Page 25 of Shatter

"What time is it?" I run my tongue over my split lip.

"Almost four." She glances at a watch on her wrist, the kind with a second hand. "You've been out about an hour."

Above us, something heavy slams.

A door, maybe, or a fist on a table.

Then a man's voice, muffled through the ceiling, deep enough I feel it in the headboard more than hear it.

I can't make out most of the words.

A few come through the floorboards clear.

"...fucking idiot..." The words thud down through the plaster.

"...a body, Hakon, in a public..." Something slams again, harder.

Every muscle in my back locks up at once, and my ribs light up like a struck match.

I grab the edge of the mattress with both gauze-wrapped hands.

Vail doesn't move.

She tips her head toward the ceiling, and her mouth twists, somewhere between a wince and a smile.

"Tor." She turns a page she hasn't read. "Our president. He's not yelling at you."

"He's yelling at him." My voice comes out a whisper. "Because of me."

"He's yelling at him because he's a prospect who shot a man without calling anybody first." Vail picks up her paperback and smooths the creased spine with her thumb. "Tor would've done it too, in his shoes. He knows it. He's going to yell anyway. It's kind of his job."

The voice goes on overhead, rising and falling.

I lie still and listen to a man I've never met tear into a man I barely know, because of me.

My eyes go from the door to the window and back, measuring how far I'd get with a cracked rib and no shoes.

Not far.

Nobody comes down the stairs.

After a while, the voice stops.

A door opens and closes somewhere above, and boots cross the floor and fade away down a hall.

My fingers slowly let go of the mattress.

It's then I see it.

On top of the dresser, beside the lamp, folded into a neat square.

Black leather.

A patch on the front I can't read from here, and a dark stain covering half of it, gone stiff and nearly black where it's dried.

My blood.

I know it's mine.