Page 75 of Shadows of Justice

“What can I do?”

“Water,” I croak. She fills a cup from a pitcher beside my bed, and helps me lean forward to drink it. Some of it spills out of my mouth, but I don’t care. I gulp it down, my throat like sandpaper.

“Are you in pain?” she asks, her brow furrowed with concern.

“Not too much. Just . . . just really foggy.”

She nods in understanding. “I’m going to go get the nurse,” she says and turns to go, but I grip her hand to stop her.

“My dad?”

Her eyes soften, a small smile spreading her lips. She brushes the hair back from my forehead. The act is so kind, so motherly, that it makes my eyes burn with tears.

“He’s all right. He was discharged today, actually—against his will. He didn’t want to leave you,” she says, and my head leans back in relief. “We all had to beg him to go home and change. He stunk.” She wrinkles her nose and smiles, and it makes me smile too.

Her features fall suddenly, like she had a displeasing thought.

“What is it?”

She just shakes her head. “I’ll let him tell you. And besides, there’s nothing you should be thinking about right now except recovering. You scared the shit out of all of us, Viv. You’ve been in a coma for a week.”

I nod, and wince as a stab of pain goes through my hip as I try to reposition to sitting up. Justine shakes her head at me, her sculpted brows furrowing.

“Take it easy, Vivvie,” she says, and reaches for the remote control to the bed. She hands it to me, and I press the button that brings me up to a more comfortable position. She fluffs my pillows and helps me settle in before heading for the door. I feel like a sap, but I can’t help it. I have to ask my next question.

“Justine, has anyone else been here?”

Her hand on the doorknob, she smiles sadly at me, the expression laced with pity.

“Gavin brought flowers . . . and Carlos and his family have come by a few times. The kids were scared for you though. They don’t stay long, just long enough to drop off those.” She points to the wall by my bed—a touching assortment of thumbtacked pictures, colorful “get well” cards, paper snowflakes, and crudely crafted people that are all on display. “I’ll be right back.”

The door latches closed behind her, leaving me alone with the gaping hole inside of my heart.

A replaced hip, a skull fracture, double wrist dislocations, torn ligaments in both shoulders, four broken fingers, three knife wounds, and two rounds of antibiotics for an alarmingly persistent infected dog bite.

Not to mention a Santa’s sleigh-load of mental trauma and PTSD, but it doesn’t count if you can’t see it, right?

I’ve been in the hospital for three weeks. Everyone here is demented. I’m convinced their solution for everything is physical therapy. So here I am, relearning to walk on my brand new titanium Terminator hip, and I haven’t ever felt more sorry for myself.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m thrilled to be alive, but barely surviving makes quite a mess of your life. I’ve got bills, medical costs that grow by the hour, and a dwindling savings account. PPD suspended me—to say the least—and I’ve been too injured to even consider returning to work anyway. Carlos comes by every few days, sometimes with Estefania and their newborn, Amora. They keep me well stocked with fresh crafts from their children, and delicious home cooked meals that I devour before they can even cool down.

All of them are well salted.

Justine visits often as well, and the last time she came she left the card of a trusted business associate—the field office’s psychiatrist.

She prepaid eight visits for me. She wouldn’t take no for an answer.

So, I’ve been going to physical therapy every day, and twice a week Dr. Ramona Hilliard comes to my room so that we can talk.

I think that I like therapy.

I mean, it’s a sobbing mess of a process that takes a shovel-sized bite out of your heart and rakes it over hot coals, but Dr. H always puts it right back in my chest and gives me a hug afterwards.

We talk about my dad. We talk about Collette. We talk about Gavin. We talk about the Valley Dogs, and Sugar, and Jennings.

We talk about Leo.

Oh—and about Sugar, or Grace.

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