Chapter Ninety-Three
Raine
The elevator is too small for all of us. Doc and Natasha have Asher between them, his weight sagging against their shoulders, and I’m…in the way. Every time they shift, an elbow or a shoulder brushes me, each accidental contact sending a spike of panic straight through my chest.
I try to flatten myself to the wall, like distance will help, but my heart races without my permission, and the air thins.
Doc notices.
He keeps glancing back at me, quick assessments—like he’s doing with Asher. I shake my head once, try to tell him I’m fine. It’s a lie, but I’m not the priority, and this lie is efficient and necessary.
I’d give anything to hear Asher’s voice right now. Just one word. Anything to prove what they did to him isn’t permanent. I should have asked Voss. Pressed that knife into his wound and—
No. That’s not me. But the thought is there, and I file it away with everything else I can’t afford to feel right now.
The elevator is too slow.
Asher barely moved the whole way here. Once or twice, he squeezed my hand—hard enough I knew the movements weren’t merely reflexive. The contact was enough to keep the panic from pulling me under.
But his eyes didn’t open until we reached the garage.
Doc and I tried to get him out of the SUV. The second I stepped forward, my body simply…stopped cooperating. My legs folded under me. I hit the seat hard and stayed there while the world tilted sideways.
Natasha rushed over, hands steady, voice calm, and I forced my brain to reroute before the panic could carry me away.
I gave directions. I did that much.
Eleventh floor. The code for the elevator. The one for the door.
My shoulder throbs steadily, a deep, dull pulse that radiates down my arm whenever I breathe too deeply. My ribs are an incessant low noise under the exhaustion, warning me of a spiral that’s waiting for a quiet moment to take hold.
It’s easier to breathe in the hall. Easier still once I unlock the door. The music is still on. It’s the one constant here. More constant than even Asher now, and the thought almost undoes me right in the middle of the living room.
“Where are we going?” Doc asks.
“Bedroom. First door on the left.”
I tell them to wait so I can pull a spare blanket from the closet. Laundry isn’t something I have the capacity for right now, and Asher shouldn’t have to lie on bloody sheets once Doc fixes him up.
If Doc can fix him up.
I find a spot against the wall where I can see Asher—where he can see me—and I’m out of the way.
Doc sets his kit on the dresser, moving efficiently.
Gauze, several small vials of liquid, and a canvas pack he opens to reveal an assortment of scalpels, forceps, and instruments I wish I didn’t recognize.
“All right. Asher, once I see what we’re dealing with, I’ll give you something for the pain. You still with me?”
He nods. The relief hits me so hard, I press my back against the wall to stay upright.
Doc cuts through what’s left of Asher’s shirt, peeling it away, followed by the dirty, blood-soaked bandage wrapped around his torso.
Mottled bruises, everywhere. Some already turning purple, others red and angry.
The wound is worse than I expected—and I knew it would be bad. An involuntary sound slips free. Small, caught, and swallowed back before it can fully escape. But Asher notices. He always notices. Even now, exhausted and in pain, he notices, and his eyes find mine.
After Doc shines a penlight at the injury, he shakes his head. “Piece of glass in there. Fuckers. You’re going to need something to take the edge off for this.”
Asher grabs the man’s arm, fingers digging into the muscle, and the tendons in his neck strain as he shakes his head.
“It won’t put you under. I promise,” Doc says.
Natasha straightens where she’s been leaning against the door jamb. “He means that. We don’t say those words—I promise—unless we know they’re true.”
Asher’s entire body loosens by degrees. Shoulders first, then his jaw, then his hands. He lets his arm fall, turning his head so he can see me again. I understand without a single word passing between us. He needs to be here. Present.
And he needs me to stay here too.
“Morphine first.” Doc is already drawing it up, the needle catching the light before he finds the IV port and depresses the plunger. He swaps syringes with the ease of someone who’s done this countless times in considerably worse conditions than these. “The local is going to sting before it helps.”
