Page 12 of Retribution

‘What do you do there?’

Tricks already? Fuck you, Redel.

‘Make drinks.’

I feel someone’s fingers brush mine and I pull away because I can’t see who it is past the light in the doctor’s hand. There are figures, but they’re just shadows to me.

‘You were in an accident. An explosion. You hurt your head.’

‘Okay,’ I murmur.

‘How do you feel? Any pain?’ the doctor asks, finally putting the light away.

I blink away the momentary blindness.

‘My head,’ I say, reaching up to touch and finding a bandage there.

‘I’ll get the nurses to give you something for that, okay, Marguerite?’

‘Yes.’

He leaves my bedside, and I close my eyes. I hear him murmuring to someone about me and I curl into myself. After everything I did, all the progress I made, they stuck me in another Heath.

Tears come to my eyes. I don’t want to cry in front of the Blanks, or the doctor, but I can’t help it.

‘Daisy, please don’t cry.’

Mav? What’s he doing here? And Blake. Blake was here, too. I didn’t imagine him, did I?

Did they bring me here? Why would they do that?

The long con. They were messing with me the whole time.

No, that can’t be it. They wouldn’t.

But a stifled sob makes its way out of me, and the chatter by the door stops.

‘Daisy,’ Mav says. ‘Open your eyes. Look at me.’

I shake my head a little, and I hear the door to my room close quietly.

‘It’s just us now.’

Shade.

They’re all here?

‘You’re okay,’ Shade begins, but I shake my head, silent tears tracking down my face.

‘There was an explosion at Wrath. We were outside, and we tried to get in to find you, but the basement was half destroyed. We thought—’ Mav’s voice wavers and he breaks off.

‘I went into the tunnels,’ Shade says quietly. ‘I found you just inside the passage that led to the club. You got inside and you were able to get the door closed, but you were hurt and… I carried you out.’

I take a shuddering breath. This time, when a hand takes mine, I squeeze it hard. ‘Where am I?’

‘She’s shaking.’

‘You’re at Richmond Memorial Hospital in the ICU.’