Wounded

by Laurell K. Hamilton

  "How dare you bring a dangerous weapon into my son's wedding?"

  "You do know I'm a U.S. Marshal, right?" I was having to really work at the smile now.

  "I don't see what difference that makes."

  "First, I've had firearms training, so trust me, it's a lot safer on me than in the coat room."

  "It's my son's wedding, and I don't feel safe with it in the room, so I'm going to have to ask you to put it in with the coats."

  "Second, I am required by law to be able to respond in a satisfactory manner if an emergency arises, and that may require a gun."

  "I must insist that you take that thing out of this wedding reception."

  "The only way to do that is to leave the reception altogether, Mrs. Conroy."

  "I don't know why you're being difficult, Ms. Blake; just put the thing away where it's not a danger to everyone."

  "It's not a danger to anyone on my hip, but handing it over to a coat-check girl who probably has never handled a gun in her life makes it a serious threat to her and others."

  "You're just being stubborn."

  "No, I'm telling you that legally and responsibly I cannot give up my sidearm to a civilian stranger because you're having a moment."

  "I'll send my husband over to speak with you about this."

  "You do that; it won't change my answer. A gun is not a magic wand, Mrs. Conroy; it isn't a danger just by being near people, it's only a danger when it's in the hands of someone who has no training, or not enough training."

  "I'm sending my husband over."

  "Suit yourself."

  "You are spoiling this reception."

  "I'm doing what I'm legally required to do; you're the one who's being difficult."

  "It's my son's wedding."

  "It's my friend's daughter's wedding, too."

  "I'll tell Rosita what you're doing."

  "Go ahead, she'll be on my side."

  "She will see it as a danger to her children and everyone here, just like I do. For heaven's sake, her son was just shot this month."

  Since I'd been one of the people who saved Tomas and made sure the bad guy got shot dead for his troubles, I thought her argument lacked validity. "You obviously haven't heard all the story," I said.

  "I've heard enough."

  I shook my head. "Go tell Rosita that you want me to give up my gun to the coat-check girl; go on."

  She gave me a doubtful look, not liking how sure I was that Rosita wouldn't agree with her. "I'm telling Rosita and Manuel and sending my husband over," she repeated.

  I'd never heard anyone call Manny Manuel before, though I knew it was his first name. "You do what you think best, Mrs. Conroy."

  She huffed off with a billow of long blue skirts. The groomsmen had all been in black tuxedos, white shirts, and royal-blue ties and cummerbunds. The bridesmaids were in royal blue, which looked good on everyone. The dresses hadn't even been too horrible; they didn't look good on everyone, but they didn't make anyone look like a blue flower had exploded all over them and then frozen in place.

  Nathaniel came over to me smiling, tie undone and a few buttons open to show more of the strong lines of his throat and just a hint of chest. "Great DJ," he said.

  I kissed him, and he hugged me close enough that I could bury my head against his chest. I let him wrap me in the warmth and vanilla scent of him. He always smelled like vanilla to me, which was part his choice of shampoo, soap, and such, but underneath that it was just the sweet scent of him. I wasn't sure if it was the vanilla, but I remembered a snow day before my mother died when we'd made sugar cookies and spent the day decorating them. That was how he made me feel, like my mother's sugar cookies on the perfect snow day, when there was icing everywhere to lick, and spread over those hot cookies, and my mother was still alive and smiling down at me. It seemed silly that someone who made me think of sex almost every time I touched him made me remember my mother and a snow day, but he did, in that moment he did.

  He pulled back from the hug first, which was unusual, but when he put out one arm I knew why he'd done it. Micah was there to walk into the other side of Nathaniel's hug. Micah put his face next to mine and we wrapped an arm around each other, the other one going around Nathaniel's waist. He was five foot nine, so we both fit under his arms, our faces pressed against each other so I could nuzzle Micah's face while Nathaniel leaned down over both of us. Micah smelled warm and spicy like cinnamon and things I couldn't name, and suddenly I was back in my mother's warm kitchen. She'd fixed us Mexican hot chocolate that day, a mix of regular American hot cocoa and that much spicier, darker, richer drink. She'd made it full strength for herself, so dark it was bitter. I could still remember the taste she'd let me have, but mine had been sweet chocolate with a hint of the spices and heat of hers. Micah's skin smelled like exotic spices, cinnamon, and dark, rich chocolate, and a memory that I'd almost forgotten. My mother would die the summer after that snow day. I'd been eight.

