Page 34 of Scarred Queen

Casey tried hard not to roll her eyes and waved her hand impatiently at him. He’d gone over most of this already. She’d been pretty positive her migraines weren’t hormone related. Obviously, he was stalling as he built toward what was actually wrong withher.

He leaned forward, shifting in the chair. She thought she detected a slight wince.See, the chairs are horrible! You monsters torture us with the chairs and the MRI machines!she wanted to shout at him, but dug her fingers into the back of Reyes’ hand instead. He didn’t even twitch as she sank her nails into his flesh, knowing the pasty doctor was working his way toward a truth that would shatter her. She wondered where he was from. He really was quite pale, and to a woman with colour-blindness a person almost had to glow for that to become apparent. His accent seemed European or something. And his name… what was his name again? She frowned. Oh, his lips were moving again. Time to tune backin.

“… Your MRI came back completelynormal.”

Casey frowned when he stopped talking and simply looked at her. She waited for him to go on with more of an explanation. There had to be something. Something to explain the migraines, the memory loss, the weird personality ticks, the drifts she took. It couldn’t all be the trauma of a failed marriage. It had to be physical. Or… or she was weak; too weak to run an empire withReyes.

When the doctor didn’t give her any further explanation, she said in a voice dripping with ice, “Then explain the memoryloss.”

The doctor’s face softened with sympathy and he reached out to take the hand that had clenched tightly in her lap. Reyes reacted immediately, snarling in response, “You’ve touched her enough for one day. Touch again without permission and lose a hand. Get on with your findings and move on to the nextpatient.”

The doctor’s face blanched and his head snapped up. He gaped at Reyes for a solid ten seconds before he remembered what he was supposed to be doing. Casey would have felt bad for him if her butt wasn’t so numb. A private clinic really ought to afford betterfurniture!

“Right!” The doctor hurried to open the file he’d been clutching between his legs. Casey glanced back sharply at Miguel who’d shifted uncomfortably and looked even more upset than before. Really, the man looked as though he was going to cry! They must now be approaching the upsettingnews.

“It’s a tumor, isn’t it?” Casey blurted outtearfully.

“Of course not, Mrs. Reyes,” the other doctor that had remained silent throughout the entire procedure, and, in fact, most of the day, murmured soothingly. “You’re clear on any form of mass. Benign or otherwise.” She smiledkindly.

Casey smiled back tremulously, grateful for the straight answer. Jesus, she’d wished that particular doctor had been the one giving her the news. She seemed to have a better bedside manner than all the men put together. And Casey would bet money that she’d pick better chairstoo.

“Then what the fuck is wrong with my wife?” Reyes snapped, finally losing patience and giving the room his favourite ‘I’m about to fuck shit up until I get all the answers’ glare. Casey giggled, despite her tension. She loved when he got all protective and angry. It made her feel warm andfuzzy.

The doctor cleared his throat and leaned back in his chair, putting some distance between himself, the mafioso couple and their equally terrifying second-in-command. He spoke quickly and directly, “While Casey’s bloodwork and MRI are normal, her x-ray has shown anomalies. The fracture lines in her skull are not consistent with an impact from a carcrash.”

Reyes’ fingers bit deep into Casey’s shoulder causing her to squirm. She expected him to say something, to rage and demand answers. In fact, she waited breathlessly for him to do just that. When he remained silent at her side, continuing to bruise the tender flesh of her shoulder, she tilted her head back, her hair shifting against the hood of her sweater and gave him a questioning look. He looked back down at her, his own expression completelyblank.

Her lips parted and her eyes widened in accusation. “Y-you knew?” shewhispered.

She didn’t need an answer. His lack of reaction told her everything. She tried to force her frozen brain to work, tried to understand what was happening in the room around her. The subtle shifting of the bodies. The painful bite of Reyes fingers. She reached up and pried his fingers away. He allowed it. She was under no illusion that she could have removed his hand if he wanted to keep it there. No, he was giving her the distance she craved in thatmoment.

He knew.He fucking knew. Which meant they’d come to Brazil not to find answers, but to find confirmation of somekind.

She lifted accusatory eyes to his and said coldly, “Ignacio told you something, didn’t he? Before hedied.”

Still his face remained flat. She uncurled her fingers and tensed, preparing to fly at him, rake her fingers down his impassive, scarred face until he told her the truth, told her what her late husband had told him before Reyes killed him. How had she ever trusted this man? A heavy hand landed on Casey’s other shoulder, pinning her to the chair. She jumped, her head snapping around to confront the one that dared touch her while her heart was in the process ofshattering.

Alejandro gave her a slight shake of the head. He’d read her mind and was telling her not to attack Reyes. She took a deep breath and ruthlessly brought herself under control. He was right. She’d grown comfortable with Reyes as her lover, her confidant and even, sometimes, her friend. But he was still the Bolivian boss. If she attacked him in a room full of people, he would have to retaliate; to brutally, ruthlessly shut her down. He could not afford to show weakness. Not with her, not withanyone.

With Alejandro’s warm, comforting touch and Reyes dark presence at her side she turned to the doctor and demanded, her voice imperious, “Tell me therest.”

He nodded, his eyes on hers, a mixture of awe and pity. He opened the file and removed the x-ray, holding it out for her to see. “It’s remarkable really, how well your brain has healed from the type of injury we’re seeing here. Your description of multiple surgeries and a five-week medically induced coma are consistent with this type of trauma. I believe that the migraines are probably a result of the original trauma that occurred when you were eighteen though we aren’t able to absolutely confirm this diagnosis. We can, however, give you better medications to help manage thesymptoms.”

She brushed off his reassurances and focused on the one important word he kept saying over and over again. “Whattrauma?”

He dropped his eyes, finally refusing to look her in the face. The room seemed to go completely still and she realized every single person in the room knew the truth of what was on the x-ray except for her. She stared at it, forcing her brain to acknowledge what everyone else could see, but she was somehowmissing.

The doctor touched the photo and traced the tip of his fingernail along something she still couldn’t understand. A delicate pattern of some kind radiating out from a dark spot. Without looking up, he said softly, “Gunshot wound to thehead.”

Chapter Twenty-Seven

“Impossible!”Casey snapped after a moment of silence. “I was in a car wreck. It killed my entirefamily!”

No one moved. No one said anything. They simply waited, statues in a still room as denial crashed over her. She felt hot. Prickles of heat penetrating all down her skin as some kind of truth tried to sweep over her. She shook her head and then she pushed her shoulders up, shrugging Alejandro’s hand away. He knew. He knew just as much as Reyes had known. They’d allknown.

But they werewrong.

Her family had died on a highway. She slammed her eyes shut and buried her hands in her hair, gripping the pale blond strands in tight fists as she forced herself to conjure a memory that wouldn’t come. Had never come. A memory of a happy family driving, screeching brakes, twisting metal, the smell of fire, people screaming, ambulance sirens. Nothing. There was nothing. There had never been any memories of theaccident.

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