reconfigure him into some massive, heaving robot. This lasts for around ten seconds, as the man stands before us, facing Les, back to the bathroom door. Then I squint through my fear. I see that the metal is not the cogs of machinery, but a ridiculous number of firearms: two shotguns laid crossways across his back, two pistols tucked between the shotguns, a small machinegun at the back of his hip, two long pistols strapped to the back of his thighs, and two small sawn-off shotguns strapped to the back of his calves. It would be laughable, if it wasn’t so terrifying.
I want to run, just duck and run past him and out the door. Being this close to something that looks built for death is too much, but I know that if I run, it will be no difficult task for this man to select one of his many guns and blow me to nothingness. Where is everyone? Where are the police? Where is security? This man—or whoever this man works for—must have some serious connections to be able to completely clear a hospital wing on a weekday morning like this.
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