I woke up alone, to an invisible cunt performing a violent Heimlich manoeuvre to my gut.
The force of it wrenched me sideways, my body heaving, a rising sensation blocking my throat, acid filling my mouth, choking me. But my body still hadn’t figured out how to puke. All it gave me was pain. No relief, and I fell onto my back again, lights flashing in my screwed-shut eyes, agony pounding in my skull, like I’d been dropped down the trapdoor to hell.
Maybe I had nothing inside me to give. Maybe...
I couldn’t finish the thought. It spun me out too much, the pain in my head too brutal to bear, and the sudden light that flooded wherever the fuck I was nearly finished me off.
Strong hands grabbed me. Familiar hands. Too far gone to figure out who the fuck he was, I took comfort in his voice.
“Easy. I’ve got you.”
The world turned upside down. I left whatever cave I’d woken up in and more light hit me, searing my nerves, even through my closed eyes.
“I know, brother. I know. I’m so fucking sorry.”
I think I passed out. I came round on a hospital bed, needles being jabbed in me, the brightest light I’d ever fucking seen being aimed right at my eyeballs.
Did not recognise the sound that tore from me. Or the apocalypse that happened in my gut as it finally, after twenty-nine fucking years, gave up and let me puke.
Shitting hell. It hurt. A lot. Everywhere from my belly to my brain. I was dying, I had to be.
Think I passed out again. Voices kept me company, but none of them were Viktor’s, so I didn’t pay much attention.
“Ranger.”
Nope.
“Ranger.”
My eyes opened against my will. Cam loomed over me, blocking the worst of the light, his face and clothes covered in mud and blood.
Viktor.
“He’s fine, but I need you to listen to me, okay?”
I tried, but I felt like I’d drunk eight bottles of Mad Dog, and total fucking madness drove me to try and sit up.
Viktor.
“He’sfine.” Cam caught me, keeping me on the bed. “I promise. But he won’t be if you fucking die on me, and neither will I. Work with me, brother. I don’t need another mad Russian wanting to kill me.”
Viktor.
But the fight in me expired, eclipsed by cold sweat and sickness, the ringing in my ears, and dizziness that hit so hard I rocked back from it, almost careening off the other side of the bed.
“Ranger.” Cam anchored me with his bulk. “Listen, okay? You took a hit to your head and I need to know how bad it is before I risk taking you to a real hospital.”
His words came out in coherent sentences, but by the time they reached me I had no clue what they meant.
Cam tried again. “They’re going to scan your brain and give you something for the pain, and you need to let them, okay? So I can get you out of here and somewhere safer.”
I had no idea whereherewas. Rising nausea overcame me and I puked over the side of the bed.
Everything after was a blur. Cam’s voice. Someone else’s. More needle pricks in my arm, and then a careening oblivion that wasn’t much better than the muted agony squeezing my skull.
The next time I opened my eyes, Cam was still there, holding my fucking hand and leaning over me. “You with me?”
My tongue was stuck to the roof of my mouth. He brought a cup to my lips, skewering me with a paternal gaze that made me feel like crying.
