Chapter 24
F allon
Freefalling.
I’d never experienced the heady sensations, but in my mind, the experience was freeing. Damning. Terrifying. I threw out my arms, embracing the rush of wind against my face, savoring the tickling sense of floating.
All while sensing the crushing end.
Death.
Shuddering, I opened my eyes and immediately sensed Navarro had left me alone.
I felt the ache in my bones.
And in my heart.
There was no electricity tickling the ends of my nerves, no rapid pulse because of his closeness. He’d left me entirely alone, determined to protect me while prowling the facilities and grounds of the hospital.
He’d barked orders as soon as we’d arrived at the hospital, acting as if he not only commanded an army, but also oversaw every doctor and nurse within twenty miles.
Soldiers had surrounded the building, all openly carrying weapons.
I’d seen them out the window and had felt equally comforted and disturbed.
This wasn’t living at all. This was waiting for another catastrophe while enduring ongoing rules and protocol.
No wonder my father had snagged an opportunity to free himself from the bleak tyranny.
With my eyelids still heavy, I continued to envision Navarro. God, the man had been furious. And protective.
Comforting.
Giving.
Loving.
Only hours before I’d wanted to drive the sharp blade into his eyeball. Now I considered him a hero. My hero. Talk about a sudden turnaround. Maybe I was more than a little cracked around the edges, but I missed his touch. His strength. Even his commanding ways.
He’d sat with me for an hour, maybe longer. Time had no meaning, no sense of urgency. I’d obviously fallen asleep, finally drained to the point I hadn’t been able to hold my eyes open. I lifted my head, studying the monitors. They weren’t wildly beeping so that was a good sign at least.
Hospitals.
They always seemed so cold and devoid of life to me, including in television programs. At least with the morning light cresting through the window, Brooke’s face didn’t look nearly as pale as when she’d been brought in.
I rested my head on my knees, my feet propped up in the only chair in the room.
There’d been no questions asked, Brooke taken to a private intensive care unit.
I glanced away, scratching an itch on my arm.
A bug bite. One of several. In doing so, I was reminded my clothes were filthy, blood splatters everywhere.
Including in long strings on my arms. I scratched the sticky substance, musing once again about the fact not a single person had asked why the group of men and women strolling into the emergency room in the dead of night were covered in blood.
It would seem even in another country, Navarro and the man he worked for wielded significant power. I wasn’t certain whether to be grateful or continue to be anxious.
Brooke had been rescued, but the nightmare wasn’t over by a long shot. I’d overheard Jago and Navarro talking, only interrupting them once to remind them I could hear what they were saying.
They’d discussed my future as if it was up for debate.
I wasn’t going to be held in a different kind of prison than Brooke had been forced into.
I’d committed to finding out everything that had occurred all the years before, and discovering if there was anything left.
If only I’d paid closer attention to the information I’d found in my father’s locked room.
I was exhausted, finally coming down from the adrenaline high after several hours.
So far, the doctor had said little other than that Brooke was severely dehydrated, her sugar levels off the charts in the wrong direction. At least I could be thankful one of the savages had been so kind as to allow her to take her medication with her.
That told me one thing. She’d never been the intended target, just as Navarro had alluded to.
I had been, but in an entirely different way.
Someone had known I’d stop at nothing to find my sister.
Was it my father? Or someone else? I closed my eyes and instantly a vision of Navarro’s face was right there as it was every single time.
A cold chill surfaced, running down my spine as I asked myself whether I’d been lying to the man or not. Could I place my trust in him? My gut told me I could, but there were too many pieces of the puzzle I couldn’t put together.
Maybe my mind was too frazzled to make sense of anything.
There were few truths and one too many questions.
One thing I knew was that my baby sister was hooked up to monitors, the doctor hopeful she’d turn the tide during the night instead of going into a coma.
I had no idea whether the hours had made a difference.
She was still unmoving. Still pale. Still…
alive. I had to keep reminding myself we could go through any trauma or crisis as long as we were together.
I was also angry, so much so I could barely think clearly. Maybe someone had tried to harness my anger so I would go through with killing Navarro. I groaned and smacked my head against my knees. I’d killed a man. I hadn’t thought anything about doing so and in truth, I had no guilt whatsoever.
