Surge (50 page)

“Thanks for permission to see to my patient, Dr. Jared,” Akio replies snidely.

I flip him off, but he’s too busy pulling new gloves on and readying his equipment to notice it. A new sterilized needle is threaded and his tweezers are dipped in rubbing alcohol before he pulls back the blanket. I avoid looking at her unbound breasts, which are currently pushing out of the too small nighty, in favor of watching Akio work.

The gash has already reopened the few stitches that he did earlier, most likely due to her thrashing, so it’s bleeding again. Using an alcohol soaked cotton ball, he cleans the area as much as possible and dries it with a gauze pad. Setting the needle to the skin, Olivia stiffens for a minute, but otherwise is unresponsive. I don’t know if that’s good or bad, but seeing how many stitches he has to dig into her skin, I’d say it was a good thing she was out for the duration.

“How many?” I ask when Akio ties off his last stitch.

“Twenty-two,” he answers as he wraps the wound up with gauze and medical tape. “Eight internal, and fourteen on the skin. It’ll leave a scar.” I raise my eyebrows. “
Another
scar then.”

“I think that scars are the least of her problems,” Cory remarks. “What’s the damage?”

“From what I can see,” Akio begins. “She’s lucky. It missed the carotid artery by a mere fraction of an inch, which could have been fatal.” My lungs freeze at that. “I won’t be able to tell how much damage was done internally, we’ll just have to wait and see.” He leans closer to her throat and runs a finger along the old scarring. I don’t want him touching her at all, but he’s the doctor, so I’ll give him another thirty seconds before I break his freaking hand. “These scars are strange. Some of them look deep enough to have cut open her larynx and esophagus, so the fact that she can breathe and talk with little difficulty is rather remarkable.”

“The psycho had a dull knife,” Cory retorts.

“If the bitch wanted to kill her, she would have used something sharper,” I add. “This was done out of spite and to inflict pain.”

“And you know this because?” Akio asks.

“Victoria told me herself,” I answer and his eyes widen. “I told you she wasn’t innocent. So I think you owe Olivia an apology.”

“She’ll get one if she wakes up,” he replies with a nod.

“If? What the fuck do you mean
‘if’
?” Cory demands and sits closer.

“She’s in a fragile state,” Akio explains. “Losing a lot of blood, shock, stress, there are a lot of different factors that play a part. I don’t have all the necessary equipment to handle this. And then there’s her mental state.”

“What’s wrong with her mental state?” I question with balled fists. “There’s nothing wrong with her.”

“I didn’t say anything was
‘wrong’
with her,” he counters. “But she is dealing with something internally and that’s taking a toll on her. Or did you not witness the panic attack that contributed to causing the seizure?” I don’t answer, because there’s no way that I’m sharing any part of Olivia’s shit with anyone in this room. Not even Cory, if he pisses me off.

“So, what do we do?” Cory asks, and you can read the pleading in his eyes. “I can’t lose her.”

“Rest and fluids are your best bet,” Akio recommends as he stands. “No bites?”

“No bites,” Whitney confirms.

“Then make sure that her wound stays clean, and the rest is up to her.” With that cheery outlook, Akio leaves the room.

“She’ll be fine,” Whitney says and gives my back a reassuring pat. “Olivia’s a fighter.”

Whitney walks over and pats Cory’s shoulder, and squeezes Olivia’s hand, before closing the door after herself. I rub a hand down my face in a weary helplessness. Patience is definitely not a strong suit of mine, but I know that the wait for her recovery will be worth it as soon as she pulls through. And I know she will. Olivia has too much fight in her to go down without finishing the bastards who took everything from her first.

And then I’ll be there to save her from herself.

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“You really don’t have to sit here,” Cory comments from the bed.

“I really do,” I insist.

We’ve been at this for the last six hours. Olivia’s still unconscious, and hasn’t shown any signs of waking, but I’m not going anywhere. My ass may be numb, but a quick pace around the ten by ten room gets the blood flowing. Like I’m doing now. I feel like a caged animal, but I’m not leaving, because then I’ll miss seeing her beautiful grey eyes open for the first time in nearing nine hours. Cory and I both ignored calls for lunch and dinner, so Whitney demanded entry and ordered us to eat dinner. And she didn’t leave until we cleared our plates.

That was two hours ago. Now, most of the people have either gone to bed, or are keeping watch, because it’s practically silent in this small ranch with the paper thin walls. Which I know for a fact are paper thin by the grunting, screaming and creaking noises coming from a room down the hall. I recognize those nightmare inducing noises from back at the condo, belonging to none other than John and Marissa. This reminds me, I still have to talk to that fucker about releasing one of his harem. He’ll get over it eventually, besides, he still has Chelsea.

“Really, Jared,” Cory repeats from the bed. He doesn’t bother removing his eyes from Olivia, as he strokes her hair. It’s like he thinks he’ll miss her if his attention is diverted. “Livs will be fine, go to sleep.”

“Then you go to sleep,” I retort and he ignores me.

“She’s all I got left,” he says. “I need her more than he does, so Travis can wait his fucking turn.”

“You’ve said that before,” I say. “But she isn’t all you have left.” This time Cory meets my eyes with his haunted ones.

“Lose Sarah and John, then come talk to me,” he replies before returning to look at Olivia. There is so much longing in that look, that it makes me look away. It isn’t the same longing that I feel for her. It’s the longing of someone that he loves like family and would crush him if he were to lose for a second time.

