Alisa turns from wife to medic, and her eyes scan me for injury. “Are you hurt?”
“No, but she is.” I jerk my thumb over my shoulder at Taylor. “Can’t hurt to curry favor with the boss, right?”
The older woman snickers and hands me bandages, as well as a bottle of transparent solution and a clean hand towel. “Do you want help?”
“No, no,” I say, waving her off. “You stay here. I’ll wrangle her.”
“Godspeed.” Javier raises his glass to me.
With an appreciative smile I take my leave, forcibly elbowing my way through the throng of people surrounding Taylor. Inhaling three slow breaths, I circle around them to slide between Taylor and Mason.
“Hate to break up the party, but I’ve got to steal Eos.” I flash the bandages at everyone and their faces are a mix of amusement and confusion. “Our hero here dodged a couple bullets tonight. Except one.”
Congenial laughter breaks out around us. “When you get back, we gotta hear the story of you and those Rangers in Atlanta,” someone calls out.
“Oh! And Mickey ain’t heard the one about you and Selene in Indianapolis years ago!” A slim man turns to his friend. “Them two blew up one of Thorne’s radio towers.”
“We’ll be back before you know it.” I guide Taylor by the arm toward the hallway I hope leads to a bathroom. Obediently, she follows close behind, snatching a bottle of whiskey from a fellow Order member on our way in.
The bathroom is ruthlessly cramped, possessing one sink, two narrow stalls with broken doors, and at least three unidentifiable, nauseating odors. Graffiti colors every available surface, only a surprisingly small number of which is targeted at Papa. The sink is marginally detached from the wall, and the single mirror is blurry and cracked like somebody shot it.
Setting down her bottle on the sink behind me, Taylor gives me a suspicious eyeful as I loosen my bandana and toss back the hood. “Why are you doing this?”
“What do you mean? Doing what?”
“Helping me.”
I arrange the medical supplies and dab antiseptic on a towel. “You’re the one keeping me alive, dummy. It wouldbehoove meto make sure you don’t die of an infection. Plus, you didn’t look thrilled to be fawned upon out there.”
She pauses and tilts her head to the side thoughtfully. “I am not a fan of crowds.”
“I noticed. Turn around and let me help you.” She doesn’t. I stare, disbelieving, into her stubborn eyes. “Turn around,capatosta.”
She narrows her eyes. “Are you using Italian to be rude?”
“Yes.”
We stare each other down until she relents, removing her hoodie and folding it on the edge of the sink. She faces the mirror, giving me a good look at her injury. It’s somewhere between a burn and a gash, about six inches long, streaking between her shoulder blades like a red lightning bolt.
I nod my head and firm my resolve. I can do this. “Okay, Doctor Lucy is here to help. You need to take off your shirt.”
Methodically, she removes her shirt and folds it, placing it atop her hoodie. Pivoting on her heel, she fruitlessly tries to touch the wound from above and below her back, craning to see it in the mirror. Eventually, her shoulders sag in defeat and she turns back around, peeling off her tank top and folding it, filing it atop of her other shirts.
Clad in only a bra, her ridiculously muscled back reveals a secret map of her life. Tawny skin is riddled with scar tissue and troubling bruises. Three red welts race diagonally across her back, but none have bled.
Less disturbing are other marks—tattoos. Stamped in bold print on her left shoulder blade are the words: VOX POPULI VOX DEI, stacked like a column. The Litany Against Fear, a block of text fromDune, is scrawled down her spine. Another tattoo on her right shoulder blade stretches almost eight or nine inches down her back. It’s a woman, styled like an ancient Greek vase in thick black ink. She’s standing sideways, drawing back an arrow and using a crescent moon for a bow, shooting at the stars. It’s quite striking.
Unconsciously I trace the ink with my fingers, raising goose bumps along her skin. Taylor’s eyes are closed when I sneak a peek at her in the mirror, knuckles white around the porcelain edge of the sink.
“Sorry, no touching.” With a turn of my wrist the cloth is soaked in peroxide, and I hover it above her wound. “This is going to hurt.”
“I’ve had worse.”
“I see that,” I reply softly.
Taylor self-consciously rubs one of her arms and ducks her gaze to the sink. “I’m one of the fortunate ones.”
She sounds both contrite and determined. In place of prying, which is what I want to do, I remain silent, and clean the blood from around the wound.
