Page 47 of Mad Love

Ex-wife, thanks to Gary’s bullshit.

“Stop tensing up,” Knight snapped as he prodded the stitches on my side and checked how I was healing. All the other bruises and cuts had healed except this one. Fucker had stuck that knife in pretty deep.

I glared at him and didn’t bother relaxing.

He sighed and lowered my shirt. “You’re healing fine, but you should—”

“If you say rest, I’ll hide your leg,” I threatened, my gaze dropping to where the prosthetic was hidden by his jeans.

“Fucker,” he griped, shaking his head and stepping away. He closed up the medical kit before turning back to me. “We should be able to take the stitches out by the end of the week.”

“Yay,” I deadpanned, not giving a shit about the pieces of material holding my side together. It itched like a bitch, to the point that the healing process was becoming almost worse than actually being stabbed.

Rolling his eyes, Knight turned away and washed his hands in the sink of the bathroom that connected his and Bishop’s rooms. Knight had gotten a lot of field experience during his time with the Army, and after he’d lost part of his leg in an IED explosion in Iraq and been discharged, he’d taken medic training. Having someone with medical experience helped when things went sideways on a Phoenix mission, and we’d been wondering if it was time to seriously consider expanding the team and adding a fulltime medic.

“Hey,” I said, catching his attention. “Have you ever wanted to go back to med school?”

Knight’s dark brows slammed down over his equally dark eyes. “What?”

I shrugged, trying to play it off. “You’re good at this shit.” I waved a hand at the kit he was stashing under the sink. “We’ve talked about expanding the team, and we thought having someone around with medical experience would be an asset.”

He leaned a hip on the sink. “Would I like to? Sure. But we’re a three-man team, Ry. Even when Rook joins us next year after his contract is up, we’re still not ready to lose a member. You’d be better off hiring a doctor.”

“Maybe. But if it’s something you want—”

“Fuck,” he huffed with a smirk. “Maddie really has you by the dick, doesn’t she? Since when do you give a fuck about our hopes and dreams and shit?”

A wry smile tugged at my lips. “It was just a thought, bro.”

“Well, table it until we’re not holed up in the middle of nowhere and things are stable,” he advised, shaking his head.

I snorted, wondering if things would ever be stable again. Wondering when I’d see Maddie or Cori or Grandpa. A slow headache started building at the base of my neck.

“I’m going to see if Ash has anything new,” I muttered, turning away.

“If I was a doctor,” Knight called, “I’d advise him to get some sleep.”

I glanced over my shoulder.

He shrugged, feigning indifference, but I could see the concern in his eyes. “Your body can only take so much before it needs to rest. If Ash doesn’t take a breather, his body will do it for him.”

My first instinct was to tell him to shut up; it didn’t matter if we all ran ourselves into the ground to find Madison, but then I realized he might be onto something. My best friend was driving himself crazy trying to unravel the mystery of where Gary had taken her.

After a beat, I nodded, acknowledging Knight’s suggestion. Then I went to find my best friend.

As I wandered past Bex’s open door, a frustrated groan caught my attention. I paused and stepped into her doorway.

The room Bex had chosen was full of large windows and light, amplified by the snow. It also had a desk where she’d set up a workstation to finish the rest of the semester. Getting the teachers to allow her to switch to a virtual-only option had taken some cajoling and more than a few thinly veiled threats, but it paid off.

“Calculus?” I guessed as I leaned against the wall. Last night, I’d caught her and Court studying for the class she struggled in the most.

Bex turned, her hazel eyes sad and frustrated. “No. My mom.”

That made me stand up straighter. “She still pushing back about you being here?”

Bex worried her lower lip between her teeth. “Sort of. I mean, not about this. Whatever you guys said to my dad to get him to agree, worked. He told Mom it’s for the best, and I’m not asking how or why she agreed. But she is insisting I go to Europe with her for Christmas to see my grandparents.”

Getting Malcolm Whittier to agree to us pulling his daughter from Pacific Cross hadn’t been hard. All we’d needed to do was threaten to expose the side deals he was making overseas to his bosses in D.C. His technology was highly sought after globally, but he’d been exclusively contracted through the Department of Defense for the past five years, ever since his CryptDuo app took off.

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