“I know what it’s like to lose someone,” I respond. “I had to listen to my parents and John’s being eaten.”

“How about watch them being eaten?” Cory counters. “Because I watched my parents get torn to pieces and what was left of Travis’s corpse being desecrated. I had to burn his body. Do you think that you could have handled that if it were John or Sarah?” I shake my head, I can’t even begin to imagine life without them. “Never mind coming home to find that not only is your brother dead, but your sister’s been stolen like she was nothing more than a piece of worthless property.”

“I’d burn the world to the ground until I found her,” I say and he nods.

“Then you can guess how I feel that when I finally find her, she’s scarred and tormented by nightmares,” he replies. “It makes me want to strangle anyone who even looks at her.” Cory gives me a pointed look. “Don’t think I can’t see you watching her all the damn time.”

“It’s not like that,” I say.

“It is like that,” he hisses. “You stare at her like she’s a piece of meat and you want to take a bite.”

“Fuck you,” I snarl. “I have much more respect for her than that.”

“Then you don’t find her attractive?” Cory demands. “She may be like a sister to me, but I know the effect she has on men. We’d be walking in the mall when she was only twelve, but since she unfortunately has the body of a sexpot, every guy from thirteen to sixty would crane their head to check her out.” He clenches his fists and hisses the rest through his teeth. “She’s been unwittingly attracting creeps for years. Now, those sick fucks just take what they want, instead of watching from afar.”

“I am not a sick fuck,” I snap. “I like Olivia, yes. I find her attractive, just like any other straight male, but I would
never
force myself on her. I like talking to her, and enjoy her company. That’s all.”

“That’s not all,” he counters. “You want what she can’t give.”

“And what is that?” I ask and cross my arms.

“What Travis has,” Cory answers. “You want what Travis took to his grave and that’s her heart. She’ll never give it away again, so don’t even try.”

“Are you telling me, that if Olivia tries to move on, you’ll stop her?” I ask incredulously. Cory glares at me for that.

“What the fuck do you think I am, a monster?” Cory spits at me. “If Olivia heals, and I do mean
if
, she heals enough to want to try starting over, I’ll support her one hundred percent. I’ll give the guy the third degree and kill him if he isn’t up to my standards, but I won’t stop her from trying to find happiness.” He looks down and cups her cheek. “If anyone truly deserves happiness in this world, it would have to be her.”

“So I’m not good enough, is that it?”

“No,” he answers and shakes his head. “Until you can admit to yourself what you want, you won’t be good enough.”

“I want to be her friend,” I say. Cory raises his eyebrows at that. “I do.”

“Like I said, if you can’t admit it to yourself, you’re wasting your time and hers,” he replies. “Just leave her alone, Jared. She deserves more.”

“I think you just want to keep her for yourself,” I say like a sullen child. I might as well call him a,
‘big fat meanie,’
while I’m at it.

“That’s right, I want to lock Olivia away for the rest of her life,” Cory replies sarcastically. “And then she’ll kick my ass sideways after chewing her way through the walls to escape.”

“Sounds like something you would do,” I say and cross my arms. He bares his teeth in a bite me grin. “Sorry, don’t roll that way.”

“No kidding,” he mutters. “I mean, you were just rolling around with Olivia’s tormentor, why not collect the set?”

“Fuck you,” I say between clenched teeth. “If I’d known she was a psychotic, deceitful bitch, I wouldn’t have brought her home in the first place.”

“You sure?” Cory asks. “Because you’ve known Kelly’s a bitch for months, and now she’s fucking with Olivia, so how’s she any different from the red head?”

“Kelly doesn’t kill people or carve them like pumpkins,” I retort. “She may have a big mouth and an obnoxious voice, but she wouldn’t harm a fly.”

“I don’t trust her,” he replies. My eyes snap to his. “Have you noticed anything different about her lately?”

“What do you mean?” I ask with tension creeping up my back.

“She’s off her fucking rocker,” Cory answers. “Spouting religious horse shit, singling out Olivia in every tirade, and just downright bitchy.”

“She’s always bitchy,” I remark dryly.

“But it’s gone from whining to accusations,” he counters. “I’m waiting for her to grab a torch and start a lynch mob.”

“Ain’t fucking happening,” I spit out, getting more pissed off as he points out his observations.

“Some people break under pressure, and I think that Barbie has finally cracked.”

“Then we’ll keep a close eye on her,” I propose. “First sign of her searching for matches, and we tie her up.”

“She won’t be getting anywhere near matches on my watch,” Cory says. “And that bitch better not say anything about, or get within three feet of Livs or I swear on all that’s holy, that I will not be responsible for my actions when I strangle the life out of her.”

“I’m not gonna stop you,” I say with a shrug. “I was contemplating doing it myself earlier when she wouldn’t shut the fuck up. And then there was that look in the car.”

“What look?” Cory says on full alert.

“Kelly was downright giddy when she thought that Olivia might die,” I answer and hear what can only be described as a growl come from the bed.

“I revise my statement,” he says in a low tone. “If that psychotic slut even looks at my sister, I’ll fucking kill her.”

“Then I hope that Kelly gets a rapid case of blindness for her sake,” I reply. “Because it’s going to be impossible for her not to look at Olivia in such confined spaces.” Cory scowls at me, so I hold up my hands. “What? I’m just stating the truth.”

“And being a smartass about it too,” he hisses.

“He has to be a smartass,” a rasp says. “He’s Mouth, it comes with the territory.”

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