24. Ripley
CHAPTER 24
RIPLEY
DROWNING. – EDEN PROJECT
My palms are slippery with anxious sweat as I’m escorted into the medical wing by the on-duty nurse, Nina. This quiet corner hasn’t been touched by the water damage that’s causing carnage elsewhere in Harrowdean. Half the institute is flooded or trashed after the storm.
Cleanup was unfolding as I picked my way through the rubble earlier to get here—tree branches, waterlogged leaves and all manner of unnamed detritus coating every surface. Patients are being confined to the unaffected areas, but a quiet word with Langley, who was luckily working, allowed me to pass the guards’ blockade.
“Is he awake?”
She holds open the door for me. “Yes. He’s under observation.”
“For how long?”
“Until his blood pressure stabilises. He was in a bad way last night.”
Breathing deeply, I follow her to Raine’s cubicle. The curtains are drawn. I have a moment to grapple my nerves, letting her walk ahead to pull back the thin blue fabric.
“Raine,” she chirps. “Visitor for you.”
Propped upright in the bed, Raine rests on several plumped-up pillows. His sandy-blonde locks are uncombed and pointing haphazardly in all directions, while a blanket covers his patterned hospital gown.
Those rich toffee eyes seem to gleam brighter when he breathes in, his lips quirking into a smile. I showered using his favourite body wash before coming. Seeing that grin makes my throat tighten.
His gaze swings around the cubicle. “Hey, Rip.”
“Anyone could smell like papaya, you know.”
“But no one could smell quite like you.”
“I’m never going to be able to sneak up on you. Am I?”
“I wouldn’t count on it. Besides, I don’t see many other girls queuing up to sob at my bedside. Do you?”
“I don’t know. I had to fight my way in here to get past your fans.”
He swats a hand through the air. “Feel free to let them in. I’m bored as fuck laying here.”
“Perhaps think of that next time, mister.” Nina bustles around him, fiddling with his multiple IV lines and frowns at various machines monitoring his vitals. “Ain’t nothing fun or interesting about drugs. You worried your girl here.”
“Alright, Nina.” Raine sighs tiredly like this isn’t the first time she’s scolded him. “Enough of the lecturing already. Isn’t your shift over yet?”
“Behave. I’ll be back.” With an eye roll, she scurries from the cubicle.
Even with her gone, I can’t bring myself to walk over to him. He looks so small and ashen in the hospital bed, an array of needles poking into his arms and the low, steady beep of a monitor measuring each heartbeat.
Part of me wonders if he’d be laying here had we never met. I know this isn’t Raine’s first rodeo. He’s been playing this game for far longer than I know. But I thought things were under control. I thought he was being safe.
“Rip.” He pats the bed. “Come here.”
I shake my head before realising he can’t see it. “I can’t do that.”
“I need to explain.”
“Well, I don’t need you to. This… It’s my fault.”
“Don’t do that to yourself. Please.”
“It’s true. I never should’ve sold to you in the first place. If you’d gone through withdrawal and maybe gotten clean back then, none of this would’ve happened.”
“Because I’d be dead,” Raine deadpans.
“You don’t know that.”
He fiddles with a clear plastic tube wrapped around him. “I’m here because I was reckless. That’s all.”
My chest constricts. “Why’d you do it?”
“It was just a dumb mistake.” He exhales loudly through his nose. “Something else must’ve been cut into the pills I took. I wasn’t trying to overdose or do anything stupid.”
“It was an accident? Really?”
“I swear, I didn’t do this on purpose.”
That loosens the pressure on my panic-strapped lungs a small amount. Outrage floods into me instead. I’m in no position to lecture or judge, not after what I’ve done, but it doesn’t stop me from feeling hurt.
“Where did you get those pills? I know they weren’t mine. You’ve been buying from someone else.”
His lips pucker then twist. “It doesn’t matter.”
“No one else is supposed to be selling in here!” My voice raises. “So it does matter. They sold you a bad batch, and it almost killed you. I want a name.”
Unseeing eyes gazing over my shoulder, he seems perfectly calm. Like swallowing God knows what chemicals and almost dying as a result is just an average weekday. I don’t know whether to kiss him or kill him, I’m so furiously confused.
“Just leave it.” He cringes in pain as he shifts his position. “I’m fine.”
“Nothing about this is fine. You were blue, Raine! Fucking blue!”
Exhaustion is catching up to me after everything that’s happened. Part of me wants to run far away from Harrowdean and all its complications. Three in particular.
Raine.
Xander.
Lennox.
Everything has been spiralling out of control since they arrived. Before then, I had a plan. Less than a year left and I could’ve walked away. Now I’m in deep waters.
“If you won’t tell me who, then tell me why.” I stop at the end of the bed. “Why not come to me?”
