Page 12 of Demon Hunter

Ian shakes his head the tiniest bit. Okay. If the police did find my kit, they haven’t mentioned it to my family. And Dyl’s here, which means he would have hacked in and checked. So my kit wasn’t in the car.

Or with me.

That’s… weird. What was I doing without my kit?

The doctor seems satisfied that I’m not going to move again, because she lets go of me and steps back. “You’re at Renown Regional Medical Center in Reno,” she confirms. “Do you remember what happened?”

I cast around in my head, but there’s nothing. I got to Reno, checked into my shitty motel, then… “No.”

“Okay. That’s not unusual—you’ve been unconscious for a long time, and that can interfere with memory. If you do remember any details as time progresses, let us know. The police will want to interview you at some stage, also.”

I want to know what happened to me, but her comment about me being unconscious for a long time scares me. “How long?”

“Sorry?”

“How long was I unconscious?” My gaze goes back to my family. They all look exhausted—except that asshole, Marc. I can’t believe Ian brought him here… or that he loves him. I swear, my bestie’s got a whole bucket’s worth of loose screws in his head. “What day is it?”

The doctor hesitates, and the beeping beside me picks up speed. I know why—I can feel my heart beating faster.

“Matt, please stay calm. We’d rather not have to sedate you again. Just try to breathe steadily,” the doctor says in a soothing kind of voice that has the opposite impact.

Then, suddenly, my heart rate settles. I don’t know why, because my brain is still freaking the fuck out, but my body is weirdly calm. Did they give me something after all?

“That’s better.” Dr. Howard’s smile is approving, but past her, Connor turns his head to glare at Marc, and it hits me suddenly thathe’sdoing it. He slowed my heart back to normal.

The rage that rips through me has no effect on my body, and it’s so strange. No adrenaline. No desire to clench my fists or teeth. Just theconceptof being angry.

This is so fucked-up. When I get out of here, I’m going to cut up some of Marc’s suits in retribution.

“You were found late on November 9 and brought here by ambulance. You’d been beaten badly—very badly—and we rushed you into emergency surgery to deal with the worst of your internal injuries. You had to be resuscitated three times during the surgery, and we kept you in a medically induced coma afterward while we waited for you to stabilize enough for further surgeries.”

Holy. Fuck.

Suddenly, I’m glad for Marc’s interference. Because the way my mind feels right now, if I was in full control of my body, I think I might be having a panic attack.

Instead, I swallow. It hurts because my throat’s still dry, but everything else hurts anyway, so who cares?

“We were… honestly, Matt, we were surprised that you stabilized. You’re a very lucky man. When you were well enough, we took you back into surgery to pin and set your broken bones. You got through those surgeries like a champion, and we have every belief that you’ll fully recover… pending a few tests we need to run now that you’re conscious.”

I don’t know what to say. “Thank you.”

She meets my gaze. “Unfortunately, in order to save your life, we were forced to remove your spleen and your right kidney. We’ll talk more during the rest of your recovery about what that will mean for you going forward. The orthopedic surgeon will come to talk to you also—there’s a lot of rehab ahead of you, but the tendon and nerve damage we were concerned about turned out not to be as bad as we initially thought.”

Uhhh… “Good?” My gaze goes to my family. Dylan’s face is still, but Ian gives me a thumbs-up. Fuck knows what that means.

The doctor’s smiling at me, so I guess she thinks everything’s hunky-dory. “Now that you’re awake and aware, we can move you out of the ICU and into a regular room. I know your family will like that—they won’t have to take turns to sit with you anymore.”

I still can’t manage to make myself smile. “H-How long?” I whisper, and I’m not sure what I’m asking about. How long I was in a coma? How long I’m going to be in the hospital? How long it will take me to recover?

She seems to understand the question, though. “Today’s November 16. Let’s take things as they come, but if your recovery continues at this rate, you’ll be out of here in no time at all.”

November 16… aweek? I’ve been unconscious for a week? And I still hurt this much?

“We’ll transfer you to a ward soon, but in the meantime, get some rest. You’ll find yourself sleeping a lot—your body needs that to heal. And we’ve got you on some pretty good painkillers. Don’t be a hero—if the pain gets bad, press this button.” She holds up a cylinder with a button on top and a cord running from the other end. “Debilitating pain will slow the healing process, so don’t let it get to that point.”

What. The.Fuck. Happened to me?

“Doctor, how soon do you think we can have him transferred closer to home?” Gabe asks, moving forward. I blink, surprised. I know he and Connor will have to get back to Illinois—they run the compound there, and it’s not good for them both to be away for long stretches of time—but surely Ian can arrange to stay here with me? A lot of his archives work is digitalized now anyway. And Dylan’s work is completely online, so he can definitely stay.

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