Page 90 of Riot Reunion
“We don’t have the staff. I wish we did. But that storm wreaked havoc here tonight. We have MVAs rolling in every other second. If you wanted to go—”
“I’m not going anywhere. I’m not leaving this hospital. Not until Chase wakes up. There’s no fucking way.”
“All right, then.”
“So, what?You’re just gonna keep waiting for him?”
“We’ll wait until we absolutely can’t any longer. Then we’ll operate and take whatever actions we deem necessary to save Presley’s life. But allowing the situation to reach such dire stages does not bode well for our chances at a happy outcome.”
“Wait! Her mom. Call her mom. Can’t she tell you what to do?”
Shaking his head, the doctor is a picture of remorse. “Presley’s mother is on deployment in Germany right now. The Red Cross Emergency Communications Service is trying to locate her, but things like that move slowly in my experience.”
“So, what? You’re not gonna help her now? You’re just gonna leave it until she’s at death’s door?”
The doctor leans in, sighing. “I suggest that you go and fetch Presley’s father, Pax. I suggest you go do it right now.”
33
ELODIE
The walls ringwith silence as Fitz pushes me into the living room. To my left, the dining room is just as we left it before we drove up to the academy. Fitz eyes me suspiciously, keeping me in his line of sight as, gingerly, he walks through to investigate our abandoned Thanksgiving dinner.
One by one, he stands behind each chair, frowning deeply. “Where are the plates?” he demands.
“We cleared them away. In the kitchen,” I tell him.
“Where washesitting?” Fitz barks. Considering that he keeps insisting that Wren is a figment of my imagination, that I made him up just to get Fitz in trouble, it’s very confusing that he keeps contradicting himself like this.
“There. At the head of the table.”
“Of course,” Fitz spits. “Precious Wren. The head of the table. In charge, overseeing the proceedings. Better than everyone else.”
“This is his house. It’s customary for the person who owns the house to sit at the head of the table. He doesn’t think he’s better than anyone.” I am crazy for arguing with him, but I just can’t stand it. A part of me has accepted that I’m not likely to make it out of this nightmare alive. And if I’m gonna die anyway, I’m damn well going to stand up for my boyfriend. The only sign that Fitz heard me is the irritated tic at the corner of his mouth, though. He picks up a fork from the table where Wren was sitting, holding it up to the light.
“He used this?” he asks.
“Yes.”
Fitz pops the tines of the fork into his mouth, closing his eyes as he sucks on the metal. He groans, shuddering, and, horrifyingly, the reeking, bloody wolf skin begins to fall from his shoulders. Fitz doesn’t even notice. It drops to the floor with a wet slap, landing in a pile of fur and stringy gore. I see the true damage the wolves wrought on Fitz’s body now. His shoulder and arm are crosshatched with scars, huge chunks of flesh missing from his muscle, the skin still a livid purple, even though it’s healed. Most of his left ear is missing.
His eyes snap to mine, as if he can feel the disgust I feel toward him crawling on his ruined skin. “You can stop looking at me like that. You can’t even see me. Not really. I look like a man to you, but I’m not. I’m a wolf. It spoke to me when it bit me. It told me it wanted to become one with me. It told me that Ihadto eat its heart. I didn’t have a choice. I had to come back and kill it…” He rants, his lips fluttering, cracked and dry, spiraling further and further into his madness.
I focus on his body language rather than his words. He twitches, his hand flexing around the handle of the hunting knife, relaxing and tightening his grip. Over and over, he does it. Rhythmically, as if there’s a pattern to his hand clenching. I count, trying to figure out that pattern, but there’s no time.
“You’re not listening!” Fitz smacks his hand down on the table, sending the wine glasses wobbling and the empty beer bottles toppling over. Two of them roll off the table, only one of them smashing when it hits the marble. I jump, fear leaping in my chest, though I do my best to hide it. My fear seems to do something to Fitz. It excites him in ways Idon’twant to think about.
“I’m s—sorry. I—this is just a—a lot to think about, y’know? You’re telling me you transformed. I mean…it’s remarkable. I didn’t believe you at first, but—but now I can see, and—it’s fascinating.”
“You’re humoring me,” he sneers. “You don’t believe me. You can’t know.”
“I promise I’m not. I believe you. I swear. Your eyes have changed. I bet in a couple of days, your whole body will be different. The wolf spirit’s too powerful to hold inside a man’s body.” It’s nonsense. All nonsense. But if I can somehow convince him that we’re allies, then he might stay his hand. Long enough for someone to show up and disturb him before he can hurt me, at least. I just need a little more time.
I want to run so badly. It’s almost impossible to keep myself rooted to the floor. If I make any sudden movements, he’ll come for me, though. I have self-defense training. There’s no doubt that I could bring him down. My father, for all his fucked-up, disgusting faults, did make sure I had martial arts training. The only good thing he ever did for me. The form I was trained in—Krav Maga—specializes in disarming people with knives, for fuck’s sake. When he comes for me, ready to quit toying with me, I will use what I know to protect myself from him. But that knife is lethal, even if he accidentally gets a good swipe at me, and the longer I can put off engaging with him, the better.
Fitz skirts around the table, coming toward me, his mouth twitching again. “What color are they, then? My wolf eyes?”
Fuck. I would tell him they’re the same color as the Wolf whose skin he’s been running around in, but I have no idea what color they were, since he cut the animal’s damned head off. Think, think, think, Elodie. What color should I say? I can’t wait much longer to reply before he knows that I’m stalling.
