She disappeared.
Chapter Eleven
Something had gone wrong.
It was the first thought Darius had before he opened his eyes, and it was only reinforced when he took in the room around him.
He was at the hospital.
Well,inthe hospital.
A dull pain radiated up his left arm. A little pinch at his hand too. He couldn’t see the bag or its label at the top of the IV pole, but he recognized the sound of digital monitors beeping. Over the last seven years or so, members of the McCoy County Sheriff’s Department had been in and out of the hospital multiple times because of one case or another.
The hospital staff already knew most of them from living in such a confined area, but by now most had gone from a politehelloto the doctors and nurses to an easy first-name-basis chat.
However, in the last seven years, Darius hadn’t been a patient. Only a visitor and a detective on the job.
He’d never been a patient who had, he guessed, gone through some sort of surgery. Darius looked down his left side. Instead of wearing a shirt, there were various bandages stuck to and wrapped around his arm, chest and shoulder. He also guessed his ribs had a wrap, but he couldn’t confirm it visually. A blanket was wrapped around him.
On top of that blanket a hand rested on his thigh.
There was a small bandage and tape holding an IV to the back of the hand. Darius followed the tube with his eyes until he had to turn his head slightly to his right. Someone was in the hospitalbed with him, body pressed along the side of his, head laid back with the incline of the bed, and mouth wide open.
Darius must have been coming off some medication.
It took him way too long to worry about Eve.
He was glad that once his brain caught up to worry, she was already there with him.
She was resting above his blankets and wearing a hospital gown that stopped at her calves. Her rainbow socks were gone.
Darius continued tracing the plastic tube from her IV to the metal pole standing on the other side of the bed. He moved his head slightly to get a better view of the reason she needed it in the first place.
Eve had been shot. He knew the moment it happened because a pain he had never known before tore through him the second she had fallen against him. It wasn’t until he had been in the room below the residence hall that he had guessed the same bullet had gone into him too.
He hadn’t cared then. He didn’t care now either.
Bandages peeked out of the top of Eve’s gown, but he couldn’t get a good view of how much of her was covered. Darius’s own IV tube pulled as he gently moved the collar of her gown away a little.
There were no ulterior motives in the move—simply the need to see proof that it wasn’t as bad as he had imagined at the time.
Eve didn’t stir at the adjustment.
However, someone else did.
Theo stood from a chair near the foot of the hospital bed. There was a couch on the wall next to them. It was occupied by another sleeping woman. Winnie had a blanket wrapped around her.
Theo had a look of panic wrapped around him.
He put his finger to his lips and hurried over to Darius’s side.
“Literally both of them just fell asleep,” Theo whispered, so close that Darius could smell coffee on the boy’s breath. “If you can, keep it down.”
Normally, Darius would have been a little grumpy at the command, but it was obvious what had happened wasn’t exactly normal. Darius took his advice to heart. He turned his head slowly, trying not to move Eve in the process. He waited a beat to make sure he succeeded in the attempt.
He only spoke once he confirmed her breathing was even.
“What time is it?”
