Page 33 of Scarred Queen

She giggled while the doctor pretended not to hear the exchange. Once they boarded, Casey made a point of sitting next to her doctor friend while Reyes sat with his men. The space was small enough that his razor-sharp gaze could watch his woman at all times. He was not remotely worried about her interactions with the relatively youthful neurologist, but he didn’t particularly like anyone near her for any length oftime.

As with their last flight, Casey watched everything about the takeoff with fascinated enthusiasm while Reyes watched his woman, his face impassive, his gaze hungry as always. After the plane lifted above the clouds and the beautiful mountain scenery no longer captured her attention, she turned to the doctor and asked the question that wouldn’t stop gnawing at her. Her anxiety increasing the closer they got toBrazil.

“What if they find something in my head?” Casey whispered, her worried eyes on Miguel’sface.

“You mean like a tumor?” he asked bluntly, addressing her worst fear. How could a person have such debilitating migraines and not have something seriously wrong with them? Yet he’d reassured her over and over that the likelihood of tumor was astronomicallyslim.

She nodded her head, but his words did assuage her fears; she knew it showed on her face so once more Miguel went over the facts withher.

“We’ve been over this many times, Casey. If you had a mass in your brain, there would be many more signs and your headaches would have gotten progressively worse over the years. But your coordination and motor skills are fine. Your vision is fine, except for the colour-blindness, which you’ve had since birth. You do admit to some memory loss, but this seems to be a by-product of your accident.” He covered her hand in his and squeezed. “Be brave, Casey. This is one of the best neuro-clinics in the world. The scans and the x-rays will only help to reassure you. Don’t fear what they’ll tell you. They’ll give us better ways to cope with theheadaches.”

Casey liked the way he said ‘us’. Ignoring Reyes’ typical murderous glare, she looped her arm through Miguel’s and held on to him for a while, needing his steady, calming reassurance. She’d gone from a complete lack of touch in her life to now basking in the glorious caresses of her lover and the completely plutonic, but nonetheless reassuring presence of her doctor. If Reyes didn’t like that she was giving her attention to both men, he could jump off an airplane. He’d gotten her a doctor for her safety and sanity and she was finding comfort in hisgift.

She snuggled back in her seat with a sigh and closed her eyes. She tilted her head slightly toward Miguel, though not completely leaning on his shoulder. After all, she wasn’t totally trying to get the man killed. She would accept his reassurances along with the solid, protective strength that Reyes surrounded her with and be brave for her upcomingordeal.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Casey wasn’t happy.And when Casey wasn’t happy, Reyes wasn’t happy. She was sitting in a private room at the Brazilian clinic with her lover pacing close by and his men standing off to the side, watching over their charges. All these big men in the small room absolutely dwarfed the space, until Reyes finally growled at two of them to take a walk, leaving only Reyes, Alejandro and Caseybehind.

Casey gripped the edge of the uncomfortable plastic chair until her knuckles were white. She rocked back and forth, back and forth. Her ankles were crossed and tucked under the chair. She wondered why a clinic as expensive as this place didn’t invest in better chairs. Maybe they didn’t know. Maybe someone should tell them. Maybe they had a comment box. Maybe they spent too much money on their high-end lab equipment and couldn’t afford decent chairs. Perhaps she would get Reyes to donate better chairs once they flew back to La Paz and she was safely away from this place. Unless she actually did have a tumor. Then she was going to sue them; because she was vindictive that way, not because it was actually their fault she had atumor.

Casey sighed and reached for the end of the string on the neck of her hoodie and put it in her mouth to chew on nervously. She wasn’t actually going to sue the clinic or let Reyes do anything evil to the doctors. She wasn’t truly vindictive. She was just scared. She shifted in her seat again and pulled her long legs up to sit cross-legged, glad she’d chosen comfort over sophistication when she dressed thismorning.

They’d arrived last night in Rio de Janeiro and stayed in a luxury hotel. This morning she’d chosen a pair of leggings, a black hoodie with a rose dipped in blood on the front and a pair of Sketchers. She’d piled her hair on top of her head in a knot, which had long since come loose to tumble in waves down her back. She wasn’t sure where the elastic had gone and the loss was really bothering her. Was the hair elastic still in the break room? Or maybe it had fallen in the MRImachine?

Most of her time at the clinic had been spent waiting to be called in between tests. Casey personally thought Reyes did a remarkable job of not freaking out with how long everything was taking and how many people touched her, though Casey was certain the doctors thought otherwise. His vicious caveman was firmly in place the entire time. He particularly hadn’t liked the MRI machine, nor anything that required her having to get undressed. He’d stood beside her for each procedure, his bulging arms crossed, his death glare firmly in place. When he was forced to leave her side, the poor doctor asked Alejandro to explain the procedure and then took off in case Reyes objected. Each needle, each test had to be fully and completely explained before anything was allowed to touch her and even then, it usually took Casey herself arguing him into compliance. She began to wonder how they weren’t kicked out of the clinic and asked never toreturn.

