Chapter 18
Sloane
I can tell the second something is wrong.
There's a shift in air pressure, the sound of boots where sneakers should be, voices clipped instead of conversational.
Nurses look up, glance away, then look back.
The ICU is never calm, but this feels different.
The air is charged; everyone's bracing for something.
I take two steps toward the desk and freeze. Winston Graves. Willowridge's mayor, Darla's father, and the man responsible for every bruise I'll be cataloguing tonight.
He stands by the charge nurse's station as though he owns the oxygen in the building. His suit is perfect, his tie straight, and the politician's expression carefully arranged. His handshake with a detective says I'm important, not I'm concerned.
My stomach tightens. I've stood next to that exact smile before. My father wore one just like it.
I slip around the far side of the desk, trying to make myself small as a gurney bursts through the double doors.
Cops trail it like a swarm. Someone radios for OR backup that won't come.
The patient's already intubated, blood soaking the sheets.
I glance at the chart clipped to the bed as it passes. Gunshot wound. Pelvic region. Male.
Before I can see the name, my phone buzzes. Knox flashes on the screen. He knows I'm on shift. He knows I'm not supposed to take calls at the desk. So if he's calling now, it's not casual. I duck into the alcove by the supply closet and swipe to answer.
"You do remember I'm at work, right?"
"I know you're at the hospital," he says, voice already strained. "I wouldn't call unless I had to." The way he says had to makes the hair rise at the back of my neck.
"What happened?"
"It's about Darla."
I stop breathing. "What about her?"
He waits half a second. Long enough to tell me whatever's coming is bad. "She was almost sold."
The ground feels unsteady beneath my feet. "Sold," I repeat, like the word is foreign.
"Auction," Knox says quietly. "Her father set it up. She fought off the buyer—Trent—and ran. She's with East. Hurt, but safe."
A buzzing fills my ears. I grip the counter so hard my knuckles whiten. "Who was the buyer?"
He hesitates. "Sloane—"
"Tell me."
"Trent Moreland."
My vision narrows until the room fades around the edges.
Trent. I know that name the way you know a scar by touch.
He used to show up at my father's auctions.
Never bid, never bought. Just watched, eyes crawling over the girls, drink in hand, enjoying the show.
The kind of man who made my skin itch even in a room full of monsters.
Knox must hear the way my breath snaps. "Sloane? Talk to me. What does Trent Moreland mean to you?"
"Nothing." Too fast. Too flat.
"Bullshit."
"Knox." The single word is cold enough to frost glass.
"Don't lock me out of this," he snaps and instantly sucks in a sharp breath.
I swallow the iron taste of panic. "Just tell me why you're calling."
"Trent," he says quietly. "He's in your hospital. Malachi wants his stay to be… memorable." Knox continues, voice low and careful, the way he gets when he's holding something volatile. "He wants to know if you, with Ruby and Frankie, can handle it."
I go still. Absolutely still. Of course Malachi figured out who could cause the most damage with the fewest traces. Of course Knox called me the second he heard.
"I'll handle things here."
"Sloane—"
"I'll text Ruby. And Frankie. I'll tell them when I'm ready." My voice comes out steady, steadier than it should be.
"Baby, talk to me—"
"I have to go," I whisper, and hang up.
Trent Moreland. Going after Darla the same way he… No. I shut the thought down before it can form teeth.
I find my supervisor and request to be added to the rotation for the new ICU admit. She doesn't question me. Nurses work with whom they're comfortable with, and I'm good at projecting capability even when I'm cracking.
When the chart finally hits my hands, the name stares back. Moreland, Trent A. My hands go still on the chart. I read the name twice to make sure my eyes aren't lying.
I tuck the chart under my arm and text Ruby a single word. Ready.
Her response comes instantly, an explosion of emojis. Ruby: LET'S RUIN A MAN. Frankie's grabbing gear.
Let's ruin a man. Yeah. Let's.
On the way to Trent's floor, I duck into Pediatrics and pocket a pair of fake lashes confiscated from a seven-year-old who did not need that much glam at 9 a.m.
Ruby and Frankie arrive at the same time, practically colliding into the stairwell door. Ruby looks like a glitter grenade detonated on a human. Frankie looks like midnight dressed itself in black lipstick and decided to walk among mortals. She's got a black tote slung over one shoulder.
Both have the exact same expression. Mischief sharpened into purpose.
Ruby wiggles her fingers. "Lead the way, Nurse Assassin."
"Do not call me that in public," I whisper.
"Oh, in private then? Bedroom voice, maybe." She wiggles her eyebrows.
Frankie elbows her. "Dial it back, Gremlin."
