by Callie Hart
“Fuck no! Just sit tight. I got you covered.”
I don’t ask questions about that. Got you covered can only mean more shady characters stalking me through the streets of Seattle, lurking in the shadows. “Alright, Zeth,” I sigh. “Just get your ass back here the first second you get. I’m not cut out for this.” Which has to be the understatement of the century. Not cut out for waiting. Not cut out for babysitting. It may seem big to others, the hospital, the vast number of patients I see every time I walk through the doors, the responsibility and the weight of all that knowledge pressing down on me, but I have made my world small. No outside requirements of me, nothing demanding much of anything at all from me besides getting up with my alarm and being there when I’m needed. Being there accounts for the majority of my day. The right person to be there when a pair of hands are needed inside the chest cavity of a wounded person. The right person to be there when an arterial bleed needs stemming. But that’s all physical, logical, manual stuff. I can do that. I’m hollow enough for that. But the other side of things—the nerves I haven’t allowed myself to feel properly when I consider getting Alexis back; the pressure of trying to be there for Lacey in an emotional sense…that’s something I have no idea how to deal with.
Zeth makes a stiff sound down the phone. “You’re gonna do just fine, Sloane,” he tells me, his voice softer than I’ve heard it before. And then he hangs up the phone.
******
Lacey’s story makes me sick to my stomach. I try to leave Pippa and the other woman alone so they can have their session together, but she reaches out and grabs hold of my hand with frightening strength. It seems that she doesn’t like strangers, and out of Pip and me I’m the familiar face. I plant myself on the other end of the couch, determined to remain impervious to whatever I hear, but that becomes increasingly difficult as Pippa asks Lacey question after question and the girl answers in a stiff, emotionless voice.
“You were raised by the state. What happened to your parents?”
They died before I was born.
“But…how could your mom have died before you were born?”
She was in a coma. Technically she was dead for the last three weeks of the pregnancy. As soon as her body gave birth to me, they let her go.
And after that?
Foster homes.
How many?
Seventeen all up. Some I stayed in a couple of months. Some just days. I stayed in the last one a year.
Why so long in the last one?
Gregory liked to have me around. I was useful to him.
In what way?
Cooking and cleaning. Sex whenever he wanted it.
So you were in a consensual relationship with the man?
Not really.
Not really?
No. It wasn’t consensual.
He raped you?
Silence.
Sometimes a mind can just not bend around a word. The word rape is like a paralytic to Lacey’s system. She just shuts down. Goes to staring out of the window, blinking slowly.
“Was he the first?” Pippa asks.
Lacey’s blonde hair brushes her shoulders as she shakes her head.
No, Gregory had not been the first.
After that Pippa backs off, sensing she’s walking a fine line, on the brink of the girl withdrawing entirely. She asks other questions: why is she afraid to be alone? Can she share why she is so attached to Zeth? But all Lacey does is shrug and tell her that she doesn’t know why. After a torturous forty-minute session, Pippa nods her head and gets up from the armchair she was sitting in.
“Alright, ladies. I think we should call it a day, don’t you? I’m exhausted.”
Lacey’s eyes flicker back to life, rising to glance at Pippa. “What, that’s it? You don’t want me to tell you anything else?”
Pip gives her a friendly smile. “Not if you don’t want to. You can tell me anything you want to, though.”
“No, that’s—that’s fine.” Lacey loosens her grip on the edge of the throw she still has over her legs. “I think I’d like to go now.”
“No problem.” Pippa holds her hand out to Lacey, offering it to her to shake. Lacey looks at it like the gesture is some kind of trick. The handshake was designed all those hundreds of years ago to demonstrate that a person wasn’t carrying any weapons; the same trick works here between Lacey and Pippa—I mean you no harm. The timid blonde reaches out to accept the patiently waiting hand. A dam seems to break in Lacey, and tears spring to her eyes. She doesn’t say anything, just gets up, tidily folds the blanket away and exits the apartment, standing on the other side of the open door, presumably waiting for me.
