"I am not going to a hospital," I grind out, my jaw locking so tightly my teeth ache. "If we walk into an ER, the FBI will have us surrounded in ten minutes. I will not let them put you in a cage, Sybil. I will blow my own brains out before I let them touch you."
"Then what do I do?" she cries, a desperate, fractured sob tearing from her throat. "Tell me what to do!"
"The car," I murmur, my head falling back against the cheap pillows. The ceiling spins violently. "In the trunk. There is a false bottom under the spare tire. Lift it. There is a black Pelican case. It is a sterile surgical kit. Bring it to me."
She doesn't hesitate. The fragile, submissive girl who would have frozen in terror is completely gone.
She scrambles off my hips, the sudden absence of her weight a jarring, agonizing loss. She grabs the heavy dark turtleneck sweater from the damp carpet and pulls it rapidly over her head.She shoves her bare legs into the dark tactical pants she had discarded minutes ago. She doesn't bother with shoes.
She grabs the brass keys from the cheap laminate nightstand.
"Lock the door behind you," I order, my eyes tracking her frantic movements. "Do not let anyone see your face. If anyone approaches the car, you get back inside this room and you lock the deadbolt."
"I know," she says, her voice trembling but laced with a core of absolute, undeniable steel.
She pulls the heavy wooden door open, slipping out into the freezing, torrential rain.
The moment the door clicks shut, the silence in the room becomes a physical weight. The paranoia is an absolute, suffocating blanket. I am lying paralyzed on a motel bed, entirely unable to defend my wife while she is outside in the dark. The urge to force myself up, to grab the Glock and follow her, is a primal scream in my blood, but my body refuses to obey. My left arm is entirely dead. My vision is darkening.
I count the seconds. One. Two. Three.
Every second is an eternity. My mind conjures horrific images of Commission assassins stepping out of the shadows, of federal agents ripping her away from the car. The obsession that rules my existence turns entirely against me, a toxic, agonizing poison that makes my heart stutter.
Thirty-two. Thirty-three. Thirty-four.
The heavy, rusted lock of the motel door rattles.
My right hand instantly shoots out, grabbing the suppressed 9mm Glock from the nightstand, aiming it directly at the wood, my finger taking up the slack on the trigger.
The door swings open.
Sybil slips inside, completely soaked, her dark hair plastered to her skull, shivering violently. In her hands, she clutches a heavy, waterproof black Pelican case.
I drop the gun back onto the nightstand, a long, ragged exhale completely escaping my lungs. She is safe.
She kicks the door shut, immediately sliding the heavy chain lock into place. She practically runs to the bed, dropping the heavy black case onto the mattress near my knees. She pops the heavy metal latches, flipping the lid open.
Inside is a meticulously organized, military-grade trauma surgical kit. Vials of lidocaine, sterile suturing needles, thick black nylon thread, hemostats, surgical scalpels, and heavy bottles of medical-grade iodine and rubbing alcohol.
"I have it," she breathes, dropping to her knees beside the bed. Her hands are shaking violently. She looks at the tools, entirely overwhelmed by the horrific reality of what I am asking her to do.
"You have to cut the bandages off," I instruct, my voice dropping to a low, steady hum, entirely focused on grounding her. "Use the trauma shears. Be careful not to pull the clotting gauze out of the wound bed."
She grabs the heavy metal shears. She leans over my chest, the scent of the freezing rain and her own sheer terror washing over me. With agonizing care, she cuts through the thick layers of soaked white bandages she had applied in the cabin.
The moment the final layer falls away, the true extent of the damage is exposed to the sickly pink light.
The combat knife sliced deep into the deltoid, severing muscle fibers and leaving a jagged, gaping trench of ruined flesh. The bleeding has slowed to a thick, sluggish ooze thanks to the chemical gauze, but the wound is entirely open, angry, and inflamed.
Sybil gags, turning her head away for a fraction of a second, completely overwhelmed by the brutal, anatomical reality of my torn body.
"Look at me," I command softly.
She forces her gaze up to my face. Her blue eyes are swimming with tears.
"You are stronger than this," I murmur, my right hand reaching out to cup the back of her damp neck. "You survived Arthur Vance for eighteen years. You survived the bunker. You survived the woods. You can do this, little bird. You are the only one who can."
The absolute, unyielding belief in my voice acts as a physical anchor for her fractured mind. She swallows hard, nodding once.
