Rouse (Revenge Book 7)

by Trevion Burns

  Accidentally or otherwise.

  That morning, however, her streak—a streak that had garnered much resentment from her unintentionally murderous colleagues—was coming to an end.

  Because Todd Lockwood had to die.

  And he had to die today.

  Veda smoothed her pink scrubs as she approached the hospital’s welcome desk to sign in for her shift, still juggling with the how. As a hospital employee, gaining access to Todd would be easy. The real question was how? How to go about killing him? How to get away with it with her job still intact? She couldn’t just walk into his room and pull the plug, no matter how much she’d enjoy doing just that.

  No.

  It had to look like an accident.

  But how?

  Coming to a stop at the welcome desk, Veda raised her eyebrows at Latika, the hospital’s head nurse, wearing Looney Toons scrubs. It wasn’t the cartoon scrubs that put the small smile on Veda’s face, however, but Latika herself. Less than two years out from her retirement and pension, it was a rare occasion when Latika gave a shit about anything. So at that moment, as she signed her name into the employee logbook, Veda found herself surprised at the flustered look on Latika’s face as she shuffled through the many stacks of patient charts behind the welcome desk. Latika ignored the phone that hadn’t stopped ringing since Veda had walked in, huffing as she hurried around the desk like a madwoman. Her rectangular glasses had slid down to the very bridge of her nose, the tip of which was dotted with sweat. The rest of her ebony skin gleamed with sweat as well.

  Veda’s eyes widened at the sight.

  Latika?

  Breaking a sweat?

  Veda had seen patients on the verge of death, clinging to life on God’s good humor, every precious second a matter of life and death, and Latika still took her sweet time strolling to their room with the crash cart, checking her nails the entire way.

  “Everything okay?” Veda asked.

  Latika shot Veda a look over the rims of her glasses but didn’t respond.

  She didn’t need to. Her face said it all.

  Veda dropped the pen after she’d signed in. “What can I take off your hands?”

  “Everything,” Latika grumbled. “Five of my nurses have called in in the last hour, and I know if I pick up this phone—” She jammed her manicured fingernail at the ringing phone. “It’s gonna be another one.”

  “So don’t pick up the phone,” Veda laughed.

  “Wasn’t planning on it, sweetness…” Latika’s voice faded away when a fellow nurse, one of the few who hadn’t called in, a blonde with a high ponytail tied to the side of her head, came barreling into the desk.

  “Todd Lockwood’s awake,” the blonde said, breathlessly. “Student nurse says he’s struggling to speak and seems to be in a lot of pain.”

  Veda’s heart zoomed to a stop. Todd was awake? Trying to speak? She could only imagine the words that were fighting to gurgle their way out of his lips right then. Something along the lines of, “It was Coco! Do you hear me? Coco Lockwood stabbed me in the neck—repeatedly! Arrest her! Throw her under the prison!”

  The blonde nurse slammed a vial of fentanyl on the desk. “I was thinking fentanyl but wanted to double check with you. 25 or 50 mgs? I’m worried 50 might put him right back into a coma.”

  “I’ll handle it!” Veda cried.

  Both nurses snapped their wide eyes to Veda, clearly taken aback at a doctor offering to lower herself—perhaps a little too enthusiastically—to performing nursely duties.

  Clearing her throat, Veda smoothed her scrubs with clammy palms. “I’ll take care of Todd. You guys have your hands full. Just tell me what room.”

  The blonde pushed off the desk, turned and raced away, leaving behind the vial of fentanyl while shouting a hurried thank you over her shoulder, as if determined to get the hell out of dodge before Veda came to her senses.

  “Oh, sweetness,” Latika breathed. “You’re a lifesaver.” She shuffled through the charts once more before launching one at Veda. “Room 103. Give him 25 mgs of fentanyl to help with the pain.”

  Veda took the chart and the vial while fighting the smirk begging to spread on her lips. As she made her way through the halls toward Todd’s room, the smile finally bloomed. All morning she’d been struggling with how to kill this piece of shit while keeping her job intact—how to make it look like an accident—and the solution to that problem had been placed squarely in her hands. Nobody could convince her there wasn’t a God up above who was enjoying the shit out of everything she was doing. He was making it way too easy!