“She’s got a long road ahead of her,” Pippa murmurs to me. “She has a lot to work through. I get the impression that she’s blocking most of it out.”
“What? So the rape isn’t the worst of it?”
A sad, pained look develops on Pip’s face. “Probably not. Make sure you keep an eye on her, okay? Ideally she’d be institutionalized and placed on suicide watch at least for a little while.”
I’m already shaking my head, no. “He won’t—”
“I know he won’t,” she interrupts. “But this isn’t about him. It’s about her and what she needs. Right now she’s somehow managed to bond herself to this guy, which is probably the most unhealthy thing she could have done. This time with him away is a good opportunity to try and break that connection.” She gives me a hesitant look. “And also a good opportunity for you to do the same.”
I gape at her. “I’m not bonded to him.”
Her lips pull into a tight line: worry. “Not right now, maybe, but I think it could happen, babe. Way easier than you think it could. Don’t forget,” she says, pausing, “I have met this man.”
I arrive at Julio’s compound at nightfall. Somewhere in the city, Rick’s waiting impatiently for direction from me. Michael, my most trusted guy, is already here too, having been watching the compound for me since he learned of Alexis’s presence. The place is way out in the boonies, skirted with a ten-foot-high concrete wall that encircles the whole place apart from the front entrance, which bears a fierce-looking wrought-iron gate with formidable spikes on the top. No fucker gets in or out of here, if not without Julio’s direct say-so, then at least without him knowing about it. Two beefy guards smoke joints by the gateway, scowling at me with dark eyes as I pull the Camaro up out front. Their hands move to the blatant weapons they carry in their waistbands as I step out of the car.
“Turn around, hombre. This ain’t the ’burbs. You ain’t got no business here,” the short, fat one tells me. I arch an eyebrow.
“Sure I do. I got open an ticket with Julio.” The other man spits on the floor, and then draws deeply on his joint. The smell of pot blossoms in the night air. “We ain’t got no white boys on the guest list tonight, brother. You need to go on home.”
I walk straight up to the railings of the gate and press my face close to the bars. “Better check your list again, brother.”
The two of them look at each other. I’m not driving a Benz, so I’m obviously not their regular clientele. The size of me doesn’t seem to be doing me any favors, either. A tense minute follows—them staring at me and me staring right back at them—before the tall one tuts disapprovingly and turns his back, mumbling in Spanish into a small walkie-talkie. He quickly turns back around and gestures upward with his chin. “Smile for the camera, pendejo.”
I see a camera mounted onto the wall to my right swivel to an angle, which encompasses me fully; I plaster a fake grin on my face, broad and arrogant, and then proceed to flip it off.
Rushed Spanish bursts out of the walkie-talkie in the taller guy’s hand; the voice sounds angry. Both guards’ faces solidify into aggravated steel—sorry motherfuckers!—as they open the gate for me. I get back into the Camaro and make sure to spin the dusty desert sand up into their faces as I burn past them. Outside the huge, single-story building that lies within the walls, a dark, li
the shape paces down the steps to meet me. The figure of a woman. I park up and take a moment to get my story straight in my head: I’m just passing through, looking for a place to crash. Charlie knows all about this.
In reality Charlie has no fucking idea I’m here. Charlie has no fucking idea I’ve even left Seattle, or that I decided to go against orders and didn’t kill Rick like I was supposed to. My mood is still blacker than black over the prospect that the old man might have told the police I was the man who killed Murphy. If I’d seen his fucking face before I left, I would have beaten down on it until his whole head had caved in.
The woman in the tiny, skin-tight dress that comes out to meet me is Alaska. I remember her from the last time I was here with Charlie. Or more specifically I remember her tits. She’d danced for me; Julio had insisted. Girl has exotic blood in her, should have been an Olympic gymnast. She splits me a wide smile as I make my way toward the building.
“So you eventually come back to see me, huh?” she laughs. “Only took you four years.”
