thumbed the phone to life and put it to his ear. “Yeah, Storm here.”
“Is he always like this?” the nurse asked in a quiet voice as she swabbed my cheek with cold antiseptic. A light, southern lilt underscored her words.
I grimaced as the sting set in and tried not to flinch then shifted my eyes over to her. “Pretty much. Don’t let it bother you though. He’s really a good guy.”
My own voice still sounded rough, and its tone remained emotionless and tired. I realized when I heard myself that I didn’t sound particularly convincing.
“I’ll have to take your word for it, Mister Gant,” she returned with a smile.
“No, really, he is.” I tried to sound more sincere. “And please call me Rowan. Every time I hear ‘Mister Gant’ I think my father is here.”
She chuckled. “All right then, Rowan. You can call me Dorothy. I am afraid, however, that I will still have to take your word for it on Detective Storm.”
“He grows on you,” I offered.
She pressed something to my cheek that I later discovered was a butterfly closure and then inspected it closely. “There. All done.”
“Thanks.”
“No problem,” she told me. “Doctor Kirkman will be back in shortly. He wanted to go over a few things with you.”
“That’s fine,” I said then shifted to look at her. “Oh, my wife is supposed to be here.”
She nodded. “Detective Storm told us. Someone will bring her back as soon as she arrives.”
“Thank you.” I tried to inject some enthusiasm into my still flat voice. “I really appreciate it. And there’s just one more thing.”
“Certainly,” she said as she cocked her head to the side and gave me a questioning look.
“Another officer was brought in ahead of us. Deckert, Carl Deckert. We’ve been trying to get an idea of his condition for a while.”
She nodded. “I’ll see if I can find out something for you.”
“Thank you,” I told her again.
“You’re welcome.” She flashed me a quick grin and nodded in Ben’s direction while turning to go. “You know, maybe you can teach some manners to your friend over there.”
“I heard that!” Ben called after her as she exited the treatment room, but she was already gone.
My friend looked back over at me and shook his head. “Jeez.”
I gave him a tired shrug in return.
“So, was that Allison?” I asked as I dipped my head at the cell phone in his hand, referring to his wife.
“What? Oh, no.” He shook his head and clipped the device back onto his belt. “It was Ackman callin’ to give me an update.”
“Good news?” I asked hopefully.
“Not really,” he returned. “Still haven’t found Porter. The weather’s not helpin’, and it’s gonna be dark in a few hours.”
“Is it really that late?” I asked as I pulled my hand up to look at my watch, only to remember that it was broken when I saw the shattered face. I don’t know why I hadn’t just taken it off. I glanced around the room and found the face of the wall clock. It was fuzzy, but it was large enough for me to be able to read it without squinting too much. The position of the hands told me it was just past two p.m. This time of the year the sun was gone by five.
“You didn’t sleep last night, did you?” Ben answered me with his own query.
I closed my eyes and massaged my forehead for a moment, then carefully laid myself back on the examination table. “No. Not much anyway.”
The tune was moving itself back into the forefront, and its eerie chords sent a fearful shiver racing up and down my spine. Each note seemed to carry with it a tiny pinprick of terror that grew exponentially as the melody wove itself through the even rhythm.
“How long you been up?” His voice sounded hollow and distant.
I did a protracted mental calculation that should have taken no more than a second or two then finally answered. “Pushing twenty-four at least, I think.”
“Jeezus, white man.”
“He’s got nothing to do with it,” I mumbled.
“Who?”
“Jesus.” This time my voice was almost a whisper.
The song was all but completely filling my ears now and sounding creepier by the second. If it were not for the level of exhaustion I was battling, I think I might have been overcome by the intangible fear. At the moment, even my earlier anger was falling by the wayside, and darkness was becoming a comfortable blanket. The fatigue broke through my defenses and began to batter me with its weapon of choice-sleep. I made a half-hearted attempt at fighting back but quickly found that I was hopelessly outmatched. With a final, heavy sigh, I surrendered.
The beginnings of a distant echo came from the other side of the room. “Dammit, Rowan, you know what I…”
I didn’t hear the rest.
CHAPTER 21:
The only thing I really remembered about the trip home was that it was dark and that the back seat of the car was cold. Prior to that, there were some dreamlike recollections of unintelligible voices, a feeling like I was sitting up and floating down a long hallway, some fuzzy streaks of white passing through muted light, and of course, that damnable song playing in an endless loop between my ears.
It was still echoing there even now.
With more effort than I expected it to take, I let out a heavy sigh and tried to relax. After failing at that task, I reached down and reluctantly shut off the water in the shower. Then, I just stood there for what seemed like a good half hour. In reality, I think it was more like five minutes. The steam was dissipating quickly and water was dripping from my tortured skin. I tingled with a self-inflicted rawness on my face, neck, hands, and forearms where I had scrubbed to remove the soot and grime left over from the fire. I was still afflicted with a cough that would attack me without warning, but at least the episodes were becoming fewer and farther between. The doctor had told me it was an after effect of the smoke inhalation and that it would most likely work itself out in a day or two; as far as I was concerned, the quicker the better.
For a moment, I considered turning the water back on and just continuing to stand there motionless as I had for the last third of the shower. The warmth felt good, and it went a long way toward soothing the aches and pains that were once more answering a roll call throughout my body.
I started to reach for the chromed knob but hesitated as I heard the door open and then close, followed by Felicity’s concerned voice. “Row, are you okay?”
I’d been in here for close to an hour, and she had already checked on me twice before now. Three was the charm I suppose.
“Yeah,” I replied in a lazy voice as I reached up and slowly slid the shower curtain aside. “Yeah, I’m okay.”
“I’m making you some tea, then,” she told me, leaning her back against the door as she spoke. “Are you hungry?”
I had actually been expecting her to break out the verbal cat ‘o nine tails on me over everything that had happened, or at the very least give me her particular brand of silent treatment. I knew that she was angry, but thus far, she had not shown that side. In fact, she had not even displayed any visible distress over the call from Porter. What was happening instead was that I was on the receiving end of her maternal instinct, which had evidently locked into overdrive.
“Not really,” I shook my head.