  I held them as close as I could and for some reason I felt my throat tighten, my eyes hot with tears that weren't quite falling yet. Micah said, "Are you crying?"

  "Almost," I said.

  "What's wrong?" he asked.

  "Nothing, absolutely nothing."

  "So why the tears?"

  I looked from him up to Nathaniel, and the first tear slid down. They both looked worried until I laughed and quoted something Nathaniel said sometimes back to both of them: "Sometimes you're so happy you can't hold it all in and it spills out your eyes."

  They smiled and hugged me then. I finally broke from the hug, dabbing carefully at my eyes so I didn't smear the eyeliner. I didn't usually wear this much, but Nathaniel liked it when I dressed up top to bottom; he'd taught me to dab at my eye makeup, not just rub and smear it. Having boyfriends who wore makeup onstage had made me much better at the girly side of being a woman.

  "I hate to be the one who breaks such a great mood, but Tomas is really hurting."

  Neither of us asked if he meant the gunshot wound, because that was a given, but it wasn't what Micah meant. Nathaniel asked, "How can we help him?"

  "What he said," I said.

  "We need to talk to Manny first."

  I looked up to scan the crowd, but the dance floor was full again and I was too short, even in heels, to see over everyone. Micah didn't even have the heels, so it was Nathaniel who started leading us around the edge of the floor. We just trusted he'd seen Manny and followed him.

  He was dancing with Rosita, his head resting on her generous bosom like it was his favorite pillow. She looked embarrassed and pleased, as if she felt torn between setting a good example and enjoying the fact that after nearly thirty years of marriage they still danced like teenagers at a prom in need of a chaperone.

  Nathaniel put his arms around both of us and said, "I want us to be like that in twenty years."

  I gave him a one-armed hug, resting my head against his chest. "I can't imagine twenty years in the future, but yes, yes."

  Micah smiled at Nathaniel, but there was something in his eyes that didn't match the happiness of the moment; maybe it was talking to Tomas? "Twenty years is a long time, but I'll do my best."

  If Nathaniel heard the hesitation in his tone, he didn't show it. He just gazed at the happy couple, face almost shining with the potential of marital bliss that could really last for a lifetime. I caught Micah's gaze, and he said, "I hate to interrupt them with serious things."

  Ah, he didn't want to ruin their happy moment or take any of the joy out of Connie's wedding day. Me, either. "Can it wait?" I asked.

  He thought about it very seriously, the weightiness of it darkening his face, filling his leopard eyes with thoughts that would never go through the eyes of a real cat. They didn't weigh other people's happiness against their immediate needs, or maybe they did; I was more a dog person.

  He nodded.

  "I'm still looking for someone who makes me feel like that," a voice behind us said. It startled me, but neither of the
men reacted; maybe they'd heard her coming. Mercedes Rodriguez, maid of honor, looked great in the royal-blue dress. The color made her skin seem even darker, as if she had that perfect, dark tan that other people risked skin cancer trying to achieve. She had her mother's height but her father's slenderness, so that she looked model-like, but with too much of her mother's curves to truly look like a modern model. The vampires in my life had told me that thinness that extreme was only for the poorest of people, those who couldn't afford food. If you had money, you didn't starve yourself. Times change, I guess.

  The last time I'd seen Mercedes had been in the hospital with Tomas. She'd looked younger and a lot less finished. Today with full makeup, she looked like she and Connie could have been twins; without makeup she looked younger, but didn't most of us under thirty? Mercedes had graduated with a degree in nutrition and was actually working in a doctors' group that specialized in helping athletes, and us ordinary folk, after an injury. Last I'd heard they'd partnered with a gym whose trainers specialized in helping people after injuries, or helping them prevent injuries through smarter exercise: work smarter, not harder. I hadn't even thought about it, but it was almost designed for helping her little brother. Sometimes karma plans way ahead of the game.