  The moment she let herself believe the God’s were on her side, however, the thought of Gage hit her like a bulldozer and sank her stomach like the Titanic. The same way it had been since the moment she’d woken up that morning. Thoughts of him came in waves, and the worry nearly ate her alive. Perhaps the God’s weren’t really on her side after all. Perhaps they saw all this madness as a simple give and take. You take Todd—we take Gage.

  Eye for an eye.

  The thought nearly stopped Veda dead in her tracks. It stole her breath and caused tears to burn her eyes. She slammed them closed and begged for focus.

  Focus on what you can control.

  She tried to focus on that thought—to play it on repeat—but Gage’s face still managed to slip through, fighting hard to distract her.

  As she entered room 103, however, and caught sight of Todd, tucked under the blankets of his bed in a wrinkled hospital gown with his blue eyes wide open and staring vacantly at the ceiling, she regained focus. The gauze taped to his neck was in desperate need of changing, soaked in blood. She was sure the rest of his dressings needed just as much attention. His dirty blonde hair, usually gelled up into a perfect swoop, was limp against his sweaty forehead. One corner of his mouth was lazy, collapsed as if he’d just gotten a shot of novocaine at the dentist. But still he mumbled and grumbled incoherently through the corner of his mouth as he turned his head on the pillow and caught sight of Veda.

  She approached the end table at the foot of the bed, sitting his medical chart and the vial of fentanyl on top of it.

  Todd’s blue eyes widened once Veda was at the foot of his bed. “Go,” he slurred. “Gooo!”

  “Go?” Veda beamed, unwrapping a fresh syringe and sticking the sharp end into the vial of fentanyl, filling it to the hilt. “But I’m the one who has the drugs.” The drugs that are going to kill your sorry ass for good.

  “Gooo,” Todd drew in a strangled breath, kicking his feet under the blankets, a sheen of sweat covering every inch of his skin. “Go!”

  “Are you sure you want me to go?” Veda showed him the syringe in her hand as she set the empty vial back on the end table and circled the bed, moving to the IV bag hanging at his bedside. “I’m the only one who can make the pain go away.”

  “Go. Go.” Todd sighed heavily, as if exasperated. “Go. Go.”

  And it hit Veda. He wasn’t telling her to leave.

  He wasn’t saying go go.

  No.

  He was saying, Coco.

  “Go-go,” A stream of drool dribbled from Todd’s lips.

  “I’m so sorry, Mr. Lockwood, I don’t understand.” Veda beamed, lips puckered and brows pinched.

  “Go-go!”

  “Gogo? Like… gogo dancer? Gogo wireless?” She gasped. “Gogo gadget arms!”

  “Gogo!” he garbled. The more stupefied Veda’s expression, the higher his voice rose, and the harder his feet kicked. “Go-go! Go-go!”

  “Okay. I think someone’s getting a little delirious,” Veda sang, using the same tone she’d use with a toddler who wouldn’t go down for his nap. “But I’ve got just the ticket.”

  Todd continued crying out go-go, much to Veda’s amusement. She refocused on the IV bag, getting to work doing the only thing that would amuse her more—watching him breathe his last breath. His screams were reduced to a dull muffle in her ears as she opened the valve at the bottom of the drip chamber
, where there was a quick connect slot for her to enter the syringe and add the fentanyl. In seconds the drug would travel through the tube and enter his bloodstream through the needle that had been placed in his arm, secured by two pieces of medical tape.

  Latika had instructed Veda to only give him 25 mgs, and Veda understood why. Fentanyl was great for managing a patient’s pain, but it was also great for knocking a patient the fuck out if used incorrectly. Any dosage over 25 mgs was playing with fire when administered to a man who had just woken from a coma.

  Veda understood that, which was why she let her thumb live on the lever of that syringe well after the point of 25 mgs. She kept pressing, kept injecting until she hit 50 mgs.

  100 mgs.

  150 mgs.

