Page 16 of Crusher

No sooner than we entered the family waitingarea the doctor came in and walked over to Speed and I stood besidehim. “Your sister did great. I had to go deep into her thigh to getto the bullet. You know of course it had nicked her femoral artery,I repaired it, but since it is the main artery in the thigh shewill have to take it easy for several weeks. This is essentialsince the artery is weakened, we don’t want to put any additionstrain on it. The bullet was lodged in the muscle, it took a littletime to get out, I didn’t want to do more damage to the muscle thanwas already done. So what all this boils down to is she will be insome extreme pain while the muscle and the surrounding area heal.Her outer sutures will have to be removed in two weeks but that canbe done at your local hospital. I’m going to recommend therapy tostrengthen the muscle back after it heals. That too can be done inher home town. But that will be after the artery heals too. I’mgoing to keep her at least three days, if she does good I willpossibly release her, if she isn’t doing well then she is lookingto be with us at a minimum of a week. I’ll know more after shewakes. Do you have any questions, Mr. Weston?” I didn’t give Speedthe chance to ask.

“When can we see her?”

“After she comes out of recovery. I will letthe nurses know to inform you when she is moved to a room. Havesomeone page me if you need me to answer any more questions youmight think of later.” The doctor shook our hands and left.

“Thank fuck.” Speed ran his hand down hisface. The day had been hard but for him maybe a little more thanthe rest of us. “I thought five years ago that the loss of my dadwas hard. If today would have went another way, I don’t think Iwould have been able to come back from the loss. I can’t evenfathom what it would be like, brother.”

“You don’t need to. Everyone is safe. Carlyis banged up a little but she will bounce back. We help Haven naildown the fuckwad and it is clear sailing.”

“You’re right, Crusher. Just needed to get itout of my system. We might as well sit down and wait for Carly towake.” Everyone took seats to wait. Wait for Carly to wake up, waitfor Haven’s men to get there for the pickup. I should thank themilitary for my patience, though they were running thin, I at leastwasn’t jumping out of my skin. I’d forgotten about Devil and whathe had been checking on until he spoke.

“This has been a shit day but I’m going toadd to it. If I’m wrong, I will own it, however, I don’t think Iam.” He paused and all eyes went to him.

“You went out to call your dad after Speedwas asked to give blood. Whatever you got working in your head,share it.” Devil nodded to me, then focused on Speed.

“When the doctor said Carly’s blood type wasA- and you had the same, Speed, it hit me as odd because A- iskinda rare, only like six percent of world has it.”

“That means what, Devil? You are losing me,”Speed frowned and I had to admit I was not following either. Theonly one who seemed to know where Devil was headed was WildBill.

“To have any negative Rh factor in blood, ittakes both parents to carry the negative Rh, because if eithercarries the positive Rh, it most always overrides the negative. TheA type blood is common, except for if both parents are O type, thechildren will only be O, no other type will come through.” Devilspoke as if we all had medical training.

“Christ, Devil, who cares. What the hell areyou saying?” My brain was on overload.

“In a nutshell. Carly isn’t Speed’shalf-sister, she is his full-blooded sister, literally.” I turnedto Speed when Devil finished and he still wore the frown but hiseyes could’ve frozen an open flame.

“That damn bitch left Black Hawk pregnant?Fuck me, she just keeps lifting out the grave to spread her shit.Are you sure, Devil?” Speed asked.

“I’m not going to say I’m one hundredpercent, but a swab of your and Carly’s mouths is all that isneeded. When I called Dad, I had him check the records for yourdad’s type, he was A- too. Wild Bill got Stone’s and Clarice’sblood type. Stone was O+, Clarice O-, we know she gave birth toCarly but no way Stone is her dad. Not saying I’m right aboutCutter, Speed, but fuck, man. That is one big coincidence if he’snot.”

My friend turned and punched the wall. “ThinkI should know for sure before we tell Carly? Damn it, I’m pissed,”he slapped the wall.

“Are you mad at Carly, Speed? Do you thinkseeing it on paper is going to change the results?” Wild Billasked, standing.

Speed turned around and looked at him, “Fuckno. I have no doubt she is my sister. I’m pissed of all we missed.My dad was a hard man and he never asked anyone to do something hewouldn’t do himself, but he expected when he asked for somethingthat it be done to the best of your ability, because that is how helived life. From the military, to being a part of Black Hawk, tobeing a dad, and to know he missed out where Carly is concernedpisses me off for him, while it has me sorry for the loss thatCarly wasn’t afforded the same opportunity I was. Cutter would havedone the same for her, they both missed out because one selfishfucking woman didn’t get her way.” Speed shook his head, his facecarrying the look of disgust.

“The test takes a few days, Speed. You sureyou want to wait for the results before you talk to Carly?” WildBill held us his hand to stop my brother from talking before hefinished, “Carly has always been strong her entire life, son. Thatgirl never let the way Stone and Clarice acted to keep her down ormold her in any way. I think their behavior only made her workharder not to be seen as weak as they were. Stone was and is adrunk and Clarice, well, she stayed tweaked out. Carly isn’t goingto take kindly to being kept in the dark until you see fit toshare. Because, Speed, there may not be a physical resemblance toyou two, but goddamn if you both don’t have the same ‘go after whatyou want’ personality.” Wild Bill chuckled.

“No shit! That answers a lot, don’t it,Prez?” Keg’s voice had us all turning around. He and Coast hadentered the room and evidently for a bit if they heard what wasjust discussed. Coast walked over with a bag and handed it tome.

“We stopped on our way here. Heard you andDevil could use a change of clothes.” I slapped Coast on theshoulder in a thank you gesture.

“Taking everything went smooth on thetransfer?” I asked.

“Done.” Only word he said and then he wentover to Flirt and Jag and sat down.

“Prez, you think Carly is going to want tocome back to Haven and recuperate?” Keg asked Wild Bill, drawingmine and Speed’s attention as they talked to each other. Speed beatme in answering.

“She will go to Black Hawk.”

“She was raised at Haven. If she wants tocome there, we will welcome her as we always have.” Wild Billglared back at Speed. I wouldn’t let her go to Haven if it was thelast thing I did but I wasn’t ready to share that information.Besides, I knew Speed well enough to know he wasn’t going to letthat happen.

“Carly may have been raised as part of Haven,but she is Black Hawk. So there is no confusion, she will berecuperating there.”

“You think you are going to get her to stayat Black Hawk?” Keg said and Moose laughed and Wild Bill justsmiled.

“It will be easy enough, if I can’t get herto cooperate, Crusher will,” Speed’s words had me turning towardhim.

“What makes you think she will listen to me?”Wild Bill’s laughter at my words pissed me off.

---