Chapter 38
I wakeup to a familiar beeping sound. Only this time, I’m not afraid. I open my eyes and search him out. I smile when I see him sitting at my bedside in the same chair he occupied all those weeks ago. He’s asleep, but based on the dark circles under his eyes, I’m guessing he hasn’t slept much.
I move to sit up, and gasp as pain radiates from my side. The sound wakes Matthew and he looks relieved. Though that relief quickly turns to frustration when he realizes that I was trying to move.
“Don’t move, sweetheart. You’ll rip out your stitches.”
“What happened?”
A worry flashes through his eyes. “You were hurt…”
I roll my eyes. “I know that. I want to know why I’m not in handcuffs for… for…” I swallow as I struggle to say what I did. Nelson Grant was an awful person, but that doesn’t change the fact that I killed a man. He deserved to die, but I never thought I was capable of something like that.
“For killing someone,” Matthew finishes for me.
I bite my lip and nod. I feel like I should feel bad for what I’ve done. There should be some level of guilt or remorse, but I feel nothing. I’m completely indifferent to the fact that I killed someone in cold blood. I shudder as I remember all the blood. I look down at my hands, expecting them to be permanently stained by what I’ve done, but they are clean.
“You’re not going to be arrested, love. Gunner and Kisten took care of it.” He says it as if it’s a common occurrence and no big deal to dispose of dead bodies.
“And Nancy?”
Matthew sighs. “She’s been taken care of too. After what she did to Hannah, she’s damn lucky Nelson got to her before Slade had a chance.”
“Is Hannah okay?” I ask panicked that my friend was hurt because of me.
“Calm down, love. She’s fine. Just a bump on the head. Though with how Slade is being, you would think she was practically decapitated.”
“Where is she?” I move to get up, wanting to see for myself that she’s fine.
Matthew puts a hand on my shoulder and keeps me in place. “She’s right next door. If I get her, will you stay put?”
“Yes.”
With a shake of his head, he leaves. My side aches, and I wonder just how badly I’m hurt. I push the covers down and pull up the gown I’m dressed in. There is a white bandage covering the wound. I pick at the tape and pull the bandage away. I’m surprised that the wound is only about three inches long. It feels so much bigger.
“Amara Rose Thompson,” Matthew snaps. “I leave you for one minute, and you’re pulling your bandage off.”
“I just wanted to see.” I look down at the small wound with disgust. “It feels so much bigger than it is. Why does it hurt so bad?”
“The wound is deep. You’re lucky he didn’t hit any vital organs.”
“Oh,” I say dumbly. I didn’t even think about that. I killed him, but he very well could have killed me too.
I don’t have time to dwell on it because Hannah and Slade walk in. Well, more specifically, Slade strides in with a very put out looking Hannah in his arms.
I give Matthew a dirty look. “You said she was fine!”
He rolls his eyes but doesn’t say anything.
“I am fine,” Hannah says petulantly.
“You are not fine,” Slade barks. “You could have been killed.”
Hannah sighs and pats him on the chest. “But I wasn’t, and I am fine.”
Slade sits in Matthew’s vacated chair, arranging Hannah on his lap. I pat the bed beside me, and Matthew carefully sits. My heart squeezes when he threads his fingers through mine, then kisses them.
Hannah tells me all about how Nancy clocked her over the head with a clipboard and stuffed her in the linen closet. “The only thing I don’t understand is why in the world Nancy would help that man,” she says.
I fill in the blanks on how Nancy was jealous of me and that Nelson Grant took advantage of that. We all avoid talking about what I did, and I’m grateful for that. I don’t know if I will ever be ready to address the fact that I’m a murderer. Sure, you can argue that it was in self-defense, but I remember a moment when I thought, “oh, he’s down, I can escape now” and not stopping. Whether it was a conscious choice or not, the fact is that I beat him to death and beyond. It took Matthew and Gunner to make me stop.
I am definitely not ready to explore the fucked-upness of all that.
After the third time I yawn, Matthew chases Hannah and Slade out of the room, declaring I need rest. I don’t argue because I’m exhausted. Matthew moves to sit back in his chair, and I stop him. “Lay with me?”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
I smile at him sleepily. “Don’t you know by now that you’ll never hurt me?”
He carefully lays on my non-injured side, and everything is right in my world.