  Todd’s slurred speech grew even more incomprehensible. More spittle flew from his lips as he struggled to speak. His blue eyes began to slowly flutter as the drug entered his veins. His head bobbed as if it weighed a thousand tons, and a gleam of confusion flashed across his face as his gaze traveled to a faraway place.

  By the time the vital machine next to the bed began to beep out of control, warning Veda that Todd was on the verge in respiratory distress, his eyes had already fluttered closed, his head collapsing back onto the pillow. With any other patient, the sound of that rapid beeping would’ve driven Veda into a panic, racing to intubate and get his breathing under control all while screaming for a crash cart. But at that moment, the beeping was music to her ears, because it represented Todd’s rapid descent. A descent into the fiery pits of hell where he belonged. Into the fate he’d been begging for, for ten long years.

  The fate she should’ve bestowed upon him when she’d first had the chance.

  The fate that would spare Coco another day of being forced to look upon his disgusting face.

  A fate that would spare Coco’s life.

  Todd’s life meant Coco’s safety—her sanity—which meant Veda could breathe easily once more, knowing she hadn’t pulled yet another person into the turbulent tornado of destruction that was her life. She hadn’t been able to save Gage. She hadn’t been able to save Linc. She sure as hell hadn’t been able to save herself.

  But at least she could save Coco.

  A small smile had been working its way onto Veda’s lips before the door to Todd’s room flew open behind her. The moment a brunette nurse charged in, looking stunned, Veda wiped the smile from her face and began to gasp, fanning her hands in front of her body while doing everything she could to blink out a few alligator tears.

  The nurse raced up to the opposite side of the bed, her wide eyes drinking in Todd before flying accusingly up to Veda. “Jesus, Dr. Vandyke, what the hell happened?”

  “I don’t know!” Veda cried, inhaling and exhaling rapidly, as if having an asthma attack, still fighting the pleased smile begging to bloom as Todd appeared to go into anaphylactic shock. “I don’t know!”

  “What did you give him?” the nurse roared.

  “Just 25 milligrams of fentanyl!” Veda howled.

  The nurse snatched up the empty vial of fentanyl Veda had left sitting on the end table, read the label, and then held it up to her. “Or 250 micrograms. My God, can’t you read?” the nurse screamed. “That’s a thousand times the intended dosage!”

  “Oh my God!” Veda tried to feign shock and hoped she was succeeding because even as she tried to make her face frown, every bone inside her was dancing, throwing streamers, and shooting fireworks. “Oh God, what did I do?” Please die, her mind begged as the nurse got to work intubating Todd in an attempt to resuscitate him. “Oh fuck, what have I done?” Please, please die. “Is he gonna be okay?” Please die slow, you fucking piece of shit.

  “Just go!” the nurse yelled, shooting Veda another sour look as she succeeded in intubating. Several more nurses and doctors raced in, surrounding the bed in seconds while gently nudging Veda aside.

  Veda stumbled away from the bed with both hands clapped over her mouth. Not because she was in real shock, but because her smile had finally won a war long fought, and she couldn’t risk anyone seeing it.

  The nurse cut her eyes at Veda as several hands flew all over Todd’s body, doing everything they could to save him. “Go, Dr. Vandyke. We’ve got this…”

  The doctor who’d just run in lifted his eyes to Veda, face full of judgment.

  “I’m so sorry…” Veda continued stumbling backward, the hands she still had over her mouth muffling her words. “I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry, I’m so sorry…”

  She kept up that three worded chant until she was out the door and in the hallway, waiting until she’d left their line of sight to drop her hands from her mouth and free the smile on her face, letting it bloom to its fullest potential. She was barely able to fight back the cackle that tried to climb up her throat to join in on the fun.

  As she moved down the hall, the beeping of Todd’s vital machine continued to float out into the hallway behind her, putting a little pep in her step as she strutted along to the beat.

  12

  Veda was no longer the envy of every doctor at Shadow Rock Hospital. Her epic spree had finally come to its long anticipated, completely inevitable end.

  She’d just killed her first patient.

  Blasting open the door of the pharmacy with a beaming smile, Veda stepped inside the cool room with her arms spread wide. Kicking the door closed behind her, a deep sigh left her lips as she locked eyes with her best friend, Jake Jones, sitting in a rolly chair behind the pharmacy desk in a white lab coat.