Four years wasn’t long enough away from this place. She places her hands against my chest as she leans up to kiss my cheek. I bear it as long as I can. The woman’s a whore, and I don’t let whores touch me. Not like they wanna drop to their knees and blow me where I stand, anyway, which is how she’s touching me right now. I take her by the wrists and remove her hands.
“Just came to pay my respects to your boss,” I snap out. She pouts, pretending to be offended by my rejection.
“I’m a lot friendlier than Julio tonight. Come on, come inside and I’ll keep you to myself for an hour before you go talk boring business.” I just look at her. Her coy smile fades as she reads exactly what I think of her offer clearly written on my features. “I see,” she says. Raising both eyebrows and tipping her head to one side, she points back inside the well-lit building. “He’s by the pool. Don’t get lost finding it.” She turns and storms back into the building, hips swinging, fizzing with fury.
I find Julio exactly where she said he would be, sitting on a lounger by the pool. He sips from a cut-glass tumbler, grinning when he sees me. He’s put on even more weight since I saw him last, and the fat fucker was already obese to begin with. Probably on the verge of coronary failure by now.
“Zeth! My good friend!” His accent is thick, laden with his heritage. “Why have you waited so long to come see me, huh?” He doesn’t rise from the lounger. Just holds his hand up for me to take hold of in some semblance of a shake. He points to the lounger beside me, groaning as he reaches across to his other side for the tumbler of amber liquid. Smells like whiskey. He free pours three fingers into another glass and holds it out to me. I accept; I’d be shitting on his hospitality otherwise. Bad start to an already precarious meeting.
“Where’s that ugly English bastard? He come down here with you?” Julio wheezes.
“No, I’m flying solo. Long drive to Las Flores. Thought you might lend me a bed for the night,” I tell him casually. “Maybe I could impose on your hospitality two or three nights if you’re feeling really generous. There are a few old friends I wouldn’t mind catching up with while I’m in the area.”
Julio takes a deep sip from his glass, dark brown eyes pensively studying me over the rim of the glass. He probably thinks Charlie’s sent me down here to spy on his business. These bastards pretend to be thicker than thieves but the reality of it is, they don’t trust each other one fucking iota. Which, by default, means that Julio doesn’t trust me, either. “Sure thing, my friend. My house is your house as the Spanish say,” he says, laughing at the fact that he says it in English instead of his native tongue. I look behind the smile, though, and catch what I’m looking for: suspicion.
“You’re very kind.” I drink from the glass—definitely whiskey—savoring the burn.
“You’re timing is also impeccable, my friend,” Julio says softly. “If you stay until Tuesday, you’ll be able to attend our little event.” The emphasis on the final word tells me exactly what kind of an event he’s referring to. The kind I used to hold myself until recently. Until Sloane. “I got plenty of fresh meat ready to be well seasoned,” he laughs. His belly shakes like a half-deflated waterbed. “This one’s a bit different, though. You gotta bring someone to the table if you get what I mean. If not for touching then at least for looking at.” He gives me an exaggerated wink, the jowls of his cheeks swinging like a basset hound’s. “I doubt you’ll have any problem finding someone to come with you.”
Tuesday. If Alexis is here, then she will definitely be attending a party like that. Today’s only Friday, though. I hadn’t really planned on staying that long. I’ll just have to make sure I run into the girl before then. I nod, taking a healthy swig from the whiskey. “Yeah. I doubt I’ll have a problem.”
******
The sleek black car follows me from the highway all the way to St Peter’s. Lacey sees it first—I’m literally having to take her to work with me, which is all kinds of fucked—and points it out as I drive. It doesn’t pull into the parking lot behind me, but draws up on the curb outside the coffee shop across from the hospital, the engine cutting as we get out of the Volvo and make our way to the entrance. The generic-looking dark vehicle has blacked-out windows so it’s impossible to see inside, although Lacey seems to have a good idea who it is.
