Page 58 of Savage Princess

I don’t know what I’m going to find inside—more people, someone else who wants to hurt me, but I didn’t come this far and most likely kill four men not to leave with what I need to keep Levin alive. I feel like I’m in a fog as I step inside, unsteady on my feet, still clutching the gun to bluff my way through if it looks like someone wants to try to stop me.

There’s no one else in the house. It smells like old food and cat piss, and I breathe shallowly as I look for a bathroom, anywhere that might have the medicine the man was talking about.

The bathroom is filthy. I snatch open the medicine cabinet, rifling through pill bottle after pill bottle until I see something that sounds like an antibiotic from the description and not some other drug these men were peddling. I grab the bottle, my heart pounding in my chest as I make my way back to the door and listen for the sounds of anyone else outside, anyone drawn by the gunshots.

I don’t know how likely it is that any authorities are going to come. This seems like the kind of place where a lot of crime goes unnoticed, but I’m not about to hang around and find out.

The bag is still on the ground, a few of the items spilled out, blood seeping towards them. My hands are shaking so badly I can barely pick them up, and I shove the gun into my jacket again, the pill bottle in the bag as I gather it all up and start to walk, my entire body rigid as I try to keep from collapsing.

Don’t think about it. Don’t think about it.I can fall apart later. I can think about the fact that tonight, I’ve likely killed five different men. That I’ve gone from an innocent cartel princess to–thisin the space of…what? I’ve lost track of time. Two weeks? More?

The car.I remember it by the time I reach the hotel, but I go inside first, setting the bag down on the dresser as I look at the still and silent shape of Levin on the bed underneath the thin blanket, and I feel tears prick at my eyes again.

I’m afraid to go to him. Afraid that while I was gone, he’s passed beyond my ability to help him. But there’s only one way to find out.

Everything that has happened to me since Diego took me away has been a test of what I can take. How strong I can be. And tonight feels like the biggest test of all.

I sit down gently on the edge of the bed, checking Levin’s pulse. It’s shallow, but it’s still there, and I breathe out a sigh of relief.

“I’ve got you,” I whisper, stroking my fingers along his cheek, over his forehead. His skin is warmer now, and I feel a sick twist in my belly, wondering if this is the fever the man talked about starting. If an infection is already setting in.

I stand up, getting the alcohol and the sewing kit, gritting my teeth as I approach the bed again.I don’t know how I’m going to do this.

When I move the bloody towel away from his side, I have to swallow back bile. The wound is gaping, raw and torn at the edges, and blood starts to seep from it again as I toss the towel and his now-ruined shirt to the side. I have to clean it and stitch it. If I don’t, he’ll bleed out eventually.

“This is going to hurt.” I wince as I take a clean gauze pad and soak it in alcohol, gently moving Levin’s arm to one side so I can reach it. I hesitate for a moment, hating the thought of how much I’m going to hurt him with this—and then I press it against the wound.

He jerks underneath my touch, groaning as the pain brings him partially back to consciousness, and I blink back tears. “I’m sorry,” I whisper, feeling him shudder and flinch under my touch. I hate all of this, every second of it.

When I’m fairly sure the wound is as clean as I can get it, I reach for the sewing kit.

Every puncture into his skin makes me shudder, and I have to keep myself from flinching. It’s not going to be much prettier of a scar than what he left me with, I can tell, and as I pull the ragged edges of flesh together, he jerks and groans, making me struggle to keep the needle from tearing through. I have to stop several times, stroking his hair and trying to soothe him before I start again, and it makes the entire process take a painfully long time.

When it’s finally stitched up, a long dark line from beneath his ribs to above his hipbone, I smear the antibiotic ointment onto it and start to bandage over the now-closed wound with the gauze and tape, until it’s fully covered.

After that, there’s nothing left to do but get some of the antibiotics into him and hope they’re not expired or something that will hurt more than help.

I’d underestimated just how hard it would be to get someone who is mostly passed out to swallow. After several failed attempts, I manage to get two of the pills down his throat without him choking, and a few sips of water before he fully passes out again, limp on the bed. I maneuver him as best as I can, trying to make sure he’ll be comfortable if he wakes up, before looking over at the bottle of bleach still on the dresser.

Now I have to clean up the evidence.

I bundle all of the medical supplies back into the bag, leaving them there as I take the napkins and bleach out to the parking lot. I glance around before I step out of the room fully to make sure that there’s no one watching as best as I can, but at this point, I’m so exhausted that I’m not even sure I care. All I want is to be finished with this day.

I wipe down the car as thoroughly as I can, scrubbing every bit of blood I can find off of the seats and wiping down anywhere that I think I might have touched. I very much doubt it’s a thorough job, even after I clumsily drive it down the street and leave it behind another building, wiping off the steering wheel and gearshift once more before shutting the door and walking away.

I’ve done my best.

It’s all I can do to get myself into the shower afterward, but I don’t want to sleep with blood and grime all over me. My feet hurt so badly when I step out of the shoes that my eyes well up with tears, especially when the still-scraped and bruised soles of my feet touch the cold tile floor. I suck in a breath, stripping off the black dress and leaving it in a pile on the floor as I hobble to the shower and turn on the hot water.

Tomorrow I’ll have to find clothes. Food. All the things Levin had been doing while I stayed in the motels. I’ll have to keep us going, somehow, until he gets better.

He has to get better.

Standing under the hot water, it’s all I can do to stave off the panic. As tired as I am, it creeps in more and more, and I wrap my arms around my waist, my fingers finding the ridge of the scar from the plane crash.

We have matching scars now. Yours and mine. They’re the same.

I feel half-delirious as I press my forehead against the cool tile, too exhausted to do more than let the water run over me. Even the shower doesn’t really make me feel better, because it makes me think of Levin too—of his hands sliding over my wet skin, the droplets of water caught between our mouths, the way it felt when he backed me against the wall and ran his lips over my body. The way it felt when he’d let go and fucked me the way I wanted.

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