“Does it matter?” he sighs.
“Yes! I thought you trusted me!”
Raine scrubs a hand over his face and the roughened stubble on his chin. “Please just sit down, okay?”
Still trembling all over, I perch on the end of the bed. Raine moves his covered legs to make space for me. His head is tilted down, eyes unfocused on the hospital sheets.
“You said you’re tired of being the bad guy.”
I blink several times, certain I’ve misheard him before the memories of admitting that float back to me. I felt so broken in that moment, tired of being the source of so much pain.
“So?”
Raine shrugs. “I didn’t want to be another thing for you to feel guilty about. I figured if I bought elsewhere, it might ease some of that burden.”
“So you bought shit heroin from some random to spare my feelings?” I gape at him.
“Erm...” He fights a smile by biting his lip. “Something like that?”
All I can do is stare, stunned to speechlessness by this complicated, enigmatic man with so much damage wrapped up in his pure soul. He really is incredibly stupid but in the most thoughtful way.
“Turns out, you’re the only good dealer in this place.” He laughs at the irony. “I don’t even want to know where those pills were from.”
“I really, really want to punch you right now.”
“I’m blind and bedridden, babe. That’s foul play.”
“You want to schedule in a better time for me to kick your ass?” I quip back. “I’ll clear my diary.”
“It’s a date.”
Brain still whirling, I’m trying to filter through possible options of who could be smuggling pills in from the outside. It’s hard, but not impossible. Some patients have regular visitation.
Raine releases the tube wrapped in his fingers, tentatively stretching out his hand palm up. “So can you forgive me for… uh, almost dying?”
“No! You’re so… so…” I slam my eyes shut to try to hold the tears at bay. “I can’t do this again. I’ve lost everyone I have ever cared about.”
“I know, Rip. I’m sorry.”
The tears escape anyway, trickling down my cheeks with a harsh sting. “Just don’t make me lose you too.”
“You’re not going to. I’m still here.”
“For how long?”
“As long as you need me to be,” he says confidently.
I open my watering eyes and snatch up his hand, needing the comfort. Our fingers thread together. We hold each other tight, neither of us speaking for a few moments before he chuckles under his breath.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he mutters.
That goddamn smirk.
“Spit it out, Raine.”
“Just wondering what happened to the whole no commitment thing?” He laughs. “You’ve changed your tune.”
Wiping off my tears, I scoff. “It’s complicated.”
“No doubt. You know I don’t care about labels either way.” His playful tone turns serious. “It’s nice to be needed by someone.”
Chin tucked down, it almost like he’s staring at the place where our hands are joined. This situationship is quickly turning into a clusterfuck with two very clear obstacles.
“I thought you’d be here when I woke up.” He seems to read my mind. “Where were you last night?”
Shuddering, I hope he can’t hear the way my breath catches. Stupidly optimistic, right? Raine immediately sits a little straighter and lifts his head to follow the sharp sound.
“Rip? What is it?”
“I… had a run in with Lennox,” I say vaguely.
“A run in?” His brows knit.
“He thought those pills you took were mine and wouldn’t listen to me.” My voice wavers a little. “Things got physical.”
“Jesus.” His grasp on my hand tightens. “Are you okay? What did he do?”
Memories of inky rainwater swallowing me whole threaten to take over. I’m just glad he can’t see the raw, scabbed-over marks that line my wrists. Nor the slice at my throat from the… well, aftermath.
“I’m alive. It was… uh, Xander bailed me out.”
“Xander,” he tests the word.
“Yeah. He found me.”
“Where, exactly?”
I don’t trust myself to speak. Not yet. Not when the memory of Xander is so fresh. So vivid in my mind. That near-death experience was petrifying, but what unfolded with him after scared me even more.
“Bailed you out of what?” he demands.
“It doesn’t matter, Raine. Xander helped me.”
“It does matter. Did Lennox hurt you?”
Gripping his fingers tight, I grimace. “Yes.”
“That son of a bitch! I warned him. I told him to stay away!” He breathes heavily.
“If it wasn’t for Xander…” I trail off.
“You know he has feelings for you.”
Studying his face, there’s no hint of anger or jealousy. Raine wears a look of weary acceptance, like he’s known this all along. It’s startling.
“He hates me,” I correct him.
Fucking liar.
“You can want the very thing you hate,” Raine states knowingly. “Sometimes, that makes you want it even more.”
The unspoken question lingers between us. Since the moment we met, I’ve made my intentions clear to Raine. I want his friends dead. For a while, that included him too. Until I saw past his affiliations.
But everything is upside down now.
I’ve lost sight of why this all began.
“So… Xander.” He keeps his voice light. “I guess things are complicated.”
