Page 47 of Vain

He groans as I move to take one of the chairs beside the bed, and Mathews takes the other.

“You in pain?” I ask, unsure if the groan is from pain or at the mention of Cora.

“Some, but it’s manageable. Docs have moved me from morphine to regular pain meds. They wear off quicker.”

“They didn’t waste time,” Mathews grunts.

“My choice. I don’t want to risk getting hooked on them. Besides, it’s nowhere near as bad as it was. Turns out I have a really hard head.”

“I could have told you that myself.”

He flips me off, making me grin, though I can’t completely relax. Kellen misses nothing. Apparently, neither does Mathews because he’s the one to ask the first question. “Who’s Cora?”

This time, it’s me that groans. “My ex.”

Mathews looks between me and Kellen before Kellen jumps in and begins story time, giving him the sad and pathetic rundown of my life.

Mathews looks at me with a look of commiseration, making me wonder if he has a Cora of his own in his past. “Sounds to me like you dodged a bullet,” he says.

“You have no idea.”

“So you rushed out of here to deal with her, why?” he asks, confused, leading me to fill them both in on Cora’s latest fiasco.

“That fucking cunt,” Kellen snarls. Mathews looks just as pissed, and I’m reminded that he just lost one of his friends and knows exactly what it’s like to be given that news.

“Don’t worry, I won’t let her get away with this shit. Can we talk about something else?”

“Well, the doctors say I’m good to move down to a regular ward tomorrow. The scans look better, and the swelling has gone down. I’ll still be stuck there for the remainder of the week, though, until they’re one hundred percent happy.”

“You don’t mess around with brain injuries,” Mathews tells him.

And for once, Kellen doesn’t argue. “I’m sorry about O’Neill,” he states.

“Me too, but it wasn’t your fault. We all know the risks in this line of work. All I care about is nailing this wannabe gangster motherfucker to the wall.”

“Tell me what you need from me.”

Kellen gets comfortable as Matthews pulls out his phone to take notes. “Tell me everything that happened from the moment you arrived at Price Security.”

I listen intently to what he says, feeling gutted for Mathews that he lost a friend, but grateful nonetheless that I didn’t lose mine. By the time Kellen is done, he’s struggling to stay awake.

“Let me see you out,” I tell Mathews, who is heading for the door.

I wait until he walks out before stepping through and pulling the door over behind me. “You good?”

He grits his teeth but nods. “We prepare for it but never think it will happen to us.”

“I get it.”

He looks at Kellen’s closed door. “I know you do.”

“You got what you need?”

“On its own, it wouldn’t be enough to put Baylor behind bars but teamed with Callie’s statement and the detonator in his possession, we have him bang to rights.”

“I hope so. Men like this are as slippery as oil. It never ceases to amaze me how easily they slip out of everything.”

“That’s why I’m here, dotting every I and crossing every T. Like fuck are we leaving anything to chance.”