Money andpower.

Casey lifted her eyes and watched the men in the room. A soft bubble of laugher erupted from her. Alejandro and Reyes looked as nervous as she felt, which, oddly, settled the butterflies in her stomach. Reyes, of course, looked fiercely protective as he paced from the window back to the chair where she sat, absently brushing his large, rough fingers across the fine strands of her hair as hepassed.

Alejandro had taken up a post by the window where he squinted with deadly concentration out into the parking lot two stories down, the set of his shoulders filled with tension. Casey could only surmise that her current situation was causing him worry since she didn’t think there was any worry of an imminent attack. She watched him with affection. The off-putting Bolivian seemed to soften towards her over the past several weeks. It was clear that he found her absurd statements hilarious and would erupt in a full-bodied laugh whenever she said or did anything that set the boss off. He’d even taken it upon himself a few times to poke the beast just to get Casey going. She’d known what he was up to and thought it was prettyfunny.

Miguel was with the other neurologists reviewing the test results. The clinic doctors had been kind enough to invite him as a professional courtesy to consult with them knowing that he would be treating Casey in the foreseeable future. Casey was extremely grateful. She’s grown to trust Miguelimplicitly.

Finally, after what felt like a decade had passed in that small, airless room, the door opened and Miguel entered with two of the clinic doctors.Just in time,she thought. She was positive that Reyes was about to start tearing heads off and demandinganswers.

The breath rushed from her lungs and Casey felt faint. She could tell immediately from the look on Miguel’s face that something was gravely wrong. His olive skin had an ashen tone and he refused to meet her eyes. Tears filled her eyes and she dug her fingers into her knees, attempting to pinch her skin hard enough to infuse some courage into her body. She wanted to open her mouth, to say the words and confront the truth. To be the first one to fill the silence. But the truth was, Casey was a coward. Her time with Reyes helped her to realize that she’d never been able to face the truth of a situation. She had avoided reality because it was too scary forher.

Finally, she managed to square her shoulders and look up, her face hard. Reyes and Alejandro came to stand on either side of her, like sentinels. It was almost laughable how much support she had in these big, strong immovable men with a wealth of power behind them compared to before with Ignacio. Reyes would move mountains, burn cities and search relentlessly for answers if it meant helpingher.

Reyes placed his hand on her shoulder and without looking at her, demanded, “Tell us what youfound.”

“Señor…” the head neurologist spoke hesitantly. Casey began to feel faint. Did she actually have a tumor? Had the impossible really become possible after all? “Perhaps you would like to speak with us in the hallwayfirst.”

The panic rose up through her and waves of dizziness washed over her. But she desperately fought against fainting, she needed to know her fate. She carefully inched her hand up toward Reyes until she was clasping his hand where it rested on her shoulder. He still refused to look at her, but she could tell from the tension in his body that he was desperately worried. His body vibrated with the telltale signs of growing rage that threatened to erupt inviolence.

His voice betrayed none of this when he spoke with chilly precision, “Speak. My wife is a strong woman. She can handle whatever you have tosay.”

Casey closed her eyes, took a deep breath and slowly stiffened her spine, stacking it until she was sitting as straight as she possibly could. When she opened her eyes, she fixed them on the wall between Miguel, who stared at the floor between his feet in utter dejection, and the other doctor. She wondered if Miguel was regretting his decision to hang with the other doctors. His intentions had been good. He’d get to learn some new techniques, share some professional expertise and help in the decision-making process when it ultimately came to the best interests of his patient. Now he didn’t seem so keen on the idea. He looked ready tobolt.

They all looked ready tobolt.

“Please,” Casey said in the same tone of voice Reyes had used. Chilly and commanding. “Tell us what youfound.”

The doctor gave her a clipped nod and pulled up one the plastic chairs so he was sitting opposite of her when he spoke. Casey respected him a little more when he pulled that move, considering her sentinels both stiffened and looked utterly unimpressed with the man’s proximity to his patient. Apparently, Reyes was finished with having these people anywhere near his woman. She squeezed his hand so he wouldn’t attack the man before she got her much neededinformation.

The doctor addressed only her, plunging directly into his findings with no preliminaries. “Your initial bloodwork findings have come back normal, there doesn’t seem to be any hormonal issues that are causing your migraines, though we’ll send it away for further checks. And of course, as we explained earlier, research in this field is alwaysdeveloping.”

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