  Jake lifted his eyebrows while removing a pen from between his teeth, shaking his shaggy blonde hair out of his eyes. “Well, don’t you look like a fat kid eating cake on Christmas morning.” Jake’s voice was high-pitched by nature, in the way only a man who was a hundred pounds soaking wet could pull off. “What are you so damn happy about? You know there’s no fun allowed around here.”

  Still grinning, Veda approached, eyeing the stacks of medications that lined the bright room as she plopped on the edge of Jake’s desk, swinging her legs over the edge. For a moment, she surveyed the hospital personnel passing by outside of the large plexiglass window that separated the pharmacy from the hospital hallway, extending from one end of the wall to the other.

  And just like that, the smile vanished from her face.

  “That’s more like it,” Jake muttered. “You’d better fix your face. This is a No-Smile Zone.”

  “I just remembered my boyfriend is still at large,” Veda said. “Jesus. And here I am, celebrating.”

  “What are we celebrating?”

  “I was celebrating the fact that Todd Lockwood is never waking up. But now I realize what an asshole that makes me. Swear to God, every time I have a win, the universe never fails to swoop right in with the lose to balance things out. God forbid I bask in a single moment of happiness.”

  Jake frowned with a shake of his head. “Okay, rewind. I feel like you’re talking to me about something I know nothing about. Where’s Gage?”

  “I don’t know.” Veda sucked in a breath. “Last night was… one of the craziest nights of my life. I don’t even know where to begin. It’s like I’ve been launched into some alternate universe—”

  “You mean you haven’t been in an alternate universe this whole time?”

  She smirked. “If you’d asked me that yesterday, the answer would’ve been a resounding yes. But last night makes my entire fucked up life look like a Full House re-run. Let’s see…” She began counting off on her fingers. “A can of underage kids was found—”

  “God, I heard. News says there were 23 kids in there. Said they’d been in there for at least ten days. Did you see the footage? Some of those poor babes were so dehydrated they couldn’t even move their little bones. Had to be lifted out by police. Fucking driver shot himself. Coward.”

  “The driver shot himself before someone else got the chance. Probably the same person who’s looking to hand my boyfriend the same fate.”

 
Jake’s eyebrows pulled.

  Veda spoke to the confusion on his face. “Gage is the one who found the kids. On the Celeste. No one would’ve even known they existed if not for him. Now he’s on the run to God knows where, and there’s nothing I can do.”

  “But the news said the shipping container was on the back of a truck? Stopped at a roadblock?”

  “Gage found the kids at the bottom of the boat, but he had to leave the scene for his own safety. By the time the police got there, the container was gone. The roadblock was set up by SRPD after Linc convinced his lieutenant that the Port Police were crooked. That they had the container moved from the ship and loaded onto a truck once word got out that a witness had laid eyes on it. He believes the Port Authority was in on it.”

  “Fuck,” Jake spat.

  “And now, Gage is the only person alive who can testify to what he saw—which means he’s dead on arrival.” Veda stared ahead, her breathing having picked up exponentially as she thought of her boyfriend’s spit-shined face and the fact that there was now someone out there dead-set on leaving it with a few extra scratches than it had started with. “I told him not to do this,” she whispered. “I begged him.”

  “You haven’t heard from him at all?”

  “He called Linc’s burner phone and left a message this morning. So, wherever he is, he’s still alive. The problem is keeping it that way.”

  “He called Linc but not you?”

  Veda met his eyes. “We’re still pretending we’re not together, remember? He agreed to rekindle his engagement to Scarlett Covington to convince his father to give him a job at the cruise line. He thought it would make it easier to find the truth about his family, and he was right. I tried to call the burner he used to call Linc, but no answer. He probably already got rid of it.”

  “Wow…” Jake leaned back in his chair, straightening his white lab coat before clasping his hands in his lap. “I’m really sorry, bub.”

  “I just feel so helpless. Gage. Coco. Linc. Linc—broke down crying in my arms last night because his wife just died. Just another reason to add to the ever-extensive list of what an asshole I was for smiling a minute earlier.” She frowned into the distance.