Run (15 page)

       The constant movement and sound shifted my brain to autopilot. I took orders, filled them, fetched water and soda and new crayons, wiped up spills and cleared away plates. I didn’t have time to think about how much my feet would hurt by the end, or the headache brewing at the base of my skull.

       I didn’t have time to think, period.

       The first place I stayed once I left Bend was a small town in Wyoming. I’d always wanted to see the Tetons, and I figured if I was running, I might as well get something out of it. The truck stop where I picked up a handful of shifts was on one of the major routes through the state, and it was always busy at the crack of dawn. Something about seeing that ever-widening glimmer of light brought the truckers out in droves.

       That truck stop taught me the value of noise. So you know when it stops, you have to pay attention.

       I thought maybe someone had finally invented a device to stop time. Adam walked in, spotted an empty table in my section, sat, and stared. I stared back, the diner, its patrons, their noise, the creaking booths and chairs scraping over linoleum fading in the sudden silence.

       The catalyst for my departure was sitting in my place of employment, waiting to be served.

       A crash jerked me back to reality. There was nothing he could do to me here. Gwen’s was safe as houses, and when it came time to close up, I still wouldn’t be alone—Charlie would walk me to my car, like he always did.

       I held out a menu to him. “Adam,” I said evenly.

       “McKenna.”

       “I recommend the chili. Charlie made it extra spicy today. Clear out your sinuses.”

       He ignored the menu. “You think you can just run from what you did?”

       Run? From what
I
did? Trevor’s questions from the other morning came back to me. “What about
you
? I screwed up. I admitted as such, accepted it, and I
tried
to move on and live with it. But I am not the only one to blame here, Adam. I saw her for an hour or two a day, five days a week. How often did you see her? Your parents? Jeff or Rex or Chris? Was I really the
only one
who thought there might be a problem and tried to help her?” I slapped my hands on the table and got in his face. “I will have to live with Deirdra’s death for the rest of my life, and the guilt of wondering if I’d only done something different. I will have to spend the rest of my life with that image burned into my brain.” Deirdra, her pale face, the blood smeared along the edges of the desk. “I have never, not
once
, heard anyone in your family do the same. And until you do, you have no right to accuse me of anything.”

       If I’d thought it’d be silent before, I was wrong. This was silence. Actual silence. Every diner was watching the tableau we’d set for them, mouths hanging open, utensils suspended in mid-air.

       I pulled out my pad. “So. The chili?”

       He scraped his chair back and stalked out of the restaurant.

       In spite of the crush, Gwen waved me into the kitchen and her tiny office, shutting the door. “Am I going to have trouble?”

       I slumped against the door. “God, I hope not. He’s one of Deirdra’s brothers,” I explained. “I don’t know what he’s doing in Austin, or if he’s here because of me or if it’s a coincidence. I doubt he’ll be back, though. Not his style.” No, he preferred waiting until his prey was isolated before pouncing.

       She nodded, and I made my way through the kitchen to the dining room to finish my shift. By the end of it, I’d managed to quarantine the incident with Adam in a corner to handle later. I clocked out and walked with Charlie to my car.

       The confrontation had shown me something I hadn’t realized I’d been waiting for. I didn’t have anything left to apologize for. Once the words left my mouth, I knew they were true; I wasn’t the only one to blame. And I was as strong as I was going to get.

       It was time to return to Bend and see if
home
really waited for me, or if it would be just another place I’d rested my head a while.

       I pulled into a space close to my building. Someone had shot out the streetlight again, leaving the only light in the parking lot the dim bulbs over each stairwell. I squinted into the dark, checking the shadows, before I opened the door and got out. On the agenda for that weekend was looking at a few apartments. Trevor had wanted to come with me. I refused. It was a little too much too soon, and we both knew it. Celia was coming with me instead.

       A car door slammed shut right after mine, and I whirled around, heart thudding. “McKenna.”

       Oh, Christ.
Adam
. I shifted my grip on my keys so they spiked out between my fingers. “What more do you have to say?”

