Chapter 26
Charlie surfacedfrom her nap to find Ani sitting next to her bed. She blinked, wondering if she was still dreaming. Her vision was blurry, and that burning in her thigh felt worse than ever.
“Ani?” she asked weakly, reaching out a hand to touch her knee. It felt real. “Is that you?”
“It’s me. I promise.” Ani smiled, her dark eyes gleaming. She was so beautiful in the sunlight streaming from the window that Charlie had to blink again.
“But you’re angry at me. You still came?”
“You’re hurt. Of course I came, as soon as I heard. You’re still my best friend, even if you pissed me off.”
“Fair. And I’m sorry. You pissed me off too, although you had a very valid point.”
Ani waved her off. “So much has happened since then. It’s not important now. Will you let me look at your wound?”
“Yes, please. It burns. Is it supposed to do that? Also I feel woozy.”
Ani knelt next to her and put a hand on her forehead. “You don’t seem feverish.”
“Okay. That’s good, right? I just want to feel better. There’s so much going on right now. There’s my dad, there’s April, there’s smoke bombs and cameras and arrows and Bulldog and some Chechens and Vasily?—”
“Shhh. One thing at a time. Let’s take a look here.” Ani pulled a band around her thick hair to keep it out of her way. “Can you turn over onto your stomach?”
Charlie obeyed. This new position gave her a lovely view out the casement window. Sweet birdsong from fox sparrows and white-winged crossbills filled the room. It should have been relaxing, but Charlie’s gaze kept straying to the window. Would an arrow make it to the second floor? What about a smoke bomb?
“Have you ever dealt with an arrow wound before?” she asked Ani, to distract herself.
“As a pediatrician, no,” Ani said dryly. “Arrow wounds are not a big part of my practice. But it’s a wound like any other. I can handle it, don’t you worry.”
“I’m a little past worry, well on my way to fucking pissed.”
“It’s an assault. It’s traumatic.”
Ani would know, thought Charlie. She’d been assaulted at the age of twelve in a racial hate crime, and hadn’t walked normally since. But she didn’t like to talk about that, so Charlie held her tongue.
“I met Nick in town, after Molly picked me up at the airstrip,” Ani said in a lighter tone, as she peeled off the old bandage. “Sam flew me in. He’s a real sweetheart, isn’t he?”
“Nick?”
“Sam. Nick seems nice too. He was having breakfast with his daughter.”
“Hm.”
“That’s it, hm?”
“He’s supposed to be…well, he’s supposed to be handling something for me.” How many hours had it been? She wasn’t sure. Her head was swimming.
“Nick wasn’t what I expected.” Ani touched the skin around the wound. Charlie braced for pain, but it didn’t hurt. Her touch was so gentle, probably because she was used to dealing with kids.
“Why not?”
“He didn’t seem like the villain everyone made him out to be.” Ani balled up the bandage and tossed it in the waste basket.
“Jury’s still out on that.”
“Really? I thought you were getting close to him?”
“Yes, so I can keep an eye on him. Keep your friends close, your enemies closer.”
“Hmmm.”
Even to her ears, that sounded like a lame excuse. Keeping your enemies close was one thing; allowing them to blow your mind with a killer orgasm was another. “I know, it sounds silly.”
“It’s not that. There’s something in this wound.”
Charlie twisted her head to look over her shoulder, but Ani gently pushed her back into position. “What is it?”
“I don’t know, but whoever cleaned your wound yesterday missed it. I should get it out before it causes an infection. Do you mind?”
“Will it hurt?”
“It might.”
Charlie steeled herself. “Okay, but don’t I get a bottle of whiskey first? Or a leather strap to bite on?”
“It is the Wild West, after all.” Ani handed her a pillow. “Want to bite this?”
“Can we soak it in whiskey first?”
Ani chuckled and dug through her medical bag, then held up a pair of tweezers. “I’m going to disinfect these, then use them in your wound. Okay?”
Charlie buried her face in the pillow. “Go for it,” she said, her voice muffled.
She gnawed at the pillow while Ani seemed to dig all the way through her flesh and into her bone. After what seemed like twenty years, but was probably a few seconds, she said, “I got it. Take a look.”
Gasping with relief, Charlie peered at the item gripped between the pincers of Ani’s tweezers. It was a slim shard, maybe more like a thread, of something metallic. “What is it?”
“I have no idea.” She moved to wipe it on a piece of bandage, but Charlie grabbed her wrist to stop her.
“Put it in a baggie. I want to get it tested. Do you think it’s the reason for that burning feeling?”
“Sure, it’s an irritant, no matter what it is.”
“And my wooziness?”
“Maybe. That could just be a reaction to trauma.”
But already, Charlie was feeling better. She watched Ani drop the tiny metal shard into a plastic zip-up bag that had contained a bandage.
She set the baggie on Charlie’s nightstand. Charlie stared at it while Ani got to work re-bandaging her wound.
Her eyelids drooped. Damn, she was sleepy again. “I want to show you the lodge, but I keep drifting off,” she murmured to Ani.
“Your body is working hard. You need all the sleep you can get.”
“Where are you staying? How long are you going to be here?” She wanted to ask about John, about the divorce, but she didn’t want to disturb this perfect harmony with her best friend.
“I’m going to stay with Lila at the hardware store.”
The hardware store.
A bell rang, a faraway reminder, a chime of a connection being sparked. There was something important about the hardware store. But it swam away as a wave of drowsiness swept over Charlie. Before she fell back asleep, she had time for only a few, though very important words.
“Say hi to Goldie for me.”