“This is such a mess. But I still need you in my life, Raine. I know I’m asking for a lot. You didn’t sign up for this disaster.”
“Not exactly low maintenance over here either, guava girl.” He raises my hand to his lips so he can kiss my knuckles. “Besides, I quite like your mess.”
“What if it isn’t just my mess?”
He hesitates, nibbling on the inside of his cheek. “Then we figure it out.”
“How?”
“I’m not willing to give this up because you have a psychopathic… Well, whatever Xander is. That’s for him to figure out. But don’t expect it to scare me off.”
“Maybe it should,” I reply jokingly.
“Maybe.” Raine relaxes and sinks into the pillows. “But I clearly have no regard for self-preservation anyway.”
“Clearly.”
Giving a soft cough, I reach into the pocket of my sweats. “Got something for you.”
“A hospital gift, huh? I must’ve been a good patient.”
“Call it a loan.”
Cupping the back of his hand, I place the folded sunglasses into his palm. They’re not the same as his special, blacked-out lenses, but I know he misses the security blanket they provided.
He takes them and begins his inspection, tracing the curved glass lenses and wire arms to map out the shape. I watch him work.
“Sunglasses?” he guesses.
“From my personal collection. Aviators are unisex, right?”
“I’ve always wanted to look like a fighter pilot.”
“Figured it’s my fault your real ones got trashed. Will these do as a temporary fix?”
Unfolding the old sunglasses, he fumbles to slide them into place.
“Thank you.” His blossoming grin is enough to make my heart flip. “They’re perfect.”
“Scoot over, would you?”
Shifting in the hospital bed, he shifts over to make a small sliver of space next to him. I crawl into the gap then burrow into his side, my head resting on his shoulder. Raine’s head slumps to rest on top of mine.
I bathe in his warmth and citrusy, sea salt scent. Just feeling the steady weight of his body pressing into mine helps to alleviate the terror that’s taken root since I found him passed out.
“So what happens now?”
“They’ve got me on methadone for when the withdrawals start,” he murmurs. “But it’s temporary. The doctor said I can either detox here or be sent back to rehab. They won’t let me out without a plan.”
I’ve never been able to quite pin him down, but I’ve long suspected that Doctor Hall is one of the good ones. Though few and far between, they’re scattered throughout the staff. Anyone else would be releasing Raine without question.
I chew over this for a moment before whispering back. “Do you want to leave?”
“Of course not. If I’m gonna detox, I’ll do it here.”
“You’d put yourself through that? Detox?”
A short breath sighs out of him. “I’ve been fucked up for so long, I don’t know any different. I’m scared to live any other way. But it’s this or go back to square one in some other shit hole… alone again.”
The thought of him detoxing alone in some hellish rehab facility hundreds of miles away makes me want to implode. He can’t leave. But I also can’t ask him to stay and put himself through this.
“Don’t freak out on me, but it’s different now.” He seems to choose his words carefully. “Back then, I didn’t have anyone to disappoint when I failed.”
My chest warms with emotion. It feels so good to be wanted by someone. But it isn’t long before fear slips back in, ever the silent assassin to hope.
“This place… It isn’t good, Raine. If you want to get clean, I’ll support your decision. But people don’t get better in Harrowdean. You deserve the chance to give this a real shot.”
“What are you saying?”
“That I don’t trust these doctors to keep you safe. None of us are safe. Not here.”
His head rubs against mine. “It’s this or leave Harrowdean.”
“I know.”
“I’m not going back to rehab. It’s never worked before. But here, I don’t know… Maybe I can clean my act up… Ready to make a go of life again when I get out.”
The giggle that bubbles up is totally inappropriate. “Raine Starling talking about cleaning his act up.”
His chest rumbles with a chuckle. “Shocking, I know. Think the world ended in that storm.”
“Mine almost did,” I croak.
We both sober, still huddled together in the tiny hospital bed. His breathing is evening out, in time to the drip of the IV feeding into him. I continue to breathe in his clinical hospital scent, savouring those faint notes of summer and seaside.
“Stay?” Raine whispers. “I’m gonna be in for a while yet.”
“Rest. I’ll be right here.”
Within seconds, the light snores coming from his mouth tell me he’s fast asleep. Nina returns to check his vitals again, grumbling about our sleeping arrangement before she vanishes.
Listening to the rhythmic beeping of the heart rate monitor, my eyes slide shut. I’m drowsing on the edge of sleep when someone thumps into the cubicle. There’s a startled inhale followed by a deep growl.
“You.”
Recognising his sonorous bark, my eyes fly open. Lennox stands near the curtain, his chocolate-brown hair tousled and face a lurid shade of red. I quickly slide out from Raine’s embrace, my eyes locked on him.
“Come to finish the job?” I goad.
