Agave Kiss

desk and found a place to park out of the way of hall traffic. The other patients went before me. I was still waiting when Shannon arrived, breathless and pale. I mean, she was always pale, but this time she didn’t have on any makeup to brighten her up.

She hugged me hard, brushing the hair out of my face. “You look like shit.”

“Right back at you.”

“Had a fight with Jesse,” she muttered.

“What about?”

“Please. I didn’t come to the ER to dump my probs on you. What the hell happened . . . and why didn’t you take me with you? I could’ve brought the undead, you know, dropped the unholy might of ghost-fu on their demon asses.”

It hadn’t even occurred to me. “I just got you home and safe. You’re crazy if you think I’m putting you at risk again.”

Saving you once cost too much already.

“Bullshit.” Her blue eyes snapped anger at me. “Don’t put that on me. We already went one round on this, and this is the last time I’ll say it. If we’re friends, we’re equals. You can’t protect me, can’t decide what I get to do . . . and I don’t want you around if you try.”

That was pure Shannon, bitching me out when I had a hole in my thigh. To be fair, maybe I wouldn’t be in this situation if I’d let her guard my back. She commanded the dead, plus some pretty impressive expertise with a sword these days, a skill she’d learned in Sheol. I still wasn’t clear on how long we’d been there. I only knew that time ran differently, so I suspected it was like a reversal of fairy legends, where it seemed like forever in hell, but on earth it had only been a few weeks.

“Fair enough,” I said quietly. “I should’ve brought you in when we went after Kel. I wasn’t thinking.”

“You’ve got too much on your plate,” she told me.

I sighed. “No argument from me.”

“You promise no more of this? I’m not a kid. You accept this?”

“I do.” Still, when you cared, it was second nature to try to protect them, even if they were old enough—and fierce enough—to do their own ass-kicking. “And when I figure out what I need to do to bring Chance back, you’ll be there. Promise.”

“That’s what I fought with Jesse about, actually.”

I raised a brow. “Really? Why?”

“He thinks I’m enabling you, encouraging your delusions.” Her mouth tightened. “But he wasn’t there. He didn’t hear what Chance said . . . and how he said it. If anybody can come back from the other side—”

“It’s him,” I finished.

“Yeah. I mean, he’s got the godling thing going on. That’s not normal either. So I told Jesse to STFU and butt out, unless there’s some reason he doesn’t want you back with Chance.”

“I’m guessing that pissed him off.”

Shan grinned. “Hells to the yeah. He accused me of not trusting him. I’m pretty sure he’s heard that shit before, but I was just ringing his bell.”

A belly laugh escaped me, startling the guy who had shot his own foot while cleaning his gun. “He’s gonna be even madder when he realizes you were just distracting him from the real issue. But I swear I’m not crazy.” I started to tell her about the dreams, but at that moment the receptionist called me to the back.

Shannon wouldn’t give way to the orderly; she pushed my wheelchair toward the door that led through into a kind of holding pen separated by cloth screens, metal framework and what looked like curtain rods holding everything together. She helped me from the chair onto the bed, and the medical equipment surrounding me gave me an unpleasant flashback to the last time I was admitted.

Please just fix me and release me.

The orderly—the same one who had helped me at the start—gave us a few instructions, which included me putting on a stupid gown. With Shan’s help, I managed it after he left. By the time I got settled I was winded . . . and my thigh was on fire. A few moments later, a doctor pushed through the curtain with my new chart in hand, looking too young to be done with medical school. But I didn’t care about her age, only her qualifications, and she looked professional with her dark hair caught up in a neat ponytail and a pair of rectangular glasses perched on her nose. Her name tag read DOCTOR ROSALES.

“I see you ran into some wild dogs while you were hiking. Let’s have a look.” She folded my gown back to reveal the wound, and my stomach churned.

By closing my eyes, I tolerated her examination, which seemed to take forever. So much poking and prodding while Shan stroked my head in a comforting fashion. Gods, I was lucky to have her.

Then the doc said, “I saw on your chart that you didn’t know your blood type. Have you never been treated before?”

“I just don’t remember what it is,” I admitted. “You can send to the hospital in Tampa for my records if you like.”

“Which one?”

I told her.

“We’ll do that, but I’m going to order a full panel of routine blood work just to be safe before we operate.”

“Why?”

“Just as a precaution. I need to make sure there’s nothing else going on before we put you under. If you have high blood pressure, we need to know in order to decide what kind of anesthetic to use.”

Put me under . . . ?

Shan put in, “You should tell her about the vomiting.”

I cut her a sharp look. “It’s eased off in the last week. I think the food in the U.K. just didn’t agree with me.”

Dr. Rosales studied me, made a note on my chart. “Have you experienced light-headedness, vertigo, stomach pain or dizziness, along with the vomiting?”

“A little dizziness or light-headedness, I guess. What does that have to do with my leg?”

“Nothing immediately, but we need a full picture of your current health, Ms. Solomon. It all factors into the ultimate treatment plan. I’ll clean and dress the wound, order your admission—”

“What? I thought I’d just get some stitches.” Panic set in. I looked to Shannon for support, and her eyes were sympathetic, but she wasn’t going to argue against me getting necessary medical care.

Dammit.

“Unfortunately, you have some structural damage. The torn muscles require a suture, and you may need some physical therapy to restore full strength to your thigh. In fact, given the location of the wound, it’s a miracle the animal didn’t open your femoral artery. If it had, we wouldn’t be having this conversation.”

If that was meant to make me feel better about surgery, well, it was working. I’d be a huge baby to complain about my lot when I could be dead in the wilderness right now. So I sucked it up.

“Okay, let’s get this over with.”

Dr. Rosales offered me a half smile. “I know you want to get in and out, but hospitals don’t always work that way. There are tests to run, lab work. I understand you have a friend delivering the animal’s body?”

“Yeah. Where should he bring it? Here?”

“No, it goes to Laboratory Services, run by the state. If you give me his cell number, I can text him the address.”

“Shan?”

In reply, she got out my cell and showed the number to Dr. Rosales, who quickly copied it to her phone. “I know it’s been a terrible day, but you’re alive, and that’s what counts. We’ll do everything we can to make things better.” She had a nice bedside manner for an ER doc.

Shannon didn’t leave my side at any part of the process, even when they asked her to step outside. But her angry face was intimidating, so they let her carry my purse with hidden dog, and my other personal effects, up to the room for me. It wasn’t long before I was settled into a bed every bit as uncomfortable as I remembered. Hospital rooms and cheap motel rooms had a few things in common: TVs bolted down and a weary procession of