The smell of bleach burns my nose as I pace outside the large double doors leading to the operating room.  Brian stands off to one side, muttering to himself about how much trouble he’s going to be in with Deklan and refusing to give me any details about what happened.

“Mrs. Kearney?”

I flip my head toward the sound of the doctor’s voice and head straight over to her.

“I’m Dr. Henry, your husband’s surgeon.”

“I’m Kera,” I tell her.  “How is he?”

“He’s going to be fine,” she says.  “It’s a serious injury but not life-threatening.”

“What happened?”

Dr. Henry narrows her eyes at Brian and then glances back to me.  She takes a long breath.

“Your husband was stabbed with a six-inch serrated knife, the kind that’s pretty popular with the gangs in the area.  Luckily, there isn’t any major organ damage, but the knife nicked his lower intestine.  It was a small cut, but we had to take care of it or there would be a risk of the contents of his bowels leaking into his body cavity.  That can be very dangerous, but we got to it in time.”

A tear tries to escape my eyelashes, but I quickly wipe it away.

“When can I see him?”

“He should be in recovery in just a few minutes,” the doctor tells me.  “I’ll have a nurse come get you as soon as he wakes up.”

She gives me a reassuring pat on the arm before she walks through the double doors and out of sight.  I turn back to Brian with a glare.

“Stitches, huh?”

Brian shrugs and tries to smile.  I consider punching him in the face.

“It’s not like he was shot or anything,” Brian says.

“You are not making me feel better.”

“Sorry, Mrs. K.”

I sit down on an uncomfortable plastic chair and cross my arms over my chest.  Brian sits beside me and leans over with his elbows on his knees.

“If it makes you feel any better,” he says, “the guy that did it is in a freezer in the basement of this place.”

“It doesn’t.”  I speak the words casually enough, but a cold knot forms in my stomach.  Brian hasn’t actually said that Deklan killed his attacker, and I don’t want to ask.  “Who was he?”

“Just some guy on the street.”  Brian can’t even look me in the eye as he says it.

“You’re a terrible liar.”

“So I’ve been told.”

I glare at the cold, white floor.  My stomach is still all twisted up, and there are too many thoughts running through my head.  What really happened?  Was he going to have a big scar?  Would he have to stay in the hospital for a long time to recover, or would he be able to come home?

Above all other questions in my mind, one keeps blaring at me like a military bugle: What if it had been worse?  What would happen to me if Deklan were to die?

The automatic doors at the entrance open, and two police officers walk into the waiting area and go up to the nurse at the counter.  I can’t hear what they say, but they both turn to look at me.

“Mrs. Kearney?”  The tall, blond cop walks up to me.

“Yes?”

“I’m Officer Jim Longbow,” he says.  He motions to the other uniformed man, also blond but slightly shorter.  “This is my partner, Allen Sloan.”

“Congratulations on the marriage,” Officer Sloan says.  “I didn’t realize Deklan was married.”

“Thank you,” I say softly.  “It was just a month ago.”

“We need to ask you a few questions, Mrs. Kearney,” Longbow says.  “Were you with your husband when he was injured?”

“No,” I say with a shake of my head, “I was at home.”

“Can you give us an idea of what occurred?”

“I…I don’t know what happened.  I haven’t seen him yet.”

“How about you, Brian?”  Longbow places his hands on his belt as he turns to my companion.

“I wasn’t there,” Brian says.  He maintains eye contact with the officer with cold, blank eyes.  “I don’t know anything.”

“You brought him to the hospital?”

“Not me.  He must’ve got himself here.”  Brian leans back in the seat and crosses his arms.

“And how did you know he was here?” the officer asks.

“I’m clairvoyant.” Brian continues to stare but refuses to offer any more information.

A nurse emerges from the double doors and heads in my direction.

“Mrs. Kearney, your husband is awake.  Would you like to see him?”

“We need to speak with him,” Longbow says.

“Family first.”  The young nurse smiles and leads me away from the police officers.  She takes me through the doors and down a hallway to a room shielded with a large curtain.  When she pulls the curtain back, I see Deklan lying on the bed with a tube running out of his arm and an oxygen feed in his nose.

Deklan’s gaze meets mine.  He doesn’t smile, not even after the nurse leaves.

“Who brought you here?”

“I was worried about you.”

“Brian wasn’t supposed to tell you anything, let alone bring you here.”  Deklan sighs and looks away.

“I made him bring me,” I say.  I walk over to the side of the bed and pull up a round, rolling chair.