I watch it all. Asher’s flinch. The piece of glass pulled free with steady hands. Saline irrigating the bloody gash. Finally, the suture kit laid out on the nightstand.
Doc reaches for a needle, his gaze pinned to the wound. “His voice. How long?”
“The video came in at three forty-five,” I say, my own words starting to fracture. “He tried to say something and…couldn’t.”
“You’re going to have to help us out here, mate. Was it hours before the video?” Doc asks with a quick glance away from the stitches.
Asher shakes his head.
“Minutes?”
A nod.
“Injury?”
No.
“Injection?”
Yes.
Doc returns his focus to Asher’s side, tying off the sutures then taping a thick piece of gauze in place over the wound. After another blood pressure check, he moves to the bottom corner of the bed so he can see both of us.
“Raine, Inara told us a friend needed help. That’s why we came. And you don’t have to explain everything. We”—he glances at Natasha—“know what it’s like to be hunted. But we’re obviously talking government here. They have a medical research division?”
I look at Asher. His eyes are half closed now, the morphine and exhaustion working together to pull him toward sleep he desperately needs.
My thumb drifts to my index finger and finds nothing. I move to the dresser and pick up the challenge coin. Its weight in my palm helps.
All of this—my trauma, Asher’s injuries, Inara on a rooftop with a sniper rifle—happened because GSD operated in the dark for years. It’ll hit the news soon, if it hasn’t already.
The calculation is easy. Doc and Natasha are already a part of this. They knew almost nothing, and they came anyway.
“I worked for the Global Security Directorate. On the books, we didn’t do any medical research. But we didn’t officially have a secret black site in Centralia that tried to erase agents who weren’t…behaving either.”
Doc is quiet for a moment. “A targeted shot to the laryngeal nerve would probably do it. Risky. Too easy to paralyze everything. Esophagus, the entire throat—” He stops and shakes his head. “The good news? Nerve blocks wear off.”
I don’t let myself react. Not yet. “And the bad news?”
He sighs. “We don’t know how long that’ll take. Or what they used. Could be an hour. Could be a day. But unless they fucked it up somehow, it will wear off.”
Asher’s eyes close. His breathing steadies into something slower—deeper. As if knowing his voice will come back is what he needs to finally let go.
My legs stop cooperating.
I don’t decide to slide down the wall as much as I stop fighting gravity, allowing it to take over. My ass finds the floor, my knees pull up, and now that Asher doesn’t need me to hold myself together for him anymore, my body files its own report about the past thirty hours.
Doc looks at me for a long moment. Then he crouches down to my level. “Your turn.”
I almost argue. But my shoulder makes the decision for me when I try to swipe a tear away and it catches sharply, almost slipping out of place from that simple motion alone.
I give Doc the short version. The shot a year ago. Delayed treatment. Two dislocations—one while under strain—in the past two weeks. Clinical. Dry. Like I’m reading someone else’s chart. “But I can’t handle anyone touching me. Not after—”
“We can go slow. I’ll just tape it. No manipulation. I can give you something for the pain first. Might help with the panic too.”
The equation is simple. My shoulder’s a liability I can’t afford right now. And something in Doc’s voice—it’s not gentle, more…steady—makes the answer easier than I expected it to be.
“Okay. But you have to go slow. Tell me what you’re doing. Each step.” I curl my fingers around the challenge coin, press my toes against the soles of my shoes, and count myself through one full breath.
“Shirt first. Can you manage?” Doc asks.
“Yes.” It’s not easy, but I’ve learned the tricks. Small movements. Left arm. Over the head. Then off. The sound I make at the end is less than dignified, but Doc doesn’t react.
“I need to put one hand here”—he touches the back of his own shoulder—“then have you test your range of motion. Is that okay?”
It’s not. But I press my thumb into the coin and nod.
The contact is brief and clinical and still sends my heart rate somewhere inconvenient enough, the edges of the room shimmer. I focus on my breathing, on the raised lines of the challenge coin, on the steady rise and fall of Asher’s chest over Doc’s shoulder.