Did that make me a monster by proxy?
If it did, I accepted whatever penance I deserved because I’d wanted more than one soldier to die. I’d want to rip out all of their throats. One by one. Hell, I wouldn’t have been happy until I’d pitched bodies over the fence. I covered my ears, still hearing the cries of man turning into food.
God. What was I becoming? Once I’d been an artist whose only concern was making rent the next month. Now I had blood on my hands. I pulled them in front of me, still able to see spots imbedded in my skin. Either that or I was hallucinating. Maybe I was more like my father than I realized.
Navarro had kept his promise. He’d done everything in his power to return Brooke to me. In doing so, he’d incited a war. Maybe I wasn’t a part of his world and couldn’t understand all the nuances, yet I’d read enough to understand how ruthless games were played within dark organizations.
There could only be one winner.
Brooke stirred and I was immediately on my feet, grasping her hand as I leaned over the bed.
I brushed hair from her face and did my best to keep from bursting into tears.
She didn’t need the added stress. As a single tear defied me, sliding down my face, the sense of relief was more jarring than before.
Her eyelids fluttered open and she licked her cracked lip. I stiffened, the tenseness in every muscle forcing my legs to cramp.
And another tear fell.
And another.
I wiped them away furiously, even managing a little laugh when she squeezed my hand and turned her head. It was impossible to tell whether she was focusing, but I sensed she knew I was looking out for her.
“Fal… lon.”
“Don’t try and talk, baby sis. You need your rest.”
“Wha… What… happened?”
I’d thought of what I should tell her a thousand times.
Nothing seemed right. I tried to plaster a smile on my face even though I knew she’d see right through me.
Still, I had to pretend or I’d be the one falling apart.
“We rescued you. You’re safe now.” Safe.
Was there such a thing in this great big, fabulous world of crime syndicates and monsters?
As she swallowed, she slowly looked around the room. “Daddy.”
Her single word wasn’t a question, just a statement that brought another wave of angst, like a knife being stuck in my heart. What the hell was I supposed to tell her, that her father had abandoned her, allowing her to be used in some treacherous game?
“Everything is fine,” I told her, the lie far too easy to whisper.
Nothing was fine.
I stroked her forehead, licking tears off my lip as soon as they fell. “Why don’t you just rest? We’ll talk more later. Okay?”
Brooke shifted her gaze, blinking a few times as if trying so hard to concentrate on what I was saying. My sweet baby sister had been through so much, her frail body fighting so hard, and I was so angry I could barely keep it together. What kind of monster did this to an innocent girl?
The kind that Navarro could be.
But did I believe it?
The ache in my system intensified as she slowly closed her eyes. I waited until her breathing was even before easing away from the bed. My legs were just as shaky as before and I was forced to grip the arm of the chair as I sat down.
This was such a nightmare.
As the sounds of the machines Brooke was hooked to created a twisted rhythm in my mind, I tried to put everything the two of us had been through in a neat basket. The why and how would make it easier to explain to her, but there were far too many missing pieces.
Another damn bug bite was driving me bananas. I started scratching my arm, barely paying any attention to what I was doing. When I finally looked again, my skin was covered in strings of fresh blood, the deep scratches just another reminder of what we’d been through. All of us.
Grief and despair had many layers. Along with feeling out of control and so tired every joint hurt, I was on the verge of tears feeling as if there was nowhere to turn.
The truth was I hadn’t allowed myself to cry, to really ugly cry since Brooke had disappeared.
I’d shifted into a person I didn’t recognize any longer so I could pretend to be someone I wasn’t.
A hero. Even with her lying in a hospital bed safe for now, if I looked into a mirror, I’d call myself a failure.
The true hero was Navarro. Never wavering. Never lying. Just telling me how it was.
He’d remembered me, the young girl who he’d insisted had altered his life.
And forgiven me for almost killing him.
But could I forgive him for causing the death of my mother?
With hot tears sliding down both cheeks, I did my best to hide my sobs. The last thing I wanted to do was to disturb Brooke. She was so fragile yet so strong, my little rock who’d been through so much.