“Held a gun to his head, did you?”

“Figuratively.”

Deklan snorts.  I reach over and take his hand.

“I was worried.  He wouldn’t tell me what really happened, and he’s a terrible liar.”

“It was nothing.”

“You just came out of surgery.  How, exactly, is that nothing?”

“Just a scratch.”  He looks down at our hands and twines his fingers around mine.  “I’m fine.”

“What happened?”

“Misunderstanding.”

“That’s vague.”  I squeeze his hand slightly.

“What happened?” I ask again, but Deklan just stares at our hands, ignoring my question.  “You aren’t going to tell me, are you?”

“No,” he says succinctly, “I’m not.  I don’t want you involved.  It’s taken care of.”

“So I hear.”

Deklan turns his head swiftly, his eyes narrowed.

“Tell Brian that he’s a dead man.”

“Leave him alone.”

“Are you giving me orders now?”

“Maybe.”

He finally cracks a smile, but it quickly turns to a wince.  I reach over with my other hand and stroke his cheek.  He leans against me for a moment.

“Go home,” Deklan says.  “The doc said I can leave in the morning.  They just want to watch me overnight.”

“I’m not going anywhere, Deklan.  If something happened, they wouldn’t even be able to reach me.”

“God, woman” he shakes his head and closes his eyes, “you are frustrating.”

“Well, you left me pretty frustrated this morning.  I’m just returning the favor.”

“Don’t make me laugh anymore.”  He gives me a half smile, and his eyes soften.  He gives my hand a squeeze and closes his eyes briefly.  “I hate the way painkillers leave my head feeling.”

The curtain moves, and Dr. Henry walks in with a smile.

“How are we doing?” she asks.

“I’ll be fine when you get rid of the painkillers in the IV.”

“You just came out of surgery,” Dr. Henry says.  “You’re going to need that for a while.”

“Bullshit.”

She checks his vitals, adjusts the IV, and asks him to rate his pain on a scale from one to ten.

“One,” Deklan says.  “Ditch the morphine.”

“Would you like a bullet to bite on instead?”

“Yes.”

Dr. Henry rolls her eyes.

“There are a couple of officers here who want to ask you about the mugging.  Are you up for that?”

“No,” Deklan says definitively.  “I won’t be later, either.”

“If you aren’t in pain, I’m not sure I can refuse them.  I don’t think they’ll leave until they talk to you.”

“I don’t have anything to say.”

“You can tell them that.”  Dr. Henry gives Deklan a pointed stare before she walks back around the curtain.

“They already asked me about you.” I rub my thumb over the edge of his hand and glance at him tentatively.

“What did you tell them?”

“Nothing.  I didn’t know anything.  I still don’t know anything.”

“And we’re going to keep it that way.  I don’t want them bothering you.”

A few minutes later, the curtain rustles and we’re facing Longbow and Sloan.

“We need to ask you some questions,” Longbow says.

“I got nothing to say, Longbow.”  Deklan stares at the man, his eyes narrowed.

“Mr. Kearney, a man is dead,” Sloan says.  “You know we can’t just walk out of here without anything from you.”

“Oh, did he die?”  Deklan shakes his head.  “I guess that will save the taxpayers some prison money.”

“He was shot in the head.”  Longbow hooks his thumbs in his belt.  “Yeah, he’s dead.  And we have a recently fired gun registered to you.  I have a pretty good idea what ballistics will have to say about it.  You have to give me something, Dek.”

I’m surprised by the familiarity.

“It’s all very simple,” Deklan says.  “I was walking down the street, and some asshole jumped me and tried to take my wallet.  He stabbed me.  I shot him.  Self-defense.”

“Were there any witnesses?”

“I was alone.”

“No one on the street?”

“Guess not.  It’s all one big blur.”

“Do you have a name for him?”

“Random mugger number one,” Deklan says.  “That’s what the credits will say when they make a movie about my life.”

Sloan snickers, and Longbow glares at him.

“He appears to have also been beaten,” Longbow says.  “Did you do that before or after you shot him in the temple?”

“No idea what you’re talking about,” Deklan says.  “Maybe it was the guy he mugged before me.  Maybe the coroner dropped him.”

“Dek…”

“You know what?”  Deklan sits up slightly, gritting his teeth.  “How about you just take all this up with my attorney?  I have nothing else to say to you two.”

“If this goes to trial,” Longbow says, “it will look better if you cooperate with us now.”

