“Sorry this happened to your sister, man.” Matt, unaware of the intimate moment Harley and I shared in the dark of the cab, turned onto the windy road leading up to Saint James. I couldn’t wait to get back, take a shower, and retreat to my cell to pray.
Though that meant I’d have to let Harley go. I didn’t want to. Holding her hand felt too good.
Way too soon, Matt pulled into the gravel parking lot outside the monastery walls. Harley and I untangled from each other right before the interior light came on.
“I want your nose to get checked out.” I rubbed my hand on my sweats to make the tingling stop. “Brother Oswin is our doc.”
Her hazel eyes wandered my face. “Only if you get checked out as well. You might have a concussion.”
Sure felt like it. I nodded. “Let’s go.”
“What do we tell Father Cruz?” Matt whispered as he shoved open the heavy iron door. “With the way the F-150 looks we can’t keep it a secret.”
Wanting to make sure the door was bolted, I gestured for him to go inside. “The truth. That we got run off the road.”
“He’s not going to like it.”
My shoulders tensed at the thought of having to bring the abbot into the loop. The search Officer Moore had performed on me on Velvet Drive, the busiest road on Darkwater Refuge, had gone viral, drawing attention to our monastery. Not the good kind. So telling him I had choked out two guys, one of them a detective . . . Not sure if I’d share that part with him.
Ten minutes later, Harley and I sat on the two twin beds in the infirmary, four feet of stone slabs separating us. The bright neon lights allowed me to see her face better. Her freckled nose was swollen, and some residue blood stuck in the corners of her mouth.
“Are you going to tell Father Cruz that it was Craig?” she whispered into the disinfectant-heavy air. Matt had retreated to his cell.
“I’d like to tell him the whole truth.”
“Okay.” She chewed on her bottom lip. The fear in her eyes told me she didn’t want me to drop Craig’s name.
The door squeaked open, and Brother Oswin limped inside. Though in his mid-sixties, he looked like eighty with his gray hair, leathery skin, and hunchback posture. The man was a fountain of wisdom, not only when it came to medical topics. And he had a very dry sense of humor.
“What am I looking at?” He opened the wooden closet across the room and unearthed latex gloves, then a first aid kit.
“Harley got hit in the face with a soccer ball.” I touched the back of my throbbing skull. My fingers came back wet. Blood. “I hit my head pretty good.”
“Show me that wound.” Brother Oswin shuffled across the stone slabs to me.
I turned so he could see the back of my head.
“Looks fatal. You don’t have much longer to live.”
“You can see my brain, can’t you?” I joked along.
“That would require that you have one.”
I chuckled. “Whoever said the older people get, the meaner they are was right.”
“There’s too much dirt in it. Wash your head, no soap, then I can take a look.”
He moved to Harley’s bed, and for a moment, I watched her posture and expression as she answered his questions. She seemed relaxed, laughing at his jokes.
Confident she was comfortable without me, I slipped out of the infirmary and headed down the hall to the shower. My ribs were red from the punches I’d scored. Wouldn’t show those to Brother Oswin. The ring Harley’s ex had worn had left a gash in my left cheek.
After the shower, I donned my other habit and headed back to the infirmary. Brother Oswin was in the middle of explaining to Harley how Matt had managed to ram an ax into his forehead. He did quick work with my head wound, cleaning it and applying antiseptic, then wrapped a bandage around my head while asking an array of questions.
“Looks like you have a mild concussion,” he said once he’d checked my eyes with a pen light. “Nothing too serious. Notify me instantly if any symptoms come on.”
I nodded. “Thanks, Brother Oswin.”
He dismissed us, and I walked Harley back to the guesthouse. Though she was silent the entire way, I sensed somethingweighing on her. The sky was dark now, the only light coming from the stars and the kerosene lamp I carried.