I don’t think so.
“Whatever job I had before, that’s procedural memory, right?” I bring my eyes back to Oliver’s. “Like, if I were a chef, I’d still be able to cook a meal, right? Or if I were a nurse, I could probably stitch my own wounds?”
His eyes flicker to my ribs… hidden beneath seven layers of blanket. “I would think so, yes. Do you think you could suture yourself?”
“No.” Without even thinking about it, the answer spills across my tongue. “Probably means I wasn’t a nurse. Or a doctor.”
“Or a veterinarian. And since we’re going, you probably weren’t military, either.”
A knock at the door makes me startle, my breath exploding from my lungs, and the heart rate monitors screaming into the air around us. My eyes shoot past Oliver’s and stop on a pair of cops in jeans and shirts. One wears a puffy bomber jacket, the zipper open to reveal a badge hanging around his neck, while the other seems fine with his arms out.
Thick, tattooed arms. A scabbed knuckle or two. He has a firm jaw and fiery, unkind eyes.
My stomach revolts, filling my throat with acid. But Oliver remains entirely relaxed, his easy smile curling, and his friendly eyes… still friendly. He glances around and lifts his chin, giving the two permission to enter, and when the muscled one leads at the front, Oliver steals his hands out from beneath my blankets, abandoning me to the cold I’d temporarily forgotten about.
“Ramone.” He looks from one to the other. Though his tone turns to ice with the second. “Billy. The police station is literally three minutes up the road, so why’d it take so long to get here?”
Ramone—bomber jacket guy—rolls his eyes. “We had things to do. Jesus. Not everything is about you, Ollie.”
“So you’re our Jane Doe?” The other one, the tattooed one, strolls around my bed, his walk an arrogant swagger. His entire demeanor… smug. He splits away from his partner and forces me onto my back. Anything to keep both men in sight. “We were here last night, but you were unconscious, and Doctor Darling assured us you wouldn’t be awake anytime soon.” He stops just two feet away and offers his hand. “I’m Detective Caster. You can call me Billy, if you want.” He nods toward the other. “Detective Devereaux. Ramone is his first name.”
“I’ll step out,” Ollie murmurs, inching away from my bed. “Leave you with a little privacy.”
“No.” I swing my arm wildly to the left, exploding from beneath seven layers of blanket and desperately latching on to his wrist, and because the damn heart rate monitor announces every sprinting beat pounding in my chest, I tear the tracker off my finger and pray the sound will stop. “P-please don’t go.” I tremble all over. My jaw. My shoulder. My entire torso, down into aching hips. “Please.”
Stunned, he looks past me to Billy, then over to Ramone.
He’s a big brother—he’s said so half a dozen times already—and he promised to be my safe space. With furrowed brows and softening eyes, he steps closer again, lowering his voice. “They’re gonna want to get your statement. They won’t hurt you, I promise.”
Terror is a living, breathing beast in my veins. It’s fire in my blood. It’s lava in my belly. Tears form in the corners of my eyes, anddammit, frustration follows immediately after.
Why can’t I close my eyes and sleep?
Why am I afraid of the dark?
“I’ll stay.” Decided, he hitches himself onto the side of my bed and pastes on a chilly, not-so-friendly smile for Billy. “Changed my mind.”
“You don’t have somewhere else to be?” Billy’s voice is deeper than Ollie’s. Harder than Ramone’s. But his eyes, when he faces Ollie, prove the pair’s iciness goes both ways. “Collecting a witness statement rarely requires a doctor’s supervision.”
“Yeah, but I’m on my lunch break, which means she’s not my patient right now. She’s my friend.” He fixes my blankets, covering our hands, and trades my death-grip for a repeat of the massage from earlier. Then, leaning across the bed, he switches off the droning heart rate monitor and smiles at an irritated Detective Caster. “I have all the time in the world, Billy. So you should get started.” He drops his gaze to mine and winks. It’s discreet. It’s a secret. Jesus, it’s respite in the storm swirling in my brain.
Billy draws a long breath, agitation forcing his chest to swell larger. Then he releases it again and takes out a notebook and a pen. “Fine.” He leans against the window frame behind him, knocking the blinds askew and spilling light into my room until the spires feel like shards of glass scraping against my eyes. He doesn’t know about that, though. Or that the rattle and crash of the weights in the base of the blinds is like cannon blasts in my ears. He doesn’t know that my head pounds, and with every thump, my stomach curdles. He merely settles in, oblivious to my pain, and pastes on an expression that hints toward friendliness.Fake as it is. “Your investigation has taken an interesting turn, Ms. Doe. You don’t remember who you are? You don’t know your name?”
I shake my head and fight the voice in the back of my brain, the one screaming,he doesn’t believe you! “I don’t remember my name. Or that I was hit by a car.” Swallowing, I bring my focus around to Ramone. He scares me less… barely. “I woke up here like this.”
“Why were you on the road?” Billy presses. “It was below freezing lastnight, Miss Doe, but you came in wearing a shirt and jeans. Where did you leave your car?”
I drag my blankets up and swipe an errant tear from the corner of my eye. “I don’t know.”
“Where were you coming from?”
“I don’t know,” I rasp. “I don’t remember.”
“Where were you going?”
“Billy,” Ollie snarls in quiet warning. “She doesn’t know.”
“Am I in trouble?” I search Billy’s hard stare, then I turn to study Ramone’s. “You make it sound like I’ve done something wrong.”
