I clamped down, twisted. He didn’t make a sound, but gritted his teeth as I pulled it out. A small, jagged piece of lead, slick and hot in the hemostats. I threw it aside and grabbed more gauze and pressed, holding it against him.
He was panting, face white as ash.
“Stitch it,” he rasped. “Straight line. Keep the edges… clean.”
“I don’t think I can”
“I don’t have the strength to do it myself.”
My hands were trembling so badly when I reached down for the suture pack that I nearly dropped it. Halo’s left hand came up, slow and shaking, and closed over mine. His grip was weak, but steadying.
“You’ve got this,” he muttered.
“Hold still,” I whispered, voice tight.
His jaw clenched so hard, I thought it might crack, but he didn’t flinch. Not when the needle pierced his skin, not when I fumbled and cursed under my breath. He just breathed, shallow and steady, and told me what to do.
“In… through the skin. Not too shallow,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Keep the thread taut.”
“I’m trying.”
“I know.”
The needle shook between my fingers. His blood was warm on my knuckles. I could feel the heat of his skin, the thrum of muscle under it. Every time my fingers brushed his chest, I felt the shiver he tried to hide.
“Tie it off there, close,” he instructed, watching my hands with quiet intensity, “and cut.”
I tied the knot, and I was confident it would never hold, but it was the best I could do. I snipped the end of the remaining suture and reached up to gently touch the flesh around the sewed-up wound, then laid a piece of gauze over top to soak up the blood.
It was messy and far from perfect, but it was closed.
“I’ve got to do your back next,” I told him, voice cracking.
“That one’s deeper,” he whispered. “You’ll… have to dig for it.”
“I know.”
He tried to push himself up but didn’t make it more than an inch. “I’m going to pass out… you know that, right?”
“You’re allowed to pass out,” I said softly, “but you don’t get to die.”
There was a ghost of a weak smile on his lips as he rolled over, and with the bloody hemostats back in my hands, I got to work.
Chapter forty-two
Eden
“A Soft Place to Bleed”
Timewasunreliablewhenyou were in a place like this. Not just this actual place, but in a situation where you were waiting to wake up and find someone next to you dead. Where sleep was a dare because he might not wake up.
Halo had been more active than I wanted him to be. He was restless, haunted. He paced from window to window as he watched for threats. He should have been unconscious, tethered to machines or high on painkillers, but he wasn’t. The same man who'd been more corpse than body, just days ago, acted like he’d never been shot. He chewed a few hydrocodone a day and acted like it was all he needed.
I hadn’t recovered. Not even close. Not mentally, not emotionally. Every time I looked at him, I still saw the hollow version: the version barely clinging to life.
I sat on the edge of the cot and watched him as he came out of the bathroom. His shoulder looked likeshit. I hadn’t done a very good job sewing it up. The lines were puckered and red, but it was holding fairly steady. The “shower” was nothing more than a concrete corner with a faucet and a drain. No curtain, noprivacy. Just another reminder that comfort had long since left the equation. But it wassomething. Still, we couldn’t stay here. Not much longer.
My eyes lingered a second too long. Just enough for him to notice.
