My life, but not my leg.
“Do you have family?” the male officer asked.
I shook my head. My mom would be of no use. These days she usually didn’t even know who I was.
“Significant other?”
Shrugging, I mumbled, “Not sure what he really is.”
“Do you know the woman who brought you in? She seemed very concerned about your well-being.”
“No.”
“Was she the person who did this to you? It appears as though your coworker reported you missing over forty-eight hours ago, but we haven’t been able to reach him since.”
I shook my head again.
“Do you know where you were? How this happened? Who may have been responsible? How you got there?”
I cleared my throat. Fiery embarrassment licked at my vocal cords and I coughed. The man in uniform handed me a plastic cup of water. After I took a sip, I cleared my throat again, and this time a trickle of shame trailed up my throat. I was a strong, independent woman—how did this happen to me?
“I was in a barn of some sort. Not near here . . . I don’t think. A blond woman, Russian accent, attacked me during my workout.” Squeezing my eyes shut, I wheezed.
“Take your time, ma’am.”
How many times was I going to be questioned? I’d just done this a few weeks ago with the officers at my apartment.
“I think her name was . . . Marina . . . that’s what I overheard the guy, Gus Cameron—my client—call her. He was there, I think. I don’t know, I could’ve been hallucinating. But she took me . . . Marina. I think she drugged me, and then Gus came and took her.”
The female officer focused on her little notebook, apparently taking notes, and the man nodded at me to continue.
“And she broke my leg.”
Understanding slammed into me, and a shriek and a defeated cry ripped through my throat. I flexed my right foot. It was there! Then I could have sworn I felt my left foot flex too, but when I looked down toward the end of the bed, the covers on that side of the bed were flat. There was nothing there.
“My leg is gone!” I shrieked as Barry ran into the room, his hair a greasy mess, his shirt wrinkled, his face twisted in pain. “Help! Help! My leg!” I kept screaming as long as my vocal cords would allow.
The officers scrambled and one raced out of the room, calling out, “Nurse? Help, nurse!”
Frantic, I grasped at Barry’s arm and yelled, “My leg is gone, where is it?”
A woman dressed in scrubs rushed into the room and pushed Barry out of the way. Leaning over me, she patted my shoulder. “Honey, you have to calm down. You were in a terrible accident. Your leg was damaged, but you’re alive.” She ran her hand up and down my arm, trying to soothe me, before lifting a syringe to my IV.
“No!” I heard a familiar deep voice yell just as I faded out.
Jake
“Someone tell me what the fuck is going on here?” I shouted, raising my voice over the beeping machines, practically hyperventilating as the room closed in around me.
One of two police officers standing in the room stepped up, blocking my view of Aly lying in that damn bed. “Sir, I’m sorry, you’re going to have to leave if you’re not immediate family.”
I shrugged his hand off my shoulder. “I’m not going anywhere. That’s my girl in that bed. With a stump for a leg. What the fuck happened?”
“Sir, please.”
“Get your fucking paw off me.”
The old Jake rumbled deep in my belly; angry-and-fighting Jake was taking over. I was mad-at-the-world Jake, the man I’d been before her, my Aly-cat.
“Legs!” Tears squeezed from my eyes as my legs weakened and I dropped to one knee.
“Sir, you’re going to have to take this out to the waiting room.”
“Legs,” I shouted.
“Jake!”
Bess was next to me, her dark hair spilling over her face as she leaned down to hug me, her own eyes filling with tears. She ran her hand down my back. “Jake, stand up, honey. Aly’s in the bed over there, she needs you. Okay?”
“Ma’am, I’m sorry, but who are you?” the female officer asked.
Bess ignored them until she helped me upright. Turning to the officers, she extended one hand in greeting as she swiped at her tears with the other. “Bess Wrigley. I’m this man’s sister-in-law. This is Jake Wrigley, and that’s his significant other lying in the bed.”
Her expression soured as she jerked a thumb over her shoulder. “And this is Shirley, she’s the woman who found Ms. Road and brought her here. She may be able to answer some of your questions.”
I vaguely remember the cop saying something about being back to speak with me, not to go far—fucking-A, I wasn’t going far—and Shirley following the officers out of the room.
In a haze, I stepped away from Bess and staggered to the bed, then did what came naturally. I crawled in next to Aly. The bed was narrow, so I made myself as small as possible, lying on my side next to her. Hesitant, I ran my hand down her leg closest to me, and let out a sigh of relief when it seemed fine. Then my hand hovered over the left, scared to hurt her. There was one of those air cushions vibrating life into the stump.
Frustrated that I couldn’t do anything for her, I simply cupped her cheek and kissed the edge of her mouth. Trying to avoid the IVs that ran into her arm, I watched her chest rise and fall with each beep, and closed my eyes with my arm wrapped around my Aly-cat.
“Jake.” The voice was ragged, but I swore I heard my name spoken in my dreams.
“Jake.” There it was again.
I struggled to wake up. Prying my eyes open, I found Aly looking at me. Her nose was red and swollen; she’d been crying. Realizing we weren’t alone, I glanced around. Bess was still sniffling, curled up in a chair in the corner, and a cop stood in the doorway.
“Al, you had me a fucking mess.” My knuckles grazed her cheek, and she brought her hand, the one free of wires, to my rough cheek.
Her eyes squeezed shut as she whispered, “I don’t have a leg.”
“Shh.” I gathered her close and rubbed my cheek against hers, mindful of my stubble. “Shh.”
We stayed like that for a while, her cheek tucked into my neck, a river of tears falling from her eyes and sliding down my throat. Eventually Bess left the room, murmuring a few words to the cop as she left. My shirt was soaked, and my head was a fucking mess.
“Aly, what happened?” I had to ask.
She looked up at me and lay back on her pillow, closing her eyes. “I still don’t know it all, but I was running on the stairs, and then I was in a barn with a Russian woman yelling about fixing the case, and going on and on about justice. Cameron showed up and took her. My leg was already crushed. I don’t know how it first broke . . . I think it was broken when I came to . . . but then that woman kept stepping on it.”
Inside I was screaming, but on the outside, I schooled my expression. Stepping on it? Jesus Fucking Christ.
“I don’t have a leg,” she whispered, her misery plain. “You can’t call me Legs anymore.”
“Doesn’t matter, babe. I got you. We’re gonna find that bitch and guess the fuck what? Rain justice.”
She didn’t say anything more, only sobbed.
Aly alternated between sobbing and sleeping for days, but refused to say anything more. The physical therapy people came and went, and she merely nodded or shook her head when necessary.
It broke my heart that she wouldn’t talk to me, but I understood. She had a lot to process, so I gave her the space she needed, mentally anyway. Physically, I stuck to her like glue.
I ignored Shirley, who waited in the hall or the waiting room for a week. I slept and showered in Aly’s room, despite her ignoring me. When the nurses kicked me out of the room to tend to her, I did push-ups and sit-ups and pull-ups and power jabs in the waiting room.