       A car rolled down the street, music thumping loud enough to drown out his response.

       Loud enough neither of us registered the gun shot until warmth bloomed on my stomach.

       Cotton doesn’t do much to staunch blood flow. Not when it’s a gunshot wound. The dark stain spread wider and wider the longer I stared at it. It slicked my hand, the metallic scent drifting under my nose. Funny, it didn’t hurt. I would have thought getting shot would hurt.

       Something was happening to my legs. They were wobbling. I had a hard time feeling them, like there was a part missing. Maybe sitting on the ground would help. I pitched forward, the cement bruising my knees.
That
I could feel. Like I could feel a burning in my side, where the bullet was.

       The ground was dirty. Dirt equaled infection. I should stay off the ground, not get an infection.

       “Fuck. Hold on. Just hold on for me, okay?” I didn’t recognize the arms holding me up, but as I blinked to clear my vision, I recognized the face. Why was Adam holding me? He hated me. He wanted me dead.

       “McKenna.” He grasped my jaw, tilting so he could see my face. “Stay with me, okay? Don’t pass out.”

       Is this what Deirdra felt like in those last minutes? Dazed? Pain slowly creeping in? Growing colder? “Cold,” I whispered. Cold, and getting colder. And alone.

       Very, very alone.

       “McKenna!”

Chapter Sixteen

       The world was a blur of red and white and black, voices running together, rising and falling over a low growl of a rumble. One face after another appeared over mine, none recognizable.

       “Female. GSW to the abdomen. No through and through.” I shut my eyes against the blinding light hovering over my head, drifting in the pain. I was still so cold. The noise was incredible and constant, voices tumbling over the beep of machines. Keeping my eyes closed seemed like the best option, so I lay there, half-numb from pain. There was an elevator ride, and a mask over my nose, a kind-eyed woman instructing me to breathe normally.

       I woke some time later, still in a considerable amount of pain. My body was stiff and achy, pulled tight in all the wrong places. The room was dimly lit and empty, quiet but for the beep of a machine next to the bed.

       Someone had stuffed cotton balls in my mouth. I ran my tongue over my teeth, trying to get rid of the fuzzy, dry feeling, wishing I had some water. I tried to lift my head and found I couldn’t. Too heavy. Thirsty and uncomfortable, I plunged into sleep.

       The crack of the bullet.

       Someone shouting my name.

       Warmth spreading over my stomach, fog creeping in and stealing my strength.

       The dirty, dirty ground, arms like iron clamps keeping me from it.

       All those lights and faces and voices, blending together.

       I slit open an eye and found the room still mostly dark. I still couldn’t move my head. I groped around, tried to close my fingers around the railings along the sides of the bed. My fingers bumped over a ridge of plastic, buried in the covers, and pulled it free. A call button. It had to be. If I’d had any tears, I would have cried. I pushed the button once, twice, three times, willing someone to come through the door.

       The dryness in my mouth had reached intolerable levels by the time a scrub-clad man walked in. “What can I help you with?”

       “Water.” I rasped out the word, tongue sticking to the roof of my mouth.

       “Ice chips first.” He ducked out, returning with a large plastic cup. When he brought it over, I saw it was full of slivers of ice. “Can you help yourself?”

       I managed to lift a hand enough to dip my fingers into the cup, fumbling to grip a shard. The instant it hit my tongue, I whimpered. Several chips later, the worst of the dryness had subsided, and I registered the deep, throbbing ache in my stomach.

       The man, who must have been a nurse, took the cup and set it on a nearby table, one I could reach if my limbs weren’t encased in cement. “I’m going to see if I can find the doctor and bring him in, okay?”

       I managed a nod, then shut my eyes as he squeaked out of the room.

       I don’t know how long I slept that time, but when I woke, I was able to reach for the cup of ice myself, only to find it mostly melted. Tipping it to my mouth would have resulted in a soaked hospital gown, so I was reduced to pressing the call button again.

       A different nurse responded. “You’re awake. Good. Let me get the doctor.”

       “Wait.” My lips smacked together on the word. “Could you help me sit up, please? I’ll probably fall asleep again if I stay like this.”