  I moved closer to Mercedes to say, "I thought you were living with the tall, dark, and handsome that's been at your side most of the day."

  "Frankie, Francisco, is great."

  The tone alone took a lot of the positive out of the "great." I raised eyebrows at her but didn't want to say anything she wasn't ready to hear. You can realize someone is wrong for you a long time before you're ready to say I quit. Mercedes and I chatted, but we weren't like besties or anything, so it wasn't my job to say the hard, awkward things.

  "I don't think I realized until tonight that he doesn't make me feel like that"--she nodded at her parents on the dance floor, and then turned to me--"or make me feel like the three of you."

  She'd said it, so I took the opening. "Then why are you living with him?"

  "He's handsome, charming, athletic, a doctor specializing in sports medicine with an emphasis on rehabilitation after injuries. My degree in nutrition will help us treat the whole patient, not just the injury. Professionally we're great."

  "But professional isn't everything," I said.

  She gave me a smile that was more irony than laughter. "Maybe not."

  I was debating on whether she wanted more girl talk, or if we should just tell her about Tomas, but she saved me the trouble, stepping forward and including Micah and Nathaniel in the conversation. "I saw you talking to Tomas. He hasn't wanted to talk to anyone in the family much, but he seemed to be talking to you."

  "It's part of my job to talk to people afterward," Micah said.

  "After what?" she asked.

  "Usually it's after they, or someone in their family, has been attacked by a lycanthrope, but violence is violence, and how people react to it is pretty similar."

  She nodded, as if that made sense to her. "Let's go somewhere we can talk without spoiling the reception for anyone else." She looked up, then nodded and smiled at her live-in boyfriend, Francisco, because that was what he'd introduced himself as, not Frankie. She took my arm and pantomimed that we were going somewhere together. He'd probably assume we were going to the bathroom. Men were always willing to accept that women weren't capable of going to the restroom alone, because most women moved in packs for the powder room. I'd never understood why; I was okay on my own, but in the blue formal you might need some help with the skirts. Connie's gown with its layers of lace and hoop skirt was lovely, but I was betting she'd need all the bridesmaids to hold the skirts if she wanted to use the bathroom. It was one of the reasons I was not wearing a hoop skirt for my own wedding.

  The moment that Francisco wasn't looking she dropped my arm, picked up her skirts, and just started for a door in the far corner. Micah followed her with a glance back at us. I nodded him onward and he caught up with Mercedes. She was moving pretty good in the dyed-to-match high heels.

  Nathaniel and I brought up the rear. I glanced back and found that Manny and Rosita had been joined by Connie and her new husband. The four of them had the dance floor to themselves while everyone beamed at them, happy to see thirty years of happiness alongside the beginning of more. It was a nice visual, but as usual when there was something nice, I was walking away from it to talk about things that would have spoiled the happiness behind me. At least now I wasn't alone when I did it. Nathaniel and Micah were willing to leave the easy happy stuff behind to deal with the hard stuff that you had to do so other people could be safe and happy. Hell, the three of us spent a lot of our couple time discussing hard topics with the rest of the people we were involved with so we could keep being happy. Ignoring the hard things doesn't make them go away. I was glad I had people in my life now who were willing to work at things.

  Mercedes led us to what looked like a break room, complete with vending machines, small tables and chairs, and even a couch against one wall. It was blissfully quiet. I hadn't thought the reception was loud until we got away from the noise. My shoulders dropped and let me know I'd been hunching them a little, like I did when I was tense. I expected Mercedes to go to a table, so we could all sit, but she turned to us as soon as the door closed. I guess we were standing.

  She turned to Micah. "Tomas talked to you longer than he's talked to any of us. He's started with a counselor, but I don't think he's talking to her either."

  "He might do better with a male counselor," Nathaniel said.

  Mercedes looked at him; her eyes were solid brown, but it was a pale brown like milk chocolate Easter candy. I realized that my eyes were darker. I was all mixed heritage, but my mother's nearly black eyes came true.

