“Good morning, sunshine. They gave your ass so many drugs, I was wondering if they’d gone ahead and finished you off themselves,” he said with a little bit too much pep in his voice.
“I need more,” I rasped out. My throat felt like it had been rubbed raw with sandpaper. “Fuck... my throat.” I tried to swallow, but it felt as if I had swallowed a handful of gravel.
“Dude, I’ll bet it hurts. You were snoring so damn loud, it sounded like there was a chainsaw in the next room.” He placed a tray of water, orange juice, and fruit in front of me. “You can have more meds after you call Charlie. He’s been blowing up your phone.”
I finally shoved off the bed and stumbled toward the bathroom. My feet caught on the bottom of my pants, and I looked down to see pajamas I know I didn’t own.
“Did you dress me, Teo?”
“I don’t wanna talk about it,” he grumbled out. I laughed through my aching throat and closed the bathroom door behind me.
When I flipped the light on, I was startled to see my ghostly reflection in the mirror. Besides the pajama pants, I didn’t have anything else on except the sling on my right arm. My skin was flushed and pale. I had bruises on my inner arm where I assumed an IV must have been inserted. I leaned over the edge of the counter to get a closer glance at the gauze taped around my shoulder.
The second I leaned forward, the memories of the previous night hit me like a bat to the face. Getting only one hit in the fight against Barrera. Chasing Flores down. Being blindsided with a knife to the back. Police arresting Flores right after he told me...
She was dead.
The weight of his words sliced through me sharper than a thousand knives to the back. My knees buckled and I hit the tile floor with a loud thud. I slid my legs out in front of me and let my head hang forward. I didn’t care about my screaming shoulder or the fact that I still hadn’t pissed in God-knows-how-long. Those were nothing compared to this black, soul-crushing pain. I was too late… too fucking late.
How long had I been chasing a ghost? Days? Weeks? Years? All this time I thought I would just know if she were gone, as if a piece of my soul went with her. But I’d felt nothing at all. Instead, I had to hear my worst fear from the repulsive mouth of Flores himself.
The door slammed open and a wide-eyed Mateo searched the large bathroom for me. His eyes finally fell toward me on the floor, and I saw the discomfort and pain in his eyes. I tried to straighten up and realized my face was wet. Tears. With the back of my hand, I quickly wiped them all away. I pulled my knees up and wrapped my left arm around them.
“I’m good,” I quietly breathed out.
“Call Charlie.” He held out my blinking phone. I took it from his hands and lay it on the ground next to me. It was fucking humiliating to have one of the best boxers I’ve ever known look down at me on the floor with pity in his eyes. I couldn’t hold eye contact with him for too long. “I’m sorry, man. I wish there was more I could have done. I should’ve tried to dig deeper into him,” he whispered.
“Don’t,” I said into my knees. “Don’t put any blame on yourself, Teo. I’ll never be able to repay you for all your help.”
He nodded his head, and I was thankful we weren’t going to sit and discuss that right now. “Seriously though, if he calls my phone one more time, all of the phones are going out the fucking window.”
“How long was I out?” I asked before he turned to leave.
“It’s only been a few hours since we got back from the hospital. Doc said the blade didn’t hit anything crucial, but you need to check back with him in a few days. You’ll also need to rehab that shoulder.”
“Well, that won’t work. I’m getting out of here.”
“Yeah, I told him that you would. Take the meds. Get it checked.” With that, he turned on his heel and headed back out to the living area.
~~~~~~~
I quickly learned how annoying it was to have to hold my arm against my chest. While taking a shower, I had to bend like a contortionist to avoid the water hitting my bandage. It was worth it though to get all that grime off of me from last night. My shoulder was beyond jacked, but I knew that if I took any more pain meds, I risked being laid out on my ass for another day. I would just have to wait until I got back home.
Where the hell was home, anyway? New York wasn’t home anymore. California was never home. Texas was full of my friends and their happy little families, but I didn’t know how long I would be able to stick around with this new, empty hole inside of me that made me want to push everyone away. I’d become good at that.
Mateo finished shoving my belongings into my bag for me while I finally scrolled through my phone. I had missed calls from just about everyone in my contact list. There were also numerous texts from Audrey. Even my mom had called, which was weird. I hadn’t kept in close contact with my parents over the past few years because it had just become too painful. As much as I knew she wanted to, my poor mom tried to not call me unless she had something important to discuss.
I typed out a quick message to Jace, letting him pass the word on to Audrey that I was heading back. Within a few minutes, I had a reply.
Jace: We’ll leave the lights on for you.
Me: I’m staying at a hotel. My place is almost done anyway.
Jace: Did it go that bad?
Me: I should be at work on Monday. Plenty of time before Nolan’s arrival.
It was shitty of me to leave him hanging like that, especially after everything he’s done for me. But there was no way in hell I was talking about this until I was ready, and I damn sure wasn’t going to discuss it over a text message. At any rate, I would have plenty of questions to answer when I walked into work, what with the sling and stab wound and all.
Mateo pulled the zipper closed on my bag and patted it, indicating it was packed and ready. I didn’t have a flight scheduled home yet. I figured I’d buy one when I arrived at the airport, and if I had to sit around and wait—well, who the fuck cared anyway. Mateo gestured that he was taking the bag down and I nodded in understanding.
The shrill ring of my phone broke up the quiet of the room and I looked down to see Charlie’s name pop up on the bright screen. I might as well get this over with. Plus, he had helped me the most out of anyone, going above and beyond the call of duty.
Charlie and I had been partners when I used to be a cop in New York. We saw each other more than we saw our own families. I would have taken a bullet for him and he would have done the same for me. He kept his ear to the ground for me and always let me know if he got a lead on Flores, even though it wasn’t his case. All while I quit the force, moved down to San Diego, and tried to find him myself.
“Yeah,” I mumbled into the phone.
“Shit, Lane,” Charlie’s gruff voice whispered into the line. “I thought you were fucking dead.”
“I thought I was too.”
“What the hell happened? Scratch that, you can tell me in a bit—”
I interrupted his speech and said, “I need you to get Flores extradited to the US. He needs to burn. He’ll just pay his way out down there.”
“You know I don’t have any power to do something like that—”
“Talk to Chief,” I interrupted again.
“I tried, man. But seriously, enough with Flores...” he whispered again.
“ENOUGH WITH HIM?” I boomed into the phone “He fucking killed her, Char. He killed her and he had the goddamn balls to laugh in my face about it. If you guys can’t do anything, I’ll go down and end him myself.”