Ruby grins and winks. We climb two flights, duck onto the ICU floor, then slip into the side corridor. I peek around the corner toward Trent's room.
Two cops. One scrolling his phone, one trying hard not to fall asleep standing.
"Security level: decorative," Ruby whispers.
I check my watch. "Shift change in four minutes. They'll swap out and there's always a gap."
"Plan?" Frankie murmurs.
"Fast, quiet, wildly disrespectful," Ruby says.
"Medically safe," I add automatically. "No messing with lines. No touching his meds. I am not losing my license over this man's missing dick."
Ruby wrinkles her nose. "God, can you imagine having that in your disciplinary file? 'Terminated: prank on neutered douche canoe.'"
Despite everything, a laugh hits the back of my throat.
We wait. At 10:02, both cops peel off toward the elevator, and their replacements are nowhere in sight. I push the door open.
Trent lies pale and slack-jawed with tubes and wires everywhere, blanket tucked protectively over the bandaged wreckage where Darla shot him.
Ruby clutches her chest dramatically. "Aww. Poor little gelding."
I snort so fast I almost choke. Frankie opens her tote and pulls out glitter boots.
Ruby claps both hands over her mouth to muffle a squeal. "You broke into the sacred closet?"
"No, they were at my place," Frankie corrects. "She'll thank me later."
We move as though we've rehearsed this. We haven't. But we're women who've survived men like Trent. That's its own choreography.
Frankie lifts the blanket at the foot of the bed, keeping all the lines clear. "Vitals stable," she comments dryly. "Shame."
Ruby slides the sparkly boots onto Trent's limp feet, tongue caught between her teeth as she adjusts the zippers. "They fit. The universe wants this."
I grab a marker and cross out the catheter label on the bag hanging by the bedrail. Rewrite it neatly: Princess Tinkles.
Ruby wheezes. Frankie fans herself with a latex glove.
"Lashes," Frankie prompts.
Ruby digs into my scrub pocket like it's hers and produces the fake lashes. "Confiscated from a unicorn princess who absolutely needed that much glam at 9 a.m."
"She did," I reply. "But Trent needs them more."
Frankie tapes them to the monitor casing right above the sedation warning, angled just so.
The heart-rate line blips cheerfully below them.
I smooth the blanket back over his feet and the glitter boots, tucking him in with hospital-grade care, because professionalism and petty vengeance can coexist.
The last step is the card. Ruby hands it over, eyes shining.
Trent, drawn with ridiculous accuracy, being wheeled into the underworld by glitter demons. Captioned: Have a Neuter Day. Signed—in faked handwriting—by half the night shift.
"That is… elaborate," I murmur.
"I contain multitudes," Ruby whispers.
I tape it dead center above his head, where he'll see it the second the morphine haze lifts.
Ruby pulls out her phone, then bows to the bed. "May your life be long and deeply uncomfortable."
Ruby snaps picture after picture. "For the archives," she mutters. "For girls' night. The group chat. When Darla needs a laugh. For when I need bail."
"Do not post that anywhere," I hiss.
"Of course not," she says, scandalized. "I'm not a monster. These are for educational purposes."
"Of what?"
"How not to fuck with our family," she replies sweetly.
Frankie watches me instead of Trent. Her gaze is sharp, but not unkind. Witchy and weighing. Something in my chest loosens a notch, but no more. A laugh slips out, small and startled. Wrong and right at the same time.
Frankie's mouth curves, the barest hint of a smile. She steps close enough that only I can hear. "Storm around you's shifting," she murmurs. "Hold on to the ones who anchor you."
Ruby swings an arm around both our shoulders. "Come on, coven. Before Princess Tinkles wakes up and starts ringing for more pain meds."
We slip out the back hall, quiet as shadows, leaving Trent Moreland glittering and labeled behind us. Whatever Malachi and the boys have planned for him once he's discharged is above my pay grade. This part was ours.
For the first time all day, my chest doesn't feel like it's caving in.
My shift ends an hour later. I text Knox: Done. Coming out.
Knox is waiting beside his bike in the visitor lot. Huge under the streetlamps. Solid. Immoveable. Cut dark against his shirt. His eyes find me instantly and hold. He looks like he hasn't slept. He keeps his hands at his sides. That tells me everything.
"Sloane." Just my name, rough and waiting.
"I handled it."
"I know you did. That's not what I'm asking about." I pivot toward the bike, needing motion, air, anything. He follows, catching my wrist gently. "Sloane."
"I'm tired."
"You're shutting me out."
"It was a rough day."
"You're not talking to me."
"I don't want to fight."