“That’s one of Charlie’s boys for sure,” she announces. She’s way more nonchalant over this tail than I am; I’m on the verge of bolting inside the hospital and hiding in a cleaning closet or something. “Bet they’re there when we leave,” she adds.
“If they’re there when we leave, I’m calling the cops.”
She snorts. “Good luck with that.”
“What do you mean?”
Pulling one shoulder up to the side, she looks at me like I’m stupid, eyes rolling. “The cops are all in someone’s pocket. Mostly Charlie’s. They probably wouldn’t even show up, let alone do anything about it.”
Well there’s a worrying piece of news. It feels like I’ve been sucked into a 1950s gangster movie, except this is real. And not being able to call the cops? Just great. Seriously. Just great.
I deposit Lacey in an on-call room. I’m already nearly late for my own rounds, so I don’t have time to baby her when I leave.
“Don’t step one foot out of this room, okay,” I command. “There are plenty of people who’ll recognize you and that’s the last thing I need. Zeth’ll murder me if you get sectioned while I’m here at work.” Fucking Zeth. The guy has done nothing but cause me problems, really. If he hadn’t killed Eli, then I might have gotten the information I was after, and Alexis would already be back home, safe and sound, heading to church with Mom and Dad every weekend. Playing the piano to accompany the choir and the singing parishioners. I try to hold on to my anger a moment, but it fizzles out like an extinguished firework when my mind veers from its wrath and decides to remember other things instead. Like his painfully big cock teasing me as he readied to push inside me. His deep brown eyes watching my expression closely as he sank himself as deep as he could, groaning under his breath.
Shit.
Lacey sits on the bed looking moderately anxious as I hurry off to get into my scrubs before nearly late transforms into actually late. Everyone thinks the interns are under the most pressure to perform, but that’s not entirely true. It’s just as easy to get booted from the residency program if you’re behind in your work. And being tardy is kind of frowned upon, too. As is bringing a twenty-six-year-old woman who needs constant babysitting to work with you.
I make it through rounds, on time thankfully, and I see the patients who have been admitted on my day off. Punctured lung, congenital heart defect, septicemia. Everything is relatively serious today. Serious enough that I have to spend a considerable amount of time with each patient, assessing their progress and filling out the necessary paperwork for their records and meds. It’s midday by the time I finally get the chance to lock myself in the bathroom and text Zeth.<
br />
Your friends followed me to work this morning.
A minute passes before the phone chimes in my hand.
Zeth: What happened?
Rcv’d 12:48 pm
Me: Nothing. They just followed us. Parked out front. What do you mean, what happened? Is something going to happen?
Zeth: Doubtful.
Rcv’d 12:51
And then…
Zeth: You okay?
Rcv’d 12:51
I should tell him the truth: no, I’m not okay! But that wouldn’t serve any real purpose. Plus for some reason I don’t want to look weak in front of him. If I admit to being frightened of his thug business colleagues, then it feels the same as admitting I’m frightened of him. And no way am I admitting that. He knows I am, but I’ll never own up to it. I’m in the middle of typing a long, strongly worded text back to him when the phone starts ringing in my hand. I pick up, frowning.
“What?!”
“You didn’t reply. When someone asks you if you’re okay after telling them you’re being watched, it’s usually a good idea to confirm you’re still alive,” he reprimands me in his deep, gravel-filled voice.
“I was replying to—urgh!” I don’t even bother. “What can you do about these guys eating donuts outside the hospital?”
“Nothing.” His voice is flat and unconcerned.
“What? They’re your boss’s men, right? Don’t you get along with any of these guys?”
That makes him laugh—a rumble that teases its way into my ear and makes me shiver. “We all tend to keep out of each other’s way. Charlie prefers it like that.”
“Well what am I supposed to do if they follow me home when I’m done here?” I ask. The thought of going home and sitting in that big house on the hill with only Lacey for protection isn’t exactly a reassuring one.
“You’re gonna be fine,” he tells me. “I got boys looking after you. Besides, they’re just watching. And if one of them breaks into your house, just stab them.”