“I should’ve done it myself in the first place instead of messing around,” he spits furiously. “How did you get out?”
“That’s the thing about cockroaches, Nox. We always survive.”
Stepping forward, Lennox moves towards me. I stand but hover a hand over Raine’s shoulder to shake him if needed.
“You want me to wake him up so he can hear you apologise for trying to drown me?”
“I wasn’t going to apologise.” He stops and crosses his arms. “Raine told me about the pills. Someone else is supplying him.”
“You believe me now? Awesome. Thanks for taking my word for it before trying to drown me alive.”
“Because your track record is so spotless,” he gibes, palming the back of his neck. “Are we going to stand around talking about our feelings, or do you want in?”
“On… what?”
His mouth hooks up at the corner. “I got the name of his dealer.”
“Well don’t hold me in suspense.”
That hint of a smile disappears. “I’ll tell you when I have your word that you’ll cut Raine off. Stay the fuck away from him. Don’t even look at him. You’re never going to sell him another pill.”
“I told you what they do to nuisances in this place.” Tampering my immediate desire to hurl abuse and threats, I summon a sense of calm. “You really think he should detox under Harrowdean’s supervision?”
“No, but I don’t want to see my friend half-dead again!”
“That’s exactly what he’ll be if management decides to intervene.”
“What’s the alternative, huh? Let him kill himself?”
A snore emanates from the bed, prompting us to lower our voices. Lennox spares Raine a glance, my gut twisting when his gaze briefly softens. His protection isn’t love. It’s control.
“And what about the day he crosses you?” I rebuke. “What about when he displeases you? Will you be the one to throw him in a pool then?”
“I would never hurt Raine.”
“You don’t know how to do anything but hurt people.”
Any hint of softness dissipates the moment I finish my sentence. “Move away from him. You’re done.”
“I have every right to be here. You’re the one who isn’t welcome.”
“Like I give a fuck where I’m welcome.” Lennox scoffs. “I go where I’m needed.”
The curtain twitches, silently parting to add another complication. Xander’s in a fresh pair of jeans and his usual smart polo shirt, though his hair is still slightly damp. He halts to look between us both.
“I see I’m interrupting.”
“Ripley is just leaving,” Lennox chides.
“You think I’d leave Raine with you when he’s vulnerable?” I laugh at him. “He’ll find himself zip tied and underwater the moment he steps a foot out of line.”
“That little dunking was just a taster?—”
“No,” Xander interrupts.
Lennox swivels to stare at his best friend, mouth hanging open slightly. Seeing him gawp in shock is so fucking satisfying.
“Stay away from Ripley,” Xander orders unequivocally.
“Xan?” Lennox scowls. “She… What? You know what she’s done.”
“I know.” His voice is ice-cool.
“What the fuck, man?”
“You didn’t hear me? Stay away from Ripley.”
Lennox looks between us several times. It’s almost comical. He’s stubborn as a mule but not stupid. Xander’s jaw muscles clench, his almost-black eyes glittering like a knife’s edge.
“You’ve spent every single day plotting how to get rid of her.” Lennox steps into his friend’s space.
“Yes.” Xander’s voice drips with disdain. “Far cleaner methods than leaving a dead body floating in a pool. That was sloppy, Nox.”
“You… helped her escape?”
“I did. She isn’t your problem to eliminate.”
“Then whose problem is she?” Lennox chuffs incredulously. “Fuck, Xan. Has the bitch made you go fucking soft? Are you deluded enough to think she’s yours ?”
His deliberately impassive expression not wavering, Xander seizes a handful of Lennox’s shirt. He drags him close enough for their noses to touch.
“No, she isn’t mine. Ripley belongs to herself. But dare to even look at her for another goddamn second, and I’ll have your tongue.”
“Who the hell are you?” Lennox seethes, his voice rising. “We only have each other, Xan! She’s trying to tear our family apart!”
“What family?” Xander claps back.
“How can you even say that to me?”
A third voice interrupts their fight.
“What on earth is going on in here?”
Nina storms into the cubicle with her clipboard in hand. She takes one look at the three of us then jabs her finger towards the door.
“This is a hospital, not a boxing ring!” she adds.
Xander releases Lennox’s shirt and steps back. “He was just leaving.”
“I want you all out. Right now.” She points towards the curtain’s opening.
Brushing his wrinkled shirt, Lennox spares a final look at Raine’s hospital bed. He escapes the cubicle without another uttered word then vanishes. I suck in a breath, but I still don’t look at Xander.
Truthfully, I don’t trust him enough not to stop me from what I have to do next. My plan was faulty all along. It isn’t enough to break their family. I know Lennox has lost everything before. Ripping his world apart will take far more finesse.
Killing him won’t cut it.
I’ll feed him to Harrowdean’s monsters instead.