  "What difference would a male counselor make?" she asked.

  "He's a thirteen-year-old boy," Nathaniel said.

  "So?"

  "Tomas is just learning, or trying to become, the kind of man he's going to be. While he's trying to figure out what it means to be a man, he's kidnapped, shot, and he couldn't protect his sister," Micah said.

  "Connie is our older sister; she's always protected us," Mercedes said.

  "But that was when Tomas was a kid; he's not really a kid anymore," Nathaniel said.

  She made a face and rolled her eyes. "He's only thirteen, he is a kid."

  "And that's why he won't talk to you," Nathaniel said, "because to you he's still your little brother, but inside his own head he's trying to be more than that."

  She frowned and studied Nathaniel's so-serious face. "I don't understand that, because he'll always be my kid brother, but you're right; he's at the age where we all try to figure out what we'll be as adults. You're saying as his family we can't see him clearly."

  "Something like that."

  "You think he'd do better with a male counselor, because he's learning to be a man and suddenly everything that society tells him is manly just got taken away from him."

  "Not away, but he's hurt," Nathaniel said.

  "How bad is the physical damage?" Micah asked.

  "What did Tomas tell you?"

  "That the doctors aren't sure he'll walk again."

  "That's not true, he will walk again."

  "How about run?" I asked.

  Mercedes looked serious and then sad; it was not a good sign.

  "That bad?" I said.

  "He got shot in the stomach, but there seems to be nerve damage down one leg. It's just bad luck that the bullet hit what it did. A one-in-a-million issue, the orthopedist said, but he also told Frankie and me in private that if the bullet had gone a few inches the other side he might have bled out and died before he got to the hospital, so it's all so . . . Tomas's whole future hung on a few millimeters inside his body, and what the bullet hit, or didn't hit."

  Her eyes got shiny with unshed tears, sparkling in the dramatic wedding eye shadow. She took a deep, shaking breath, visibly steadying herself. Her voice was almost eve
n as she said, "They think if he does his physical therapy religiously, and adds even more weight lifting than he was doing for track, that he should recover enough to run."

  "Recover enough to run like he did before?" I asked.

  She shrugged. "No doctor is going to say yes or no right now. There are too many variables. I've tried to explain it to Mama and Papa, but they want definite answers and it's just not that easy."

  It took me a second to realize that Mama and Papa were Manny and Rosita.

  "I understand the reasoning," Micah said. "They can't know for sure what will heal, and they can't control how hard Tomas works at his physical therapy."

  "He's young, so that will help him heal, but he's started the very beginnings of PT, and he's not working at it like he should."

  "He's depressed," Nathaniel said.

  "Yes, but if he doesn't do his PT then it's almost a guarantee that he won't heal enough to do track again. Damn it, if he doesn't put effort into recovering, he could end up crippled permanently."

  "What will make the difference?" I asked.

  "Following doctor's orders, being serious about PT, and in a few weeks if he does that Frankie and I will help him start adding weights and other exercises. This is the kind of thing we both wanted to do to help people. We, I, can help Tomas, if he'll let me." The tears started trickling down her cheeks now.

  I glanced at Micah, and then Nathaniel. One looked at me, and the other one made a small motion. I sighed and hugged Mercedes, letting her fold herself down so I could hold her while she cried even though I was inches shorter. Why was it always the girl who was supposed to hold people when they cried? Shouldn't whoever was best at it, regardless of gender, do it? But I patted her back and made comforting noises, not sure if it did a damn bit of good, but sometimes it's the best you can do, or the best I can do.

  "Have you tried introducing him to someone who's recovered from a similar injury?" Micah asked.

  It made Mercedes stand up straight and wipe at her eyes. She wiped too hard and smeared her eye makeup. I'd tell her before she went back to the reception. "We've got some patients who are pro athletes. It's not the same kind of injuries, but Tomas loves sports, and hearing about how hard they're working to recover might help him work harder at PT. That's a great idea, Micah, thank you."

  "Yes, it is, but what about Anita talking to him now?" Nathaniel asked.