An old anger snapped its jaws inside me. I fuckinghatedPeter. He’d done everything he could to piss me off, any chance he’d gotten—made fun of me, taunted me—and I’d been just as bad back. Hell, maybe I was worse. Creed, Merit, and I had tangled with him and his group of friends more than once. I rested my head against the wall and the anger didn’t go away, not even when I made myself laugh. “It can’t be the same fuckin’ guy. Just can’t. Angel’s too nice.”
“Can I help you?”
I glanced over at PJ Adams, who was apparently a doctor now, and forced a smile. While I tried to pull myself together enough to talk, he smoothed down the collar of his white coat and then stuffed his hands into the pockets.
“The man I came in with, Angel? He asked me to give this to his dad.” I flashed the insurance card. “Peter Gaffin. Didn’t start looking for him yet.”
“Gaffin?” PJ’s nose wrinkled. “He’s a known element here. Comes in cursing and swearing and hitting every few months. Uh….” He hesitated and a nervous smile flashed across his face. I wasn’t sure what I’d done in college for him to be acting this way, but I’d always had a temper, and I’d been much worse at controlling it then.
“Do you know who I could talk to about this?” I held up the card again and wanted to laugh as he craned his neck to get a better look instead of stepping closer. Yeah, he was fucking scared of me. Right now, I wasn’t sure how I felt about that. Old habits were waking in me as I thought about Peter. Fear was good. People who were afraid of me weren’t going to try to hurt me or my friends. I knew those thoughts were wrong. Creed had worked on me a long time to get it through my thick skull that people being afraid of me was a bad thing, but I took a sick pleasure in the way he nervously licked his lips and absolutely wouldn’t shuffle even a half step nearer.
“Yes. Yes, I do. Follow me.” His smile was back, fake as a five-dollar diamond.
The busy hallways PJ led me around seemed like a circle, and I didn’t pay much attention as I kept pace with him. His Adam’s apple bobbed on a harsh swallow as I cut a glance at him, and he stared at the tips of his shoes as we walked.
“Was I really that awful?”
He frowned and picked up his pace. “What do you mean?”
“You’re acting like I’m a ticking time bomb.”
He glanced at me and his mouth twisted down in a small frown. “Do you remember that you had the dorm room next to mine? How often you would lose it all over someone in the laundry room? How you smashed every plate in the shared kitchen for the floor one morning when there were no clean ones? Your sister bought us new dishes.”
The short answer was no, I didn’t remember any of those things because they were the norm for me then. That sounded crazy, though, so instead I said, “I remember I was upset a lot and feeling ganged up on in the dorms. Someone always had something to fucking say to me.”
PJ hummed.
“What?”
He slowed and tilted his head back to give me something closer to a real smile. “Everyone was scared of you. And you always had those two goons with you who could be just as bad. They were with you a lot. And no one ever knew what would set you off.”
“I’m sorry if I ever scared you.”
PJ straightened and actually looked up and met my gaze. “You’re doing better?”
“Fuck. Maybe? I don’t know. I thought so.”
He nodded and fidgeted his hands in his pockets. “Your boyfriend’s dad is down there. They always take him to the room closest to the security desk when he comes in. Glad I didn’t get him. No offence.”
“Fuck, none taken.”
We turned a corner and came to a stop. Far away at the end of the hallway two uniformed officers stood on either side of a door. “See the police? If you didn’t do that to your… uh… your boyfriend—”
“I didn’t.” My tone left no room for arguments, and I had no fucks to give that he flinched.
“Someone did.” He shifted until he was facing me and scowled. “I’m not wrong. That break was no fall.”
My jaw ticked and I struggled to stop it. “Thanks.”
PJ nodded. A loud shriek that jolted five years off my life echoed into the hall, and far away from me the cops both spun on the spot to stare in the open doorway they appeared to be guarding. Shouts of “fucking whore! That hurts!” blasted out to echo around. A short blond man in scrubs sprinted out of the room and he almost collided with the wall on the other side of the hall. The man’s young face crumpled. He was a compact guy, which made me think of Angel immediately, and he had his hand over his heart. The two cops who’d been standing beside the door rushed inside.
“Angie! Angel! One of you bring me my pills. Help! They won’t give me anything. They won’t give me anything I need.” The bellows continued in the same vein.
PJ shared a dark look with me. “You could just give the information to the front desk.”
Morbid curiosity gripped me, and I stepped forward. “I promised I’d get the insurance card to his dad. You’re sure that’s him?”
“Yeah. Same last name as the patient, Angel.” I nodded so he would keep talking when he hesitated. “He’s the only patient we have from lockup tonight.”