“You’re going to need stabilization for a while.
I’d like to come back tomorrow—if you’re in a position to be checked on.
If not, I’m leaving you with some pain meds and a roll of tape.
” There’s no pressure in his tone. Just information, delivered with a calm, gentle reassurance I’ve only ever found with Asher.
“We’ll…try to let you know.” I can’t promise him anything. Not after what Natasha said the word means to him. But I can give him this much.
He tapes my shoulder quickly, warning me before every touch, explaining where each strip goes so I know what to do without him. Then he sits back on his heels.
“You should get some rest. Asher’s stable. He’ll be okay.” Doc pauses, glances up at the bed, then back to me. “He’d probably sleep better if you were next to him.”
I suck in a quick breath. Too quick for my ribs, but I ignore the pain. “I won’t…hurt him?”
“Stay on his right side. Don’t jostle the wound. Or pull out the IV.” One corner of his mouth twitches into a half smile. “We’ve been where you are, Raine. Medicine can do a lot. Love can do even more.”
I’m still on the floor when Inara walks in. Doc gave me permission to move to the bed. More than that, he gave me understanding. But Asher can’t give me his, and I’ve learned—the hard way—what crossing that distance without it can mean.
“Can I sit?” Inara asks, keeping her voice to a whisper.
At my nod, she sinks down gracefully, her legs folding with the ease of a dancer until her back is against the same wall, with enough space between us not to overload my frayed nervous system.
“Doc says he’ll be okay.” I will the words to be true, because until I hear his voice, I’m not sure I can believe them.
“Then he will. Doc’s part of our team. You remember what I said about us?”
“You’re the best at what you do.”
“We are. Which is why it took me so long to get here. I stayed on that roof until I knew it was done. I watched Voss take his last breath. Saw them load him into a body bag. He’s gone, Raine. You did it.”
“We did it. I couldn’t have…not alone,” I whisper.
“Oh, I think you would have. But I’m glad you didn’t have to.”
“Thank you,” I say. “For everything.”
“All I did was show up. Well, and hit a couple of them center mass from four hundred yards away through smoke and chaos.” She says it simply, like it’s not an extraordinary thing that she was there at all.
The small huff tugs at my ribs. It’s the closest thing to a laugh I have at the moment.
We’re quiet. Long enough I start to think I might not say anything else. Long enough it would be easy not to.
But Inara killed people for me tonight. I know the toll that takes. Even when it’s necessary. When it’s life or death. And she didn’t hesitate for a second.
I look over at her. She’s calm. Still in a way I’ve come to understand is simply her.
“In the hospital,” I murmur, “you said ‘maybe in this life.’”
“I remember.”
“I’ve been thinking about that.” I look down at my hands.
At the fading bruises around my wrists. “I don’t know how to do this.
Friendship. People leave, or I leave, or I’m too much for them and they stop showing up.
” My heart kicks hard against my ribs. “You showed up. With a sniper rifle and flash bangs and donuts. And now you’re here. ”
“I am.” She doesn’t try to minimize her actions. Or assign meaning to them. She lets them be what they are.
“I think…in this life.” The words break me open, the fear and pain and exhaustion too much to hold in. A sob slips out, hoarse and raw. And everything shatters at once, tears spilling down my cheeks and my body trapped in the rubble.
Inara doesn’t try to stop it. Doesn’t tell me everything will be okay. Doesn’t do anything but place her hand between us, palm up.
I grab on with more force than I intend. It’s too much and not enough at the same time.
The next sob shakes through me, and I turn to her, unable to find the words for what I need, but hoping she understands.
It only takes a single moment. She wraps me in a careful embrace, letting me cry until there’s nothing left.
But amid all my tears, I took back one more thing they stole from me. This moment. Being held by a friend as my world crashes down around me.
Inara helps me up, walks me to the bed, and whispers, “Get some sleep. I’ll keep watch. I’ve got you, Raine. I promise.”