Chapter 8
Alette
“Good morning, Liam,” I announce from my hospital bed.
“Holy hell!” He yells as he jumps against the door frame. Four of his eight hands slap the wall. “You scared me half out of my mind.”
“By being a good patient who slept in her hospital bed?”
“Yes, exactly that,” he says, squinting his one eye at me.
“To what do I owe your sudden compliance? Are you waiting for me to get close enough to bite me again? Because it won’t happen.
I’ve worked in nursing for centuries, and not even royal vampires have taken a chunk out of me.
You got lucky. I underestimated you. That won’t happen again. ”
“I’m sorry I bit you,” I reply with a blush lighting my face ablaze. “I was hysterical and desperate—not a vampire.”
“For what it’s worth, most of the hospital staff agree with you. It’s not right for a pack leader to consent in place of a patient. It’s not like you’re a minor and he’s your parent. You have a fully-formed frontal lobe and can make your own decisions.”
“That means so much to me,” I reply. “Maybe my story will save another were from the same fate—”
“I’m sorry, but while we agree with you. We are powerless when it comes to Pack Law. Dr. Stein has met with Leader Grant several times—”
“He has?!” My heart leaps into my throat with excitement. Frank may call himself a cold man, but his sense of justice warms me to him even more than his kisses. He’s truly a miracle worker…saving his patients from illness in the hospital as well as from humiliation out of it.
“Yeah, called him the day you hid in the vents. He doesn’t take patient agency lightly—”
“He never said,” I murmur. He can’t be an egomaniac if he keeps half his good deeds to himself.
Frank is misunderstood. His medical accomplishments are worthy of bragging…
and that’s just the top layer of the goodness to him.
He’s earned all the bragging and more so.
If I were his girl, I’d brag twice as loud…
“Ohhh, I forgot. Rumor has it you are becoming the expert on our Dr. Stein. Hmm mmm, yeah, I got twenty bucks riding on whether it’s true you gave him a dental exam in the butterfly garden last night with your tongue.”
“That’s horrible!” I shout, clasping my hands over my mouth.
“So I lost twenty bucks? You aren’t the reason Dr. Stein is all happy and floaty today?”
“He’s happy and floaty?” I may be his girl after all. A happy glow sits over my heart…at odds with the flare building in my belly.
“And you’re docile and compliant,” he says, folding a pair of arms across his chest. “Spill it, girl. Anyone you tell will spread it around to me anyway. Might as well ensure the accuracy. So, is the kiss of Dr. Stein the reason why you slept in your bed last night instead of the floor of the air vents?”
“If I’m ensuring the accuracy of the rumor mill of Haunted Health, I might as well stop you there. I slept on my bathroom floor with another flare. Strawberry cake and I no longer get along. The breakup was long and painful, but my heart will go on.”
“That’s horrible. Can I examine you? Do you know if it’s a bowel obstruction?” He grabs latex gloves from a box affixed to the wall. Reaching for me with four gloved hands, he approaches the bed with fear written across his features.
“Yes, I promise not to bite you,” I say, lying flat and raising my gown to my ribs.
“Sorry, my hands are cold. The building’s HVAC system can’t keep up with the temperature fluctuations this time of year. Hey, maybe you can take a look at it for us!”
“Very funny, but you earned that one,” I say with a wince when he palpates a tender spot. I grunt when he rubs over the spot again. A lump shifts above my belly button, clanging on my insides. Pain radiates down my left side that takes my breath away.
“You’ve got a large obstruction. Have you ever had one of this size?” He frowns as he continues his exam. Smaller lumps are upstream of the big one.
“That one’s been there for a while,” I confess. “I usually get the little ones to break apart and can expel them around that big guy. My flares correspond to his shifts and moods.”
“Have Dr. Drake or Dr. Stein felt this?”
“No,” I whisper in shame. “I’ve avoided any hands-on treatment. I was silly—”
“You were a threatened rabbit, cornered in her den. Hopefully, now you see we’re the good guys…or at least Dr. Stein is a good guy. He certainly likes you,” he says, frowning at the mass in my guts.
“You can tell your rumor mill the feelings are reciprocated—oh!” The large boulder rolls, and my eyes cross with pain.
Breath saws through my teeth as I fight to reclaim my wits.
Everything seizes as my insides clench. My hands fly to my middle as my legs fold into a ball.
I roll to my left side to allow gravity to aid my straining muscles.
“Alette! Alette!”
I hear Liam’s frantic calls, but I can’t assure him that I’m okay.
This happens often. The boulder shifts, something inside pops—probably an ulcer—and the burning starts.
If I just cry it out, I’ll be fine. At least I’m warm in a bed and not lying on the dirty floor of an outhouse.
A second pop, followed by a third, blinds me with pain.
Liam is talking to someone. He wavers in and out of focus as he gestures wildly. One hand holds a phone. Is he on the phone with Frank?
I can’t let Frank see me this way. It’s one thing that he knows about my flares; it’s another to see one for himself.
He will want to spring into action, but I never accepted his gifts.
I didn’t praise his plan. His kiss and the promise of romance stole the moment.
He doesn’t know I’d allow him to do anything to save me.
He doesn’t know I want to live…for Haunted Health…for him…for what we can build together.
“Paging Dr. Stein. Paging Dr. Stein.” The loudspeaker announces Frank’s going somewhere else…as he should. Someone needs his miracle hands and brilliant mind.
I’m going to have to get used to sharing him when we’re here.
It’s not fair that I steal his attention when it means life or death for someone.
I’m just the lucky girl to comfort him after the hard work is over.
I’ll cuddle him when they can’t be saved and smother him with kisses when he beats the odds, but no matter what, I’ll patiently wait for them to receive his attention first.
