I glared at him, but he stared helpfully at the nurse, whose name I’d forgotten so well, not even a hint of it lived in my mind, and I sighed. I was here a lot, and the ER was boring, and I never actually wanted to come in the first place. Now they knew they needed to inspect me, and it would takeforever.
“You were what?” a man asked, and it took me a second to notice the silver-and-blue NYPD badge hanging around his neck on a chain. The bloody T-shirt clinging to his torso had been to hell and back, and a thick bandage around his left hand seemed like something he’d cobbled together. Despite his injuries, he stood up and walked over to take a seat across from us.
Ten minutes later my mind wanted to explode with trying to keep track of the thousands of questions—probably not that many, but it felt like it—Detective Cummins had asked me. Him being here waiting to get stitched up was the worst luck. Yesterday I’d wanted someone to save me, and Cillian and Rowen had done that, not the police. Today, when all I wanted to do was get out of this waiting-room hell and back to the school, I was answering a million questions. I pulled my phone from my pocket and stared at the time. Almost seven. The day was slipping away. Had we really been sitting around this long?
“You didn’t know this man’s name? The one who attacked you?” Detective Cummins asked. He pushed my hand down so I had to look at him. He had a square face and a square cop haircut that matched his square shoulders. He was all hard angles and lines.
“No, no, I have no idea. People frequently come to my lectures.”
He nodded and bit at his lips while he appeared to think. “They often yell at you?”
“Yes,” Lor and I said at the same time, and the detective’s eyebrows dove.
“Was anyone else there when you were assaulted who could identify this man?”
Lor gave me wide eyes as I shook my head. “No, sir. Some bystanders helped me.”
“And this was near campus, but notoncampus?”
“Yes,” I said and slipped my phone back into my pocket. I massaged my temples, and Lor did that thing where he patted my shoulder and seemed all woebegone.
“Near Murphy’s,” the detective repeated, as if to double-check.
“Yes,” I growled out.
I couldn’t say why, but I didn’t want to talk about Cillian and Rowen with the detective, and Lor kept giving me big eyes and barely shaking his head, almost like he felt the same way. But he couldn’t feel that way. He didn’t know what had happened, right? I hadn’t told him they saved me. I hadn’t told him they were there when I was attacked. Lor wasn’t there. Yet I got the impression he knew all about it and wanted me to stop talking.
The nurse came back and saved me. “Your turn, Vail, honey.”
“I’m going to put a report in about this,” Detective Cummins said, and the nurse beamed at him.
“Thank you,” I murmured because I supposed that was what someone usually said. Lor begged with his eyes to allow him to come with me, so I jerked my head at him and he followed at my heels. The ER doc looked me over and declared me “probably fine,” then asked if I wanted a head scan. I said, “For the love of God, no, I can’t stand this place!” and the doc sent me on my way.
We’d done this in the past.
Detective Cummins met us at the exit before Lor and I could escape the hospital, and I crossed my arms and stopped, darting my attention out toward the sidewalk where I desperately wanted to be.
“Yes, sir?” I asked. “I thought we were done?”
“I have one more question.” He smiled, but there was something wrong with his eyes. Maybe it was the blood loss because he was still not stitched up. I had no idea why they’d taken me before him, but maybe it was just that the nurses liked me.
“Yes?” I asked, feeling like I was about to fly apart.
“Do you know anyone by the name Gavino Rastrelli? Because the last he was seen, he was at Manhattan Central yelling at you, and his body was also found full of bullet holes last night. The detectives who are trying to run this down were already at MCU today, which is what got me thinking this might be related. You weren’t there this morning to talk to them, were you?”
My stomach roiled with dread as I shook my head. The man who attacked me wasdead. How had that happened?
“No, I wasn’t.”
“Where were you?”
“At home in bed. I wasn’t feeling well after being attacked,” I said, getting snippy.
He nodded. “Can I call you if I have any more questions?”
Sighing, I nodded and gave him my number, which he didn’t write down or put in his phone, but by the look on his face, I had no doubt he’d remember.
I couldn’t believe it; the man who’d pounded me into the sidewalk wasdead. How did that even happen? I felt odd and floaty inside, but I wasn’t actually upset in the way I thought I should be. Maybe that was natural, though, since the man had beaten me.