       She showed me the buttons on the side with the arrows, and the top half of the bed lifted, shifting me into a mostly sitting position. As she strode out of the room, I reached for the cup again, hand trembling. I could manage a few sips without spilling. I had to.

       The tepid water tasted like ambrosia and gave me another piece of vital information—I must have been out for a few hours for the ice to have melted and the water to warm to room temperature. To kick my brain into gear, I glanced around the room. The shades were drawn, and the other bed was empty. A needle attached to a clear tube stuck out of my left arm, and my feet were cold. Light edged the blinds. I pushed the blankets to my lap and worked the gown up over my hips.

       Cotton padding was taped down on my lower right stomach. I squirmed a bit, trying to touch my back. No corresponding dressing on the opposite side. The bullet must not have gone through.

       “Ms. Davis?” A short, sandy-haired man with a paunchy stomach and a double chin stopped at the foot of the bed. “Dr. Kearns.”

       “How long have I been out?”

       He skimmed his gaze over the chart he’d unhooked from the end of the bed. “You were brought in around ten last night. It’s about five now. Less than a day. The bullet grazed your kidney. The blood loss was the most damaging. We’d like to keep you for a few days for observation.”

       Adam’s face loomed in my memory, his tone angry and frantic as he shouted my name. Shit. I didn’t have an emergency contact listed in my forms at the diner, and I didn’t carry anything in my purse that identified my place of employment. Unless someone had gone through my phone and called Trevor or Celia, no one would know where I was.

       The same nurse who’d gone for the doctor poked her head in. “Dr. Kearns? There’s a guy asking to see her. Is it all right if I bring him in?”

       Dr. Kearns glanced at me, and my heart sped up. I nodded. I wanted to see Trevor, with his sexy mouth creases and calm blue eyes, his strong, nimble fingers threading through mine.

       But the guy who walked through the door was the one I’d least expected. “Adam?”

       “Glad to see you two know each other,” the doctor said. “He wasn’t able to provide a lot of details.”

       Of course he couldn’t. He only knew me as a teacher. As a failure. As the devil who had to be cast out.

       The doctor gave a run down on my injuries. Beyond the wound in my stomach, I was otherwise fine. Internal damage had been minimal, considering the edge of my kidney had been the path of the bullet. A few days in the hospital to watch for infection and I’d be released.

       He left with a parting comment about sending someone up to get my insurance information, since Adam had been unable to provide it.

       Insurance. Something I didn’t have.

       Adam had remained quiet the entire time, hands clasped between his knees. A scrub-wearing woman walked in with a large plastic cup, a straw, and a pitcher of water. After setting these on the nearby table, she walked out again.

       I
hurt
. All over. My joints ached, my skin itched, my wound flamed out along the edges, scraping along my nerves. I was stuck in a hospital in a city where I knew practically no one, and the person sitting next to me wasn’t an adorably shaggy-haired, broad shouldered man who called me “darlin’,” but a man who’d bruised me twice, then made sure I got medical attention.

       “If you’re going to sit there, mind making yourself useful and moving that table closer?”

       He rolled the table over and went a step further, pouring water into the cup and sticking the straw in it. He handed it to me. “Why are you in Austin?”

       I fought not to gulp the water. “It seemed like a good idea at the time. Better question is why are you here?”

       He trained his gaze on his hands. “Friend of mine invited me down for a weekend. Needed to get away for a bit.”

       “Been longer than a weekend.” This was the strangest conversation. I was laid up, unable to move, in a great deal of pain, and chatting calmly with the man who’d threatened my life a year ago. He had yet to lay a finger on me.

       “Sure as hell didn’t expect to run into you.” He rubbed the tip of one of those fingers over the knuckles of the opposite hand, the occasional beep of the machine filling the void in the conversation. “Blaming you was easier.”

       Of course it was.

       “Blaming you meant we didn’t have to think about what we could have done to save her. Blaming you meant we could ignore the blind eye we all turned, thinking she was only being a teenage girl.”