Page 8 of Demon Hunter

“Please keep your voices down for the benefit of all the patients in this ward. If you cause a disturbance, you’ll be forced to leave. The doctor will come to speak with you shortly, but until then, be prepared for a shock. Matthias?—”

“Matt,” Ian corrects. “He prefers Matt.”

Her face softens the tiniest bit. “Matt has been through some massive trauma. He’s very bruised and may not be recognizable at first. There’s a tube in his throat to help him breathe and quite a few other machines. It can be very confronting, so if you feel you need a moment to regroup, you can step out.” She gestures to the doors behind us. “Now that I know you, there won’t be a problem with letting you back in.”

I manage a nod. Ian just looks sick.

“Please don’t touch Matt. I understand that will be difficult and that your instinct will be to offer comfort that way, but he requires further surgery that can’t be completed until he’s more stable, and even a gentle touch may cause more damage.”

Oh my god. I clench my fists tightly, needing the bite of my nails into my palms to keep from freaking out. What happened to him?

“Are you ready to go in, or would you like a few more moments to prepare?”

“Take us in,” Ian and I say in unison, and Marc nods.

She leads us past several glass-fronted rooms and then stops in front of one directly opposite the nurses’ station. I stare through the glass at the still form lying in the bed. The only thing recognizable about him is his hair.

“There was no head injury?” Marc asks, but his tone is absent. He’s staring hard at Matt.

“No,” the nurse replies. “Through some stroke of luck, his head escaped serious injury. Some minor contusions only, and a few cuts on his face. He’s in a medically induced coma, so he won’t be responsive at all, but feel free to speak quietly to him and each other.” She nods toward the open door. “You can go in, and the doctor will be with you shortly.”

Inside the room, the only sounds are the beeping and humming of the machines that are keeping Matt alive. There are two chairs on the far side of the bed and a door that I guess leads into a bathroom. No window.

But then, I guess people in comas don’t need a view.

“Matty,” Ian breathes, but I can’t speak.

“Sit, both of you,” Marc orders.

I glance over at him. He’s standing at the foot of the bed, his gaze skimming up Matt’s body. “Don’t you need to?—”

“I’m best positioned here. Sit.”

I pull a chair closer to the bed and plant my ass in it. I want to reach out and touch Matt so badly; just brush my finger along his skin and reassure myself heexists—but I don’t. I won’t do anything to make this worse.

His chest is rising and falling evenly, though I guess that’s thanks to the tube running into his mouth. Half of his face is covered by a mask, but the nurse was right about cuts and bruises. A sheet is pulled up to his waist, and his upper torso is covered by a hospital gown, but his arms and neck are visible, and everywhere there isn’t a bandage, tube, or wire seems to be bruised or cut. His arms are splinted, hands swollen, and I remember what Gabe said about bones being broken. Can they really not do anything about that yet?

I’ve never been a religious person, but if it wasn’t for the fact the demon standing only three feet from me has sworn to heal him, I’d be praying for Matt now.

That’s so fucked-up.

Ian pulls the other chair up beside mine, sits, and looks at his boyfriend. “Tell me again that you can fix him.”

Marc doesn’t take his eyes off Matt. “Your lack of faith in me is disturbing, grubby human. Stop bothering me.”

Somehow, I find that more comforting than all the life-saving machines in the room.

Chapter 4

Dylan

I pacethe waiting room restlessly. It’s early morning on the third day of this hellscape that’s become my life, and if what Marc tells us is true, the doctors should decide today that Matt’s stable enough to breathe on his own and maybe perform some of the surgeries he needs to set his broken bones.

Since Gabe and Connor arrived, I haven’t had much time in there with him. Marc needs to be there all the time, of course, and after he convinced that first nurse—Carolyn, her name is—to let more than two people in, nobody else has questioned it. At first I thought it was because Marc was mind controlling them all, but then I hacked into Matt’s file and found a note from the doctor that visitor rules were relaxed per patient policy 822.4b. A quick hack of the hospital’s internal policies told me this isn’t a good thing. There was a lot of jargon, but basically it came down to “patient not expected to survive.”

Once my hands stopped shaking, I got online, found the fanciest custom handkerchiefs I could, and ordered a set to be monogrammed for Marc. He’ll probably critique them, but I had to do something. The memory of the doctor’s face when Gabe arrived and she all but told him she hadn’t expected him to makeit in time to say goodbye… well, it’s pretty obvious that Matt would be dead if it wasn’t for Marc.

Matty’s going to hate that. I know it’s eating Connor from the inside out. He, Ian, and I have been trading off going in to sit with Gabe and Marc. We didn’t want to push our luck by having too many people in there, especially since Matt’s already surprising the medical professionals by still being alive. This morning they’re running some tests, and all the work Marc’s been doing should show that Matt’s going to survive.

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