Chapter 20
KIARA
Consciousness doesn’t return gently. It claws its way back in pieces as the subtle beep of a heart rate monitor tries to keep me grounded.
The first thing I remember is the heat. Not the sound. Not the fall. Just the unbelievable heat scorching my back as the flames consumed us. But then we fell, and the flames were gone, leaving us to plummet to the ground beneath us.
My hands flinch at my sides, and a sharp pain shoots up my arm, a feeling I’ve only ever had when there was a hairline fracture in my hand, something that would only happen after beating the living shit out of somebody.
But it wasn’t from that. I know Raiden and I fought like cats and dogs, but this break comes from the way he crushed my hand into his as he ran toward that window.
My feet scrambled under me, barely able to keep up with his momentum, but I wasn’t willing to leave everything behind in that fifth-story penthouse. It wasn’t worth it.
Nothing is worth having to walk away from everything I have . . . from him.
My throat burns with every breath, but at least I’m no longer breathing in the flames. Now, there’s a sterile taste to the air, and I know without a doubt that I’m lying in a hospital bed, probably a million miles away from home.
My arms feel heavy, and as I try to move them, I feel a sharp pinch at my wrist combined with the distinct feeling of too-sticky tape pulling at my skin.
Great. Just fucking great. I’m attached to an IV line. I shouldn’t be surprised. It’s literally the most basic assumption anyone could make about being in the hospital, and yet, I don’t like it. It makes me feel as though I’m being held down by something.
The memories flash in my mind like a broken movie that’s stuck on rewind.
The glass. The explosion. The fear.
His voice screaming for me to jump.
Fuck.
God, I hope he’s okay. I’m not one who’s religious. In my line of work, what’s the point? But for the first time in my life, I have the overwhelming need to beg to whoever or whatever exists out there, desperate to know that Raiden made it through.
He grabbed me as we plummeted from the fifth story, letting me use his body as a human shield before we crashed into the roof of a car.
He absorbed the impact to save my life. How could anybody survive that?
I know Raiden is capable of things beyond what any human should be able to achieve, but there’s just no way. It’s not possible.
Tears well in my eyes, slowly rolling over the side and falling to the cheap pillow beneath my head, and I instantly want to scold myself.
The Kiara of six weeks ago wouldn’t even recognize this new version of myself.
Crying over a man who has done nothing but drive me crazy, yet the idea of not having him live right next door, solely for the purpose of infuriating me . . . fuck.
What has he done to me?
As the tears come in thicker and faster, I try to focus on the room, the alien emotions not sitting well with me. Hell, I’d cut him with my blade and almost fell to pieces in his arms. Surely, there must be something wrong with me. Maybe it’s a brain tumor. It’s the only logical explanation.
Opening my eyes, I try to focus on the room around me. My bed is closed in by curtained walls, and honestly, there’s a whole lot of nothing to look at.
I can hear the faint sound of other people sharing what must be some kind of communal recovery ward, a far cry from the private rooms I’m used to staying in after a job goes south.
There’s the subtle sound of at least six heart rate monitors in the room, and I groan.
If I have to smell even one rank fart, I’m throwing myself out another window.
I can’t do shared hospital rooms with all their coughing and groaning and ugh.
I vomit a little in my mouth at just the thought of all the airborne diseases this room has seen.
God, I hope this room has been scrubbed with no less than a bucket of pure bleach and a blue light before some nurse shoved an IV in my arm and parked my ass here.
Truth be told, I don’t know why I’m not restrained by a pair of cuffs.
The last thing I remember, the police were closing in, sirens screaming through the night, so why the fuck am I not under twenty-four-hour police surveillance?
As far as I’m concerned, there were still staff in the lobby who could have clearly identified both Raiden and me.
They could have told the police exactly who we were, but considering I’m not chained up and in a straitjacket, I can only assume that they kept their mouths shut.
And that only makes sense if they worked directly for Alistair Montague Vale.
Shit. I severely underestimated the pull this target had.
That’s an error someone with my experience shouldn’t be making.
Hell, there was a point where he wasn’t even the target on my mind.
Once Raiden and I started . . . shit. I didn’t even think about Alistair after that, and that’s the biggest mistake I’ve ever made.
