Sin & Suffer

The doctor inched warily into the room. “What on earth is going on in here?”

“He’s just woken up, Doc,” Hopper said, trying to grab my shoulders but unwilling to risk another fist to his jaw. “Ain’t got his bearings yet.”

“I’ve got my fucking bearings, asshole. Let me up!”

“You gotta do something, before he makes it worse,” Mo growled. His lip was bleeding, his nostrils flared in pain.

Did I do that?

The headache turned feral, crumpling me in its agony as if I were nothing more than a sardine can. Clutching my skull—finding bandages instead of hair—I bellowed, “What the fuck is going on? Someone tell me before my brain explodes out of my goddamn ears!”

My heartbeat clanged to one name. A single name siphoning through my blood over and over again.

Cle … o.

Cle … o.

“You’re in hospital, Mr. Killian. I need you to relax.” The doctor used his calm-the-unhinged-patient-down voice as he crept closer. Grabbing the chart from the foot of the bed and scooting backward as if he would get bitten or infected by being too close to me, he flipped the pages and scanned the notes.

I couldn’t breathe properly.

I couldn’t see anything in my peripheral vision, and that damn fucking beeping was getting on my nerves.

“Someone shut that thing up!”

Grasshopper ignored me, coming to the side of the bed and bravely laying a hand on my chest. “Kill, you have a concussion. Doctors said if you move too much before the swelling goes down, you might do some serious damage.”

My headache came back with ten-ton pressure.

“Concussion? How the fuck did I get a concussion?” My eyes flew around the room.

I wasn’t in my bedroom, that was for fucking sure. White morbid walls looked like a bleached coffin, while an outdated television hung like a spider just waiting for death. The entire place reeked of antiseptic and corpses.

Hospital.

I’m in the fucking hospital.

Clutching my head, I tried to gather my temper and relax. Screaming only drove pins of agony through my eyeballs and terrified answers away. “Speak. Tell me.”

Mo looked at Hopper, unsuccessfully hiding the nervousness in his eyes. They waited for me to explode again. When I didn’t, Mo admitted, “Eh, you were struck in the head.”

My headache tripled its efforts to turn me into a vegetable almost as if on cue.

Then … everything came back.

Finding Cleo after all this time.

Loving Cleo after all this time.

Holding Cleo after all this fucking time.

She’s not dead.

She was never dead, just missing.

They took her!

I soared out of bed. The wires, the sheets—nothing had any power to hold me in my wrath. “Where is she?!” Shoving aside Grasshopper with superhuman strength, I swallowed hard as the room spun like a fun house. “They have her! Goddammit, they have her.”

Grasshopper, Mo, and the doctor sprang on me, each grabbing an arm or a leg. I grunted, buckling beneath their weight. In ordinary circumstances, I would’ve let them win. I would’ve been rational and collected and listened to what they had to say.

But this wasn’t ordinary circumstances.

This was motherfucking war!

My father and brother had broken into my house, got past security, and taken the only thing of value I had left.

They’d stolen her from me all over again.

“Shit!” I screamed. “Shit, shit, shit!”

“Kill, calm down!”

“Let us explain!”

“Get the fuck off me.” No amount of arms could hold me down. Adrenaline tore through my blood, giving me a merciless edge. My vision might be faulty, my head might be broken, but I still knew how to fight.

They weren’t listening to my voice. Perhaps they would listen to my fist.

With no effort at all, I punched the three men in a connecting roundhouse, and tore at the IV in the back of my hand.

Yanking it out, blood spurted over the white sheets and linoleum floor. The stark crimson spread macabre patterns, whispering of murder and revenge as I launched out of bed, battling sickness and vertigo. “Someone better start talking.” I breathed hard. “Now. Right fucking now.”

Mo and Hopper stared transfixed at my bleeding vein. “We should patch you up, dude.”

Waving my hand, splattering the bed with more red droplets, I snarled, “Leave it. It’s not important. I don’t even feel it.” Strangely, that was the truth. There was nothing that could overpower the pain of knowing they’d taken Cleo. That agony was enough to drown me. Over and fucking over again.

I groaned under my breath as scenarios and horror-filled daydreams tormented me.

Please, please, let her be okay!

My eyes flickered to the door. All I wanted to do was leave. To chase after my rotten enemies and give them what they deserved.

Suddenly, nausea raced up my gullet. I stumbled to the side. Crashing against the bed, I gritted my teeth against the swirling room.

The doctor sidestepped, avoiding me as best he could. “If you could sit down, Mr. Killian.”

“Do what he says, Kill. Just behave for once in your damn life,” Grasshopper growled. “Let us explain before you kill yourself, you bloody asshole!”

A wave of brutal heat tackled me to the bed. The nausea turned to sickness. My teeth chattered as the agony in my blood came back full force. Having no choice but to lean against the bed like a fucking invalid, I muttered, “Why the hell aren’t you out there looking for her? She’s your responsibility, too!” The light stabbed my eyeballs as I stared at my trusted friend and vice president.