“You fuckers know this isn’t going to go to trial,” Deklan says, “so stop wasting my time.”

Deklan refuses to say anything else, and the two officers finally give up and leave, promising to be back in the morning.

“You should go home,” Deklan tells me again.  “I’m fine, and they’re just going to tell me to rest.”

“Well, I’ll have to stay to make sure that you do.”  I raise an eyebrow at Deklan when he glares at me.  “I’m not going anywhere.  Get used to it.”

“Stubborn.”

“When I need to be.”

“Where’s Brian?”

“In the waiting room, as far as I know.  Do you want me to get him?”

“Just tell him to keep an eye on shit,” Deklan says.  “I’ll talk to him tomorrow.”

I deliver Deklan’s message to Brian, and Deklan is moved to a private room with a reclining chair so I have somewhere to sleep.  Once he’s settled in, he asks me to retrieve his phone from his bag of personal effects.  I’m surprised to find an actual smartphone inside.

Deklan takes it from me and starts tapping the screen.

“Who are you texting?” I ask.

“Sean.”

“I didn’t know you had a smartphone.”

“I don’t use it very much.”

He only takes a moment to complete his message.  I find it strange that I’ve never seen this phone before and wonder if he’s been intentionally hiding it from me.  It’s entirely possible.  It makes me wonder what else he’s hiding—probably quite a bit.

It bothers me.  A lot.  It reminds me that I know very little about the man I married.

“Can I look through your phone?” I blurt out.

“Why?”

“I want to know what kind of music you like.”

“There isn’t any music on my phone.”

“Why not?”

“I just use it for work.”

I narrow my eyes at him.  Deklan sighs and holds out his hand, palm up, with the phone lying in the middle of it.

“Go ahead.  Look through all of it.  I don’t text, and there aren’t any women’s phone numbers in there except Teagan’s.”

I narrow my eyes at him slightly as I take the phone from his hand.  It’s not locked, and he was telling the truth about the lack of texts.  Aside from the message he sent to Sean, which just says “all good,” there are only four of them in the phone’s history.  All were sent to him.  The messages are brief and cryptic, and he only replied to the one from Teagan.  The others don’t even have a contact associated with them.  The only music on the device is some classical piece that probably came with the music app.

I look through the rest of it.  It’s mostly just the apps that come with a phone though I do find one surprise.

“You have games on here.”

“Just a couple.”

“Candy Crush?  Really?”  I laugh.

“Hey, even I get bored at work sometimes.”

I don’t really believe that, but something about Deklan playing stupid phone games relaxes me.

“Happy now?” he asks as he takes the phone back.

“Not at all.”

“Why not?”

I look down at my hands as I search for the right words.

“Because I want to know more about you,” I say, “and that didn’t help at all.”

“Maybe you should just ask.”

“You don’t usually answer my questions.”

“You ask the wrong questions.  You ask questions that could get you into trouble, and I’m not going to put my wife at risk.”

“So, I can ask you about other things?  Personal things?”

“Of course.  I can’t swear I’ll answer them all, but I won’t lie to you.”

I wonder if the pain medication is altering his judgment but decide it’s best to jump on this opportunity.  I might not get another one.

“You’re really Catholic?”

“Yes.”

“Do you believe in all of that stuff?  God, Jesus, the Virgin Mary—all that Bible stuff?”

“Yes,” Deklan says darkly, “I believe in all that Bible stuff.”

“Then how can you reconcile what you do?”

There’s a long pause as Deklan stares at me.  He takes a couple of deep breaths.

“I go to confession every week.”

This is news to me, and I try to picture Deklan cramming himself into a confessional box while a priest listens to him admit to murder and whatever else he’s done.  The picture in my head looks ridiculous, but he said he wouldn’t lie to me.

“I’m tired,” Deklan says suddenly.  “Can we pick this up another time?”

“Sure.”  I get up from the chair and turn the lights off.

When I sit back down, Deklan settles back in the bed and reaches for my hand.  He rubs my wrist for a moment before he interlocks our fingers and closes his eyes.  He’s asleep just a few minutes later, but I stay right next to the bed for some time before releasing his hand and situating myself in the recliner.

I can’t sleep.  The recliner is lumpy, and there is way too much on my mind.  I stare over at Deklan’s bed in the low lighting.

He’s an enigma.  He’s gentle and protective of me but arrogant and brutal with others.  I don’t know what to think of it.  Either he is two people inside of one body, or one of his personas is a lie.

Which one is the real Deklan Kearney?