But the way she said it, tired and resigned, suggested she knew I would. People like me always did.
I walked to the door, each step careful but steady. My gun was where I'd dropped it, so I bent—carefully—to retrieve it. When I straightened, she was standing by her surgical table, already starting to clean up the mess I'd left behind. The blood, the gauze, the remnants of violence she'd quietly repaired.
"What's your name?" I asked, not sure why it mattered.
She looked up from her cleaning, that same exhausted expression on her face. "Does it matter?"
"Of course it matters."
A pause. Then: "Dr. Cross. That's all anyone needs to know."
Dr. Cross. Not her first name, of course. But then, she hadn't asked for mine either. We were just two people operating outside the normal world, crossing paths in a basement that shouldn't exist.
“I want you back here in three days,” she said, reluctantly. “I’ll have to check for infection. See how the wounds are healing. Unless you want to do that at a normal hospi—”
“No. I’ll be back here. I trust you.”
She smiled an almost imperceptible smile.
“See you in three days, then.”
I climbed the stairs to street level, each step pulling at my sutures but manageable. Dawn was breaking over Brighton Beach, painting everything in shades of grey and gold. The Escalade was where I'd left it, front tire still up on the curb, driver's door hanging open. Blood had pooled on the driver's seat, already starting to dry in the morning air.
I got in anyway, started the engine, and drove away from the basement where Dr. Cross was probably already bleaching away any trace of my existence.
But I'd be back.
The monster in my chest, usually so restless, had gone quiet again. Not satisfied, not peaceful, just . . . interested.
It had been a long time since anything had interested us besides violence.
Dr. Cross, whoever she really was, had changed that.
Chapter 4
Maya
Theworkneverended.The steady stream of poor people, immigrants, criminals or those with incriminating injuries never stopped. It didn’t matter that I couldn’t stop thinking about him.
The enforcer.
I didn’t have time for fantasies, for dreams. I had the dying to attend to.
The suture needle slipped between my fingers for the third time in ten minutes. I caught it before it could contaminate itself on Roberto's blood-soaked flannel, but my hands—my steadiest feature, the only part of me I trusted completely—were betraying me.
"Hold still," I told Roberto, though he hadn't moved. The command was more for myself, trying to anchor my wandering mind back to the present. Back to the gash running from his elbow to mid-forearm, courtesy of a circular saw that had kicked back during an under-the-table renovation job.
He was a construction worker, immigration status uncertain, insurance status in no doubt. The injury was bad, but could have been a lot worse.
Roberto gripped the table edge with his good hand, knuckles white. No anesthetic except the whiskey his brother had poured down his throat in the van outside. He'd wanted lidocaine, but I was out—Frank's last supply run hadn't included any, and I couldn't risk another trip to the hospital loading docks. Not with Dr. Brand suddenly back on the picture.
For some reason, the enforcer’s face popped back into my mind—as though he could protect me from Dr. Brand. As though he could guard me from my past.
I forced the needle through Roberto's skin, keeping my stitches exactly four millimeters apart. Muscle memory took over while my mind betrayed me again, conjuring the stranger's voice when he'd thanked me in Russian. "Spasibo." Soft. Reverent. Like I was something precious instead of something useful. Like I'd given him a gift instead of performed a basic trauma repair that any third-year resident could have managed.
"Jesus, Doc," Roberto hissed through clenched teeth. "That hurts like hell."
"Almost done." I tied off another suture, moved to the next section. Twenty-three stitches total—I'd already placed seventeen. Six more and I could send Roberto on his way, could stop pretending that my distraction was about exhaustion and not about dark eyes that had tracked my every movement with an intensity that made my hands want to shake.
