been in a position very similar to this. Instead of a knife, her wound had been produced by a bullet making it through a gap in her protective vest, but the method behind the injury really didn’t matter. Hers had still been courtesy of Miranda, just like mine.
“Guess it’s just me then,” I sighed.
“You should probably tell the nurse about it though. They might need to put you on something else for the pain.”
“Maybe,” I agreed.
Constance waited a moment then nodded toward the tray at the foot of the bed. “So…do you still want some of those ice chips?”
“Sure…” I replied.
She smiled and stepped away as I sent my fingers in search of the bed controls. Finding them mostly by touch, I eventually managed to start the top half into an upward tilt.
“How long was I asleep?” I asked once I’d struggled through the pain of adjusting myself into something resembling a reclined sitting position.
Constance handed me a half full cup of the crushed ice and shook her head. “I’m not entirely sure. You had already been out for a while when I took over, and that was…” She gave her watch a quick glance and said, “A little over four hours ago now. So probably five hours at least.”
“Hope you brought another one of your romance novels to pass the time,” I quipped.
She let out a light chuckle. “Some law enforcement bulletins and a copy of Guns and Ammo, actually.”
“Seriously? But…”
She cut me off. “I never said that I didn’t read it.”
“True. You didn’t.” I paused and tried to focus on more recent memories. Unfortunately, they were still a bit of a blur. “So…I guess I should check… It’s still Tuesday, right?” I asked, then tilted the cup to my lips and shook a few small chunks of the ice into my mouth. As they began to melt, I allowed the cool water to run down the back of my dry throat. The sensation made me realize just how thirsty I really was, so I tipped the cup to my mouth again.
“Yes,” she said with a nod. “Still Tuesday. Although it’s early evening. Coming up on seven.”
I laid my head back and sighed as I did the mental calculation. Once I had swallowed the rest of the water, I turned my face to her. She had stepped the short distance back across the room and parked herself in the chair again. “Any word from Ben? When he left earlier there was something going on with another victim.”
Constance nodded as she answered. “Yes, actually. I talked to him an hour or so ago, and they were finally starting the interview.”
“Interview?” I asked, scrunching my brow. “What do you mean? I’m not sure I follow.”
“I’m sorry,” she replied. “I thought you already knew. The victim is still alive. He somehow managed to escape before the killer had a chance to bleed him out.”
“Are you serious?” I asked.
“Yes,” she replied. “He was picked up not far from here as a matter of fact. He was wandering down the middle of a street in Saint Flora, naked, and apparently in a complete daze. It appeared he had been tortured for a while, and he’s in pretty rough shape but stable now, as far as I’ve heard. They brought him here to the emergency room.” She extended her index finger and pointed at the ceiling. “He’s in a bed two floors up at the moment, being interviewed by Ben and his lieutenant.”
“Amazing…” I almost whispered as I stared off. Something still wasn’t registering for me, but I couldn’t yet put my finger on it.
Constance nodded. “You aren’t the first person to use that word.”
“I’ve had some pretty crazy nightmares lately,” I said. “You aren’t about to morph into a giant rabbit and tell me that’s what this is, are you?”
“Your nightmares have been about giant rabbits?”
I gave my head a small shake. “No. Just making up an example.”
“Well, you aren’t dreaming this time,” she assured me. “I can pinch you if you’d like.”
“Thanks, I’ll pass.”
“Good call. I pinch pretty hard.”
I rolled my head back up and slowly shook some more of the chipped ice into my mouth. I chewed it and once again allowed the melt to run down my throat.
The mind fog was lifting even more, but at the same time, I was already feeling twinges of pain in my gut-the trade off for clarity I suppose. Fortunately though, they were still dull and remote. With luck I’d have plenty of time before they became unbearable enough for me to be willing to endure the nightmare for the umpteenth time.
I started to lift the cup to my lips again but stopped and held it hanging in mid-air as my opiate intoxicated synapses continued to sober up. A series of misfires between neurons finally captured and then generated a shaky connection. As it continued to flicker and arc, a question floated through my brain. Rolling my head to the side once again, I lent a voice to the query.
“So, Constance…”
“Yes?”
“If they just now started the interview, how did they know earlier that he was a victim of the same killer?” I asked.
She frowned and shook her head. “It’s not that important, Rowan. Just trust me. There was some very compelling evidence.”
“Go ahead and pinch me,” I said.
“What?”
“Go ahead and tell me what you’re hiding,” I replied. “That should be as good as any pinch.”
“I can if you really want to know,” she said. “But I don’t see how it will help, and you aren’t going to wake up from this. It’s not that kind of nightmare.”
“Yeah, I kind of got that already,” I told her. “How’d they know, Constance?”
She sighed and shook her head again. “They knew because your name had been carved into his chest…and his back, and his arms, and even his forehead… Honestly, from what I understand, it’s just about anywhere on his body there’s room enough for it to fit.”
CHAPTER 30
“Oh,” I replied.
The word was patently anticlimactic in and of itself, but there really wasn’t much one could say in response to an explanation such as Constance had just given-especially in this line of work and having seen some of the horrors I had witnessed over the years. Once upon a time, such a revelation would have been shocking to me. Absolutely horrifying on levels I couldn’t even imagine, in fact. But, that was then. Now, such a violent reaction was a part of my distant past, and atrocities like these were just a matter of course in my painful world.
However, this isn’t to say I was completely cold-blooded.
I was beyond disgusted by the news-that much was absolutely certain. It made me sick just to think about it. Still, surprise just didn’t fit into the equation at all.
The simple fact of the matter was that carving my name into a victim was exactly the sort of thing Miranda would do, especially if she was working some type of hoodoo against me. She’d gone that route several times before, so there was no reason to believe she wouldn’t do so again. The only question in my mind was exactly what kind of magick it was?
If I had to guess, I would say she was probably trying to kill me. On the surface, that’s definitely how it looked. And, after all, we knew for certain that particular errand was at the top of her agenda, so it made perfect sense. Basic sympathetic magick-name the victim for me and then kill him as me. It was almost as simplistic as my use of salt to ward against her. In fact, it made me wonder if I had revealed too much during that meeting in Texas. Maybe she was taking a page from my own playbook and using my belief in the KISS principle against me. Given my currently weakened state, who knows, it might even have worked.
