Page 57 of Scythe & Sparrow
Barbara hisses, but Rose doesn’t seem to take that as proof of my point. “She’s not rabid. She’s pretty talented, actually. Cheryl’s been training her with the poodles. She had her debut show last week.”
I open my mouth to say something, but my brain can’t seem to sort through the many questions I have fast enough to land on a single one. Chad, however, is ready to fill the void. “She has a petraccoon,” he declares from the treadmill. “Isn’t that badass?”
I let out an audibleughand refocus my attention on Rose. “You really don’t have to explain, Rose. Well, more detail about the raccoon is probably warranted. But not about the guy. We never agreed to be exclusive.”
“Thanks for the reminder, you fucking clown. But I do have some standards,” she says as she rolls her eyes and crosses her arms over her chest, her brows knitting together for the briefest moment before her expression smooths to a veneer of barely restrained fury. “Dudes with tattoos made with a Bic pen in their garage don’t fit the bill, ya know?”
“Then what the hell is going on?” A sinking feeling drops through my chest to simmer in my guts when Rose gnaws her lip. “Spit it out—”
“He should bedead,” she hisses. “At least, that’s what Sloane told me when I texted her. I gave him double what she suggested.”
“What …?”
“I laced his churros with enough speed to choke a gorilla. He puked all over me and then started pacing around in circles so I brought him here and stuck him on the treadmill while I got cleaned up. I think he might’ve taken some other shit before I got to him. It didn’t take much convincing to get him to go for a little run, but then again I might have told a lie or two about letting him fuck me in the ass if he beat my nonexistent treadmill record.”
I blink at Rose, trying to process everything that just spilled out of her mouth. Churros. Speed. Gorilla. Ass fucking …? I shake my head and try to return to the medical part of her confession, though it’s a struggle. I finally land on, “You gave him amphetamines?”
Rose snorts. “A lotof amphetamines.”
“… Why?”
“He deals ‘study drugs’ to local high school and college kids when he’s not beating up his girlfriend, so it didn’t seem like it’d be a stretch if he took a little too much and wound up dead. Fuck around and find out. I was just hoping thefinding outpart would come a little more easily.”
“And your plan now is … what … exactly?”
“I dunno,” she says with an irritated flick of her hand in my direction. “Maybe to make him run until his heart explodes in his chest and he bleeds from his eyeballs or some shit. I’m not a scientist.”
We turn toward the man. His pace is relentless. When we face each other once more, Rose juts her chin out and tightens herarms across her chest, determined not to balk beneath my cold and clinical stare.
“I don’t think he’s just going to magically die on your treadmill, Rose.”
“A girl can dream.”
“Aren’t you worried about what will happen if he does?”
“I had a great plan to ditch his body at the fishing hole off Loop Road. But I guess I’ll just have to wing it. Gransie seemed pretty confident it would work out anyway. But it’s a good thing you’re here just in time for ‘trouble whatsoever,’ right, Doc?”
I give her a flat glare and then grasp her shoulders just long enough to keep her rooted in one spot so I can slip past her. When I stop at the treadmill, Chad gives me a beaming grin despite the effort it takes to keep running. I should probably take his pulse, which I’m sure is past two hundred beats per minute, or at least point him in the direction of a hospital. Hippocratic oath and all that shit. But then, who am I to crush Rose’s dreams? It’s not like Chad is asking for medical assistance. And if Rose has gone to this much effort, the guy is surely no saint. I’m probably doing humanity more good than harm by just letting him live or die by the rules of natural selection.
I drag a hand down my face.Christ.
With a fleeting, suspicious glance toward Rose, I turn my attention back to the man before me. “How are you feeling, Chad? Ready to take a break?”
“Nah, bro.”
“In that case, how about we take this run to the great outdoors.”
“Yeah, man,” he says through panting breaths. “I’m ready to take on the fuckin’world.”
I press the emergency stop button on the treadmill and Chad stumbles before jumping onto the foot rails. Disappointed that he didn’t fall on his face, I turn and hold open the door of the RV. “Great. Do a few laps of the grounds or whatever. We’ll catch up.”
“You sure?”
“I’m a doctor, I never lie.”
Rose barks a laugh behind me. I shoot her a glare over my shoulder and she throws her hands up in surrender.
Turning my attention back to Chad, I grab his wrist and tug him toward the open door. His pulse thrums like hummingbird wings beneath my fingertips. “We’ll come find you. Promise.”