“She’s not responsive,” Liam says. I want to ask who he’s talking about, but my lips won’t move. Drool collects at the corner and soaks the pillow. How embarrassing! Oh, Liam, get your friend out of my room!
“Alette, Alette,” Frank’s frantic calls join Liam’s babbling. Why are there so many people in this room? Why isn’t Frank responding to the emergency? If he’s ignoring the emergency to see me, I want time alone with him.
“Alette, please look at me. See me. It’s Frank,” he says, taking my face in his warm hands.
He’s always so warm. I want to lose myself in his earthy, brown eyes…
but I can’t focus on them. Why can’t I focus on his face?
My head swims as my thoughts jump from Frank to the pain to trying to decipher what Liam is saying.
Pain. White, hot pain.
I push my tongue against the back of my front teeth to tell him…anything. A moan escapes, unformed by my efforts. I’ve lost control. My sheets are wet under my bottom. Heat gathers at my belly as my limbs go cold.
A weight dips the mattress beside me. An arm holds me.
Why won’t they hold my hand? I’m so alone…
but someone rides this bed with me. I can’t be alone when someone’s wrapped their arms around me.
I don’t know how or why, but I know I’m safe…
Maybe it’s because the rails snap into place to cocoon me.
That’s it, I’m going into my cocoon like a moth lady.
Maybe today I get my wings.
“Move! Prep OR Seven for Alette and Dr. Stein! Now! Go!” Liam’s voice yells over the ambient noise of the busy hospital.
“Get Dr. Burton! I need my OR now!” Frank yells like a general. He’s mad. I hope he’s not mad at me for running. I wouldn’t have run if I knew he’d fight for me.
Pain comes in waves, threatening to drown me.
My hair flutters…I’m on the move. Lights flash as I fly down the hallway. Crashes from doors opening and closing seem miles away, but they can’t be. I’m traveling inside a building. A stampede rushes down the hallway around me. An army of miracle workers escorts me to Frank’s battlefield.
“I’ve got you, Alette. Believe in me. I’ve got you,” Frank says as everything goes black.
I hope I get the chance to tell him…I believe in him…
*
Frank
“Please, God, Goddess, Universal Source…if you even exist…” I whisper as Drake throws a sterile gown over my shoulders and ties it behind me.
Bracken does the same for Landyn. Nobody dares to make eye contact with me as I pray to a higher power, when yesterday, I considered myself a god.
“Please don’t take her from us. Our world still needs her. ”
“Focus Asshole,” Bracken yells.
“Just do what you do best,” Drake adds, cinching the ties at my waist extra tight.
“Dr. Stein, miracle worker,” Bracken says with none of his usual humor.
“Give me three to put her under,” says Mindy, the lizard lady anesthesiologist. Her elongated pupils can’t hide the worry in her eyes. Somehow, Alette must have touched her life, too. It’s as if the entire hospital holds its breath for her. Praying for me to save her.
I’ve never felt so inadequate in my life as I soak my tools in sterilization solution.
The oxygen mask dominates her little face and hides the lips I want to kiss again.
She’s so small and helpless. Liam unfurls her limbs from where she had shielded her body from the pain.
She’s flat, open, and vulnerable. Her flat belly lies calmly, while a war wages beneath her skin.
It won’t be long before the purple contusions give away where blood pools within her, threatening to drown her in the fluid that gives her life.
Someone, probably her, painted her toenails a bright pink.
I don’t know why I notice them now. They shine at me like a reminder of what’s at stake…
a beautiful soul slips away while we wait for her to breathe the chemicals that take her mind far away from here.
I promised her an escape from the pain of her intestines and the control of her pack, but is this it?
After she’s healed, will she return to the forest? Will I never see her again?
None of that matters if I don’t save her.
“She’s out,” Mindy says. “Start the clock.”
“I love you,” I whisper as I slice away the hospital gown.
My scalpel slices cleanly from her lowest rib to her belly button. The layers of pink muscle gape open…and turn black at the edges. It hits me through my mask.
Sugar.
How?
The sugary scent of Fae reaches my nose and scrambles my brain.
“No! No! No!” I scream. “Close her up! Close her up!”
I reach for her but stop at the last second.
My fingers. My lifesaving fingers are instruments of death.
If I touch her insides, they will rot instantly because I’m made of metal.
I flex and retract my robotic hands over her as powerlessness washes over me in waves.
What can I do? The veins inside her belly turn black, stretching under her skin like necrotic spider webs.
“What’s happening!” Drake yells in my face to wake me from my stupor. We meet gazes. My mouth moves, but there’s nothing to say.
“Move! You can’t block the way! Move!” Landyn says as his elbow hits me in the ribs.
I stumble to the side like a discarded glove.
My arms hang lifelessly at my sides as I watch the only woman I thought I could love slip away.
Her happy pink toenails sit atop ashen, grey feet.
Black pools in the heels as rot claims her limbs.
I killed her.
“Dammit! She’s Fae!” Bracken yells. His hands hover over her body without a plan. “Get Stein out of the way! Don’t let him touch her again!”
Don’t let him touch her again because his touch kills her.
“How is she a Fae? How did we miss it?”
“I’ve got compressions! Mindy, bag her!”
“Why are her insides turning black? It’s so fast! What do we do?” Landyn’s yelling mirrors my thoughts as if he’s the dummy and I’m the ventriloquist.
They found her in the forest. She’s not a were. She’s adopted into the pack.
“She’s a changeling,” I murmur. “The glow of her skin in the moonlight. The magic in her hugs and laughter. Her tiny stature. Her love of sweets. She’d never belong in the werepack or the human world—because she’s a changeling.”
“She was a changeling,” Bracken says. “Time of death, 11:15 am.”