Chapter 12
Chapter Twelve
It doesn’t look like Doctor Greg has shaved in several days. I stare at the lightly grayed stubble on his jaw as he opens the car door, letting me out. We’ve been driving for hours, and I’ve exhausted myself from worry.
The driver refuses to speak to Bells and me, leaving all my questions unanswered.
“Evelyn.” Doctor Greg breathes my name, his wide, brown eyes darting up and down my frame. He’s scanning for injuries. I’m covered in blood, but it’s not mine. I somehow made it out of this unharmed. “Are you okay?”
I don’t answer that. I can’t.
I blink, eyeing the hospital exterior behind him. I’m coming to hate this fucking place.
“Caleb needs help,” I say, repeating what I told Sash and Logan hours earlier. “His eye…”
Images of Caleb’s mangled face and limp body flash in my mind. I flinch.
His eye. The blood.
Nurse June walks around the car, tying her thick, dark hair out of her face as she heads toward Bells. I have half a mind to warn her about the blue-haired human, but she pulls open the car door before I find the words.
Bells lunges for Nurse June the second her door is opened, another high-pitched scream erupting from her throat. It bursts my eardrums. Nurse June’s, too, if her wince is anything to go by.
I lose my composure. Bells and I have been trapped in this car together for hours, and I’ve done my best to leave her alone. I can’t handle it any longer.
I spin around, fully prepared to wallop her beside the head.
Doctor Greg yanks me out of the car before I make contact.
“Come on,” he grunts, carrying me inside.
Nurse June handles Bells, trying and failing to convince the human to come inside of her own accord before losing her patience and throwing Bells over her shoulder.
Doctor Greg deposits me on a hard bed inside a private room. He wordlessly points to my collarbone.
“Remove your shirt.”
He knows about my chip. I tug off my clothes, eager to have this damned thing cut out of me. Nurse June enters the room with a huff, but it doesn’t seem directed at me. The sleeve of her blue scrub top is torn.
“She’s sedated in room three,” she tells Doctor Greg. Then she extends her hand, revealing a bloody bite mark on her arm. “And she fucking bit me.”
I hum. “Adam’s in for a treat.”
I’m not trying to be funny, but Nurse June laughs. This is the first time in weeks that she’s shown me any emotion besides contempt. I’d be pleased with my victory if the knowledge that Caleb’s mangled wolf was abandoned in that field wasn’t the only thing on my mind.
Nurse June busies herself, readying a tray for Doctor Greg.
I watch, emotionless as she pulls out a giant fucking needle, a scalpel, and tweezers. I should feel something about this.
Doctor Greg is rifling through drawers. He sets aside gauze and other bandages, then tugs on a pair of sterile gloves.
I shift my gaze toward the door. I don’t care to see him cut me open and dig around in search of a chip. I’m not a purse to be rifled through.
Doctor Greg prods at my collarbone, his touch gentle as he slides his thumb over my skin. He pauses once he finds the chip, a muffled curse slipping from his lips.
Where is Caleb? Still in that field?
Still—
Doctor Greg wipes my skin with an alcohol wipe.
“I’m going to give you a numbing shot,” he warns.
“Okay.”
He plucks the needle Nurse June prepared from the tray. The numbing burns, but I hardly react to the pain. It’s nothing compared to what I’ve gone through these past few days.
Doctor Greg waits several minutes before grabbing the scalpel. I stare at the ceiling.
“Does this feel sharp?” he asks.
I shake my head, only feeling pressure.
Several minutes pass before Doctor Greg retreats.
In his tweezers is a small piece of metal. It’s shaped like a grain of rice, so damned easy to miss. Nurse June presses a gauze to my chest, stopping the bleeding as Doctor Greg takes care of the chip. He places it inside a metal box.
I’m sure they’re going to inspect it.
Guilt threatens to consume me, but I can’t bring myself to feel it. I can’t bring myself to feel anything. Somebody comes in and takes the chip. Both Doctor Greg and Nurse June visibly relax the moment it’s out of sight.
Doctor Greg is the first to speak. “Knox isn’t dead.”
The words come erupting from him. I repeat them in my mind, rolling them over and over and over.
I don’t understand.
I don’t believe him.
“His eye…” I say, trailing off. “He was shot in the head. I saw it.”
“Daniel had rubber bullets in his gun.” Doctor Greg crouches, looking me in the eye. “They’re enough to injure, but not to kill. Knox was killed in front of the camera HPAW had set up, but he’s not dead.”
That doesn’t make sense. I still don’t understand.
“They left him there,” I say.
Doctor Greg nods. “Shifters prioritize the living, and HPAW knows that. Leaving Knox in the field was a calculated risk. The camera was knocked over and broken shortly after Logan carried you away. Knox was then immediately removed.”
Nurse June replaces the gauze she’s holding against my chest. I look down, eyeing the bloody spot where the chip once lived. They needed me to believe Caleb was dead until the chip was removed. Anything I know, HPAW knows.
“Why did Daniel have rubber bullets?”
He was a loyal HPAW soldier. He would never work with the shifters, even for me. It goes against everything he believes in.
“He contacted us shortly after HPAW brought you in,” Greg explains. “There are some programs HPAW is involved in that…” Greg pauses, clearing his throat. “He referred to you as his daughter in one conversation. He was concerned for your well-being.”
That’s not true.
“I don’t believe you,” I say.
Doctor Greg peels back the gauze covering my shrapnel wound directly above my nipple. A few of the stitches have split open, but it otherwise looks fine.
“I’m not saying that Daniel was on our side,” he admits. “He shared only the time and location of your execution, along with the information that you were chipped. The plan was for him to shoot Caleb with the rubber bullet—probably to advance his career. In exchange, we’d let him live.”
That sounds more like him.
I clear my throat, my hands trembling. “I killed him.”
“So I’ve been told. We weren’t anticipating that.”
He examines my disfigured mark. I don’t like seeing it, and I turn away until it’s cleaned and rewrapped. I don’t want to look at what’s left.
“Are you going to ask about Knox?” he eventually asks.
I should. I know I should.
Why am I not?
I replay the image of Caleb’s limp body and mangled face in my mind, then realize it’s because I don’t entirely believe what I’m being told. Not after what I saw.
Doctor Greg frowns, then orders Nurse June to help me change into a hospital gown and be hooked up to an IV. He says something about fluids. I hardly listen.
Is Caleb really alive? Or is this just another lie I want to believe?