Page 43 of Crown of the Fae King

Nurse?

I looked around the room again, verified it was indeed my bedroom. He'd brought a nurse to the house?

He left the room. I would have surrendered to sleep again, but my bladder forbade it. Already, he was back with a woman in scrubs. She turned on a lamp and smiled kindly.

"Ready for a trip to the loo, then?"

It turnedout that I had slept for a day and a half, and I'd never come as close to dying as I thought I had. In the morning, a doctor actually came to the house to check on me and discuss my injuries.

“Wickham won’t let me look in the mirror,” I grumbled.

“Ye’ve got a shiner, lass. All else seems to be in place. Though, the nurse tells me yer neck hurts?”

“Might be whiplash. He slapped me pretty hard.”

The man’s face paled. “Ye have a linear skull fracture…”

“I’m pretty sure someone stomped on my head. But my clothes were in a pile beneath me. You know. A cushion. So it could have been worse.”

The doctor scowled at Wickham. “I’m askin’ ye to leave the room, sir.”

Wickham rolled his eyes. “Lennon, I believe Dr. McAvoy needs to ken who did these things to ye. In yer own words, not mine.”

I finally got it. “It wasn’t him.” I struggled to remember. "They followed me from the train station. Two men and a woman. I hailed a cab, but the driver was one of them and let them in the car too. They..." I had to stop myself before I started using words like "fairy" and glowing purple eyes. "They were looking for something. I think they had me confused with someone else. They..." I couldn't find the words. "They..."

"Miss Todd, perhaps ye could ask Mr. Muir to step outside?” McAvoy scowled at Wickham, but the Highlander only scowled back.

“He’s fine,” I said. “It’s fine.”

“So be it.” He sighed. “I found evidence of sexual abuse--"

"No!” I lowered my voice. “No. Nothing like that. They were just...searching."

He looked doubtful.

"Maybe they thought I was a drug mule or something. Hiding something in my...you know. They didn't appreciate me fighting back. And when they didn't find what they were looking for," I locked eyes with Wickham, "they weren't happy."

The doctor nodded, a little more convinced. "Tell me again, who slapped ye?"

"The man sitting beside me. I slapped him first, for trying to take off my shirt..." I was suddenly back there, seeing it all again. I got a funny taste in my mouth. Panic swirled in my stomach like the worst case of motion sickness. “I’m going to be sick.”

McAvoy handed me a plastic container. Running to the toilet was apparently not an option. "And who stomped on yer head?"

"I'm pretty sure that was the woman. She asked me whereitwas. I told her I didn't know what she was talking about. I think I called her…something unkind. That’s when it happened. I think. But I'm not sure. Pretty sure I checked out after that."

"Let's talk about yer arm." He gently lifted the limb in question and pointed with his pen. "It is broken here, and here." He pointed above the elbow, then below it.

"Same guy maybe? When I finally got off the floor, I tried to gouge his eye out and one of them whacked me hard."

The doctor sighed, then nodded. "And what about the scratches on yer arms and legs?"

I smiled. "You should see the other guys."

Wickham stayed awayfor three days after that doctor visit. The nurse stayed another night until I was sure I could get to the bathroom on my own. Everly promised she would help me with everything else. And there I was again, naked in front of another human being, like I swore would never happen again.

At least I had a thick layer of bubbles between us most of the time. She sat on a chair to make sure I didn’t drown in the bathtub. We never talked about why I left. And for those two days, we all walked on eggshells, waiting for some unseen shoe to drop.

Kitch, Persi, and I sat in the dining room eating lunch on the fourth day when Wickham stuck his head in the door. "Meeting in the war room at one o'clock, aye?" Then he was gone.

---