Page 59 of Blackmail
Another nurse approaches from the side. “Are you family?”
“Boyfriend.” The word flies out of my mouth. Certainly a better answer than “guy I’ve slept with a few times and can’t stop thinking about,” which won’t get me into the room with him.
The nurse tugs again on my arm. “Let them do their job. We’ll settle him in a room, and then you can join him. I’ll have an administrator come in so you can help get his paperwork filled out.”
I’d rather take a bullet to the chest than let go. I shouldn’t have left him that day in the parking lot. I don’t want to leave him now. But Simon needs care, so I let him go. I’m cold all over as they wheel him away.
“But what happened? I just saw him, and he was fine.” It was two days ago, but still. How does a person go from healthy to unconscious in less than forty-eight hours?
Chapter
Twenty
SEBASTIAN
“Do you happen to know how he broke his arm?”
“I’m sorry?” It’s been a few hours of sitting in a room while Simon was wheeled in and out for tests, nurses took his blood, and I filled out paperwork as if I were someone to Simon, when I’m not. And all the while, he’s remained unconscious.
Not unconscious. Asleep. They said he’d tested positive for the flu. He’d passed out at work, suffering from exhaustion and dehydration.
Things must be bad if he’s able to sleep in this place. He’s surrounded by machines and monitors that constantly click and ding. I’d have lost my shit and smashed them by now if they weren’t helping Simon. And the IV needle the nurse put into him? Large enough that I’d have been tempted to smash him if he wasn’t helping Simon.
“How is his arm related to why he’s sick?”
The doctor, a tall, pale man who needs to fire his barber for giving him the same haircut as the toddler in the next room, shakes his head. The accusation in his gaze is loud and clear. I don’t like it one bit.
“It doesn’t relate directly, but he had some bruising on his arm. We were told he lost consciousness while moving medical equipment, and we’d been concerned he might have broken something when he fell. There’s no new damage, but we noticed an older-looking spiral fracture. They’re often a sign of abuse, as are his previously broken ribs. He’s also got some specific patterns of bruising that are quite recent.”
“Specific as in…?”
“Fingers.” He glances down at my hands.
To be fair, I did cause those bruises. The look on the doctor’s face tells me that no amount of explaining that what we did to cause them was consensual will help me here.
If I can’t dispel this doctor’s suspicion, he can have me removed from the hospital with a phone call. Which I absolutely cannot allow to happen.
“Look, I don’t know what you’re trying to accuse me of—” Of course I do. “—but Simon and I have only been together for a few weeks, and he’s been busy working for the past two days. I only knew he was here at the hospital because I happened to be visiting another patient. I don’t know what happened to him in the time we were apart, and I sure as hell don’t know how he broke his ribs or his arm.”
The anger boiling in me has less to do with the doc’s accusations and more to do with the question of how Simon broke his arm in the first place. I don’t know what happened, but I’d like to. I’d like to talk with the person responsible.
“Man, what the hell are you still doing here?” Lehman sticks his head into the room.
“I could ask you the same thing.”
“Just left Lilly. They’re going to be locking down the modular flood wall soon. Anyone not staying needs to be out the door in the next hour.”
I glance at Simon and then the doctor. “I’d like to take him home. You’ve given him fluids. He can recuperate more comfortably there than here.”
Doc looks conflicted. “He’s exhausted. I’d like to wait for him to wake up. And I’d like to speak with him. Privately.”
Lehman’s eyes bounce from me to the bed to the doctor and back again. “Who are you taking home?”
“Simon. My boyfriend.” I glare at him, willing him to play along.
One way or another, I’ll make it true eventually, so it’s not entirely a lie. Lilliana would probably call it something like future casting or manifesting. Those influencers all speak the same language. I’m calling it no other option.
“Boyfriend?”
