Chapter 20
NICOLETTA
A strong medicinal smell, then more pressure and packing. When he is done, he applies tape in precise strips, smoothing each one down from end to end.
He shines the light close again, then steps back. “Done.” He snaps off the surgical gloves and disposes of them in a container under the table. “Let me get you something clean to wear.”
“Grab a t-shirt for me too.” Bolt shrugs out of the tux jacket, and as he predicted, the back is split up the middle.
Diesel shakes his head. “Just like the fuckin’ Hulk.”
Bolt peels off the dress shirt and pitches it in the waste bin.
“I guess you won’t be getting the deposit back on that tux,” Blood laughs around his words.
Ezra returns with an oversized t-shirt and a pair of sweat shorts for me and a faded t-shirt for Bolt.
Ezra points to the other side of the room. “You can change in the bathroom.”
Bolt slips on the t-shirt, then places his muscled arm behind my back. “Gonna ease you up, babe.” He slowly gets me to a sitting position while keeping the sheet wrapped around me. “You all right?”
I nod. Even though the intense pain has subsided, I’m not quite sure about my legs.
“You want me to carry you?” Bolt asks.
Callahan spins around from the sink, where he’s washing his hands. “Ease her onto her feet. I wanna see if she’s able to walk.”
Bolt does as the doctor says, still bracing me from behind. I lean against him, feeling a bit wobbly.
“Just give it a minute and get your legs under you,” Callahan instructs.
I expected this man to be a barbaric butcher, and I couldn’t have been more wrong. He’s calm, confident, considerate, and totally professional, with steady hands and a kind smile.
I stand for a few minutes, then nod toward the bathroom.
Bolt stays by my side until I enter the bathroom.
I take off the rest of the shredded dress, pull on the t-shirt, and carefully ease the shorts up just below the bandage.
I rinse my hands and face in the sink, get myself together, and when I open the door, Bolt is again at my side.
For the first time, I hear the music and the sounds of the bar bleeding through the wall.
Callahan hands a paper bag to Bolt. “Antibiotics that have to be taken every six hours.” His gaze shifts to me. “Finish the entire bottle even if on day four you feel great. Ibuprofen for the pain.” He nods to Bolt. “There’s something stronger in there, but only if she needs it.”
Bolt nods. Serious. Concerned.
His eyes haven’t left mine the entire time. Like a lifeline, I knew he was there holding me up. Even before, when Callahan told him to get the hell outta his light. Bolt moved a few inches to the foot of the table but still in my line of vision.
Then the doctor hands me a piece of paper printed with instructions.
“Tomorrow, I want you to read this carefully. It tells you how to redress the wound, and what you can and can’t do over the next week.
Any oozing outside the bandage area or a fever over one hundred, you call me.
” Then his gaze shifts to Bolt. “And if there’s any red streaking moving away from the wound, you go to an emergency room.
Immediately. No matter what the consequences. ”
“And if we don’t?” Bolt asks.
“Then she dies.” Callahan’s voice is flat and firm. “Sepsis doesn’t wait for bad decisions.” Then he says, "No strenuous activity for two weeks.”
Bolt makes a sound.
"I'm aware," the doctor says dryly, "that the instruction is theoretical in nature.”
Bolt makes a face I can’t decipher.
"She should eat something. Preferably protein. She’s lost blood, and she’s running on empty and adrenaline. That only carries a person so far."
“Fish tacos?” For the first time all night, I’m actually hungry.
“Whatever you want, babe.” Bolt anchors his arm around my shoulders.
Smoke whips out his phone. “I’ll let Marisol know you’re doin’ good, we’re on our way, and you want her special fish tacos.”
“Don’t you dare,” I say. “Not at this time of night.”
“Shit, she lives for this stuff. For her, somebody requesting her food is the best compliment ever. She’ll have them made and ready when we get there.”
“Can you make it out to the Escalade?” Bolt asks.
“I think so.” The longer I stand, the stronger I feel.
Bolt holds out his hand to Ezra. “You always come through for me, man.”
The two men shake, their faces serious, then Ezra breaks the mood. “What would I do without you?” He looks at me and winks. “This guy keeps me in business. And I've kept him in one piece. We have an arrangement."
"Is that what you call it?” Bolt laughs.
"It's what I call most things."
Bolt angles me toward the back door, but I stop and turn to Ezra.
“Thank you.” My throat tightens. I want to say more, but the words won’t come.
He takes my hand in his strong, callused palm and gently shakes it. “You’re very welcome. Take care of yourself. Or at the very least —" his eyes cut briefly to Bolt, "let someone help you do it."
“Thank you” seems not enough, seems foolish and insignificant, but the look in Ezra’s eyes tells me he got it. Tells me he’s seen this kind of gratitude before and knows “thank you” is all that’s needed.
As we head out the door, I don’t miss the wad of cash Smoke presses into Ezra’s palm.
We all troop out to the SUV, and Manny’s head shoots up. “Everything all right?”
He must’ve stayed outside standing guard.
“Yeah, she’s good,” Bolt answers, and I realize Manny was asking about me.
Smoke calling Marisol about the food, then paying Ezra, Manny’s concerned question. Diesel sacrificing his t-shirt that was now in the waste bin in Ezra Callahan’s office. Blood, still and silently observing the whole time, on-point and ready to act at a moment’s notice.
When Bolt talked about the club a few days ago, he’d mentioned family, and for the first time, I actually get it. Family isn’t blood relations; it’s a feeling, a closeness, a willingness to act no matter what.
Outside, the alley smells like the ocean and old rain.
I stop walking and just stand for a moment, gazing up at the black star-studded sky, my hand resting lightly against the fresh dressing. Bolt stops too.
"How long has he been back there?" I ask.
"Seven years."
"And before that?"
"Cedars-Sinai,” he says. "Trauma surgery. One of the best in the state."
I shake my head. "And now he sews up outlaws on a pool table."
"And now he sews up outlaws on a pool table." Bolt's voice is even, but something underneath it is not. "The world runs on arrangements like that. You just don't see them until you're standing on this side of things."
I look up at Bolt, seeing him differently.
This man who has a doctor on call in a Long Beach bar.
Who carries a medical kit in the cargo hold like other men carry jumper cables.
Who lives by his own code, with his own version of every institution the straight world takes for granted.
Clark Williams and all my friends in L.A.
take for granted. Bolt is a man who values loyalty over paperwork.
These last few weeks, I thought I stepped outside my world. Only I’ve just stepped into a different one.
“Let’s go,” Smoke says. “It’s been a long-ass night, and now I want my woman’s fish tacos.”
“Yeah,” Blood agrees. “They are fuckin’ good.”
Bolt’s face relaxes for a split second. “Best tacos south of the border.”
"Then let's go," I say. "I'm starving."
Bolt’s hand finds the small of my back — careful, deliberate, just above the wound. The crashing tide in the distance. The boardwalk empty and washed in that particular blue-gray that belongs only to the coast before dawn.
I have a bullet wound, a paper bag of antibiotics and the growing, irreversible sense that there is nothing else that exists beyond right now.
I’m almost at peace with that. Almost— the most honest word available.