I’m compromised.
The curtain parts, and as my head whips toward the sound, a nurse strides in, her hand yanking the privacy curtain back into place before I even get a chance to see the world outside this three-by-three piece of linoleum.
“Oh, good,” she says with a cheery smile as she strides right up to me as though we’ve been best friends for years. “You’re awake. How’re you feeling, sweetheart?”
Sweetheart?
I swallow over the bitterness and give her a friendly smile. “Okay. Just a little sore,” I tell her, not wanting to let her in on the way my body truly aches. Otherwise, I’ll never get out of here and back to Spikezilla. Been there, done that, and it’s not nice. “Do you know how long I was out?”
She smiles and collects my chart from the end of my bed and starts checking things off. “Not long. Just a few hours,” she tells me before coming around the side of my bed and pressing buttons on the monitors. “Do you know where you are?”
“Unless I’ve been kidnapped and am in some kind of underground government lab that’s testing experimental super-soldier serums on unwilling civilians, then my guess would be a hospital.”
She laughs, and I can’t help but wonder if things were different and I had a normal life, that maybe this woman and I might actually be friends.
She has a kind smile, and it’s not something I get to see much anymore.
“That’s right,” she says. “But I meant a little broader. Do you know which hospital? Your name?”
I shrug my shoulders. “Last I checked, I was in Austin, Texas. But I’m not from here. My husband and I were visiting a friend, so I don’t know the hospital name,” I explain, attempting to sit up, only for my muscles to scream in pain.
“Whoa, honey. Don’t try to sit up just yet. Your body has been through quite the ordeal,” she explains. “I’m Katie, by the way. Can you tell me your name? Date of birth? We haven’t been able to locate any of your details.”
“Bianca St. Hayes,” I tell her, using one of my many aliases, knowing that if she looks me up, she’ll get a complete patient history with every one of my made-up details that Milan meticulously put together.
Milan will also get a notification the moment the hospital searches my name, and she’ll know exactly where to find me.
“Perfect,” Katie says, jotting down my details. “Now, can you remember anything about the accident at all?”
I groan and glance away, the explosion flashing in my mind again. “All of it, unfortunately.”
She gives me a sad smile and nods. “I know that must be hard, but this is good news. It means we can rule out any kind of brain injury. Unless you’re experiencing any kind of headaches? Pains?”
I shake my head and look at her with a pleading stare. “Do you know where he is? The man I was with? My husband?”
“Husband?” she questions. “Do you have his name?”
Shit. If Raiden is here, he would have likely given an alias too, assuming by here, I don’t actually mean in a body bag down in the hospital’s morgue. “Uh . . . Xaden Payne.”
I get a little kick out of that, feeling it’s the most appropriate alias he could ever have. It’s close to his real name, while also extremely accurate to his actual personality of being a giant pain in my ass.
“Uhhhhh, I will have to check for you,” she says. “The name isn’t ringing a bell. Though there was a man who came in at the same time as you, but he isn’t my patient. I’m unsure of the details.”
I give her a tight smile, and she heads back around the end of my bed to drop my chart back into place.
“Okay, I’ll get out of your hair so you can rest. The doctor should be around shortly to give a thorough examination, and from there, we’ll be able to determine when you’ll be able to get out of here. ”
“Perfect, thank you.”
“My pleasure, sweetheart. Just call out if you need anything,” she says. “There’s a call button on the side of the bed.”
I give her another small smile as she slips back around the curtain and disappears.
“Don’t know what fucks me up more, Firecracker,” that deep, gravelly voice of my wildest dreams murmurs from somewhere in the room. “You calling me your husband or that name.”
My heart rate spikes on the monitor, and I shove the shitty hospital blanket aside, scrambling out of bed at the sound of his low voice. Only I forget about the IV line tethered to my wrist, and I’m yanked back hard enough to make me hiss as the tape pulls hard. “Shit.”
I backtrack, forcing myself to slow down, as I swing my legs over the edge of the bed properly this time, gripping the IV pole and dragging it closer, before using it to haul myself upright.
My bare feet hit the floor and immediately threaten to give out.
Not good. Perhaps the explosion took a greater toll than I anticipated, and this hospital bed is exactly where I’m supposed to be.