Vindicated (36 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

One.

There was a hint of warm air against my face.

Two.

I felt the surface underneath me hit my back like being slapped with a wooden plank.

Three.

Pain.

Four.

A scream leapt from my throat.

Five.

I rolled over and vomited on whatever surface I lay on, my stomach heaving.

Six.

Someone screamed.

Seven.

My eyes finally opened.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE

“Wait a minute!” someone screamed.
 
“There’s one more!”

I couldn’t quite place myself as I stared up at the ceiling.
 
The fan above me seemed to be spinning, but after a moment I realized it was
me
who was spinning, not it.
 
Or rather my brain was spinning.
 
There was blood on the tan carpet and on the bed that I could just make out in peripheral vision.
 
There were red lights flashing against the walls.

“Jessica!” a familiar sounding voice said and the surface I lay on suddenly jostled and shifted.
 
A beautiful albeit white and terrified looking face leaned across my field of vision.

“Holy shi…” I heard someone else breathe near the doorway.
 
I thought it sounded like Austin.

“Emily?” I said, my voice barely audible.

“Jessica!” she said, her voice terrified and relieved sounding.
 
“We thought…” she started choking on her words.
 
“We thought you were gone.
 
Oh my… Jessica.
 
Your eyes.”

But I wasn’t comprehending her words.
 
Blackness was starting to close in on the edges of my vision.
 
That strange thumping that seemed to start and stop in my chest was back.
 
My entire body felt chilled, despite the fire that was back in my brain.

“Alex,” I muttered.
 
“Where’s Alex?
 
Is he alright?”

Emily stilled for just a moment, holding something back.

“What?” I tried to demand, my voice to week to sound demanding.
 
“Just tell me.”

“He’s back,” she said, her voice cracking.
 
“He’s in pretty bad shape though.
 
He looks like he’s been run over by a semi.”

“He’s…” I tried to understand.
 
And then it clicked.
 
“No, he’s had the life nearly beaten out of him by Cole.”
 
Alex had come back in the same shape he’d left as well.
 
Right before Cole snapped Alex’s neck Cole had beaten him to death.

Suddenly two people dressed in uniform rushed in and started barking questions.

“What’s wrong with her?”

“Who is she?”

“Where’d she come from?”

The blackness was closing in on me faster though as I felt my body being lifted and then set back down.
 
I felt wheels rolling underneath me and the air grew cooler.
 
Suddenly I could smell trees and rain.
 
Turning my head to the side, I forced my eyes open.
 

Just before they closed the back door to one of the two ambulances, I saw the bottom of one of Alex’s favorite shoes, completely covered in blood.

I let the darkness take me.

X

There was a certain smell.
 
That was the first thing I was aware of.
 
It was subtle but familiar.
 
With that smell came a sense of dread in the pit of my stomach.

They say the sense of smell is the strongest in triggering memory.

Mine was filled with times of worrying about Sal, of times after being in an accident with Austin, of wondering if Caroline would survive.

A hospital.

That was where I was.

My entire body felt sluggish and achy.
 
And my eyes felt so heavy.
 
It took everything I had in me to force them open.

The ceiling tiles above me looked blurry and yet not, at the same time.
 
I kept waiting for all the small little details to slide into focus, to start noticing all the tiny cobwebs, the cracks in the walls, anything.
 
But they didn’t.

Forcing the muscles in my body to work, I lifted my head and took my surroundings in.

I was in a hospital room, that was for sure.
 
Another bed lay empty across the room.
 
There were balloons and flowers spread across the two bedside tables, a handful of cards were to be found.
 
As I looked down at myself, I realized I was in a hospital gown.
 
Attached to me were tubes and wires, an oxygen cannula sticking in my nose.
 
A monitor beeped that I was still alive.

I was alive.

And while I didn’t feel great, I didn’t feel like I was on the verge of dying either.
 
My head wasn’t spinning or pulsing, my body was sore but didn’t feel like it had been hit with a bus.

My stomach actually growled.

I was alive.

As I heard footsteps, noticing how quiet everything sounded, I realized the door to my room had been left open.
 

Panic flooded me for just a moment.
 
Where was Alex?
 
What had happened to him?
 
I remembered blood and there being paramedics but not much else.

And then a moment later, a wheelchair was pushed into the room by a towering man with black as night skin.
 

“Alex,” I breathed, feeling tears prickle at the back of my eyes.

“I’m here,” he breathed as they stopped just inside the door.
 
His eyes instantly turned red and it took only a moment for a tear to break onto his cheek.
 
Actual tears.

My breath caught in my throat as I looked at his eyes.
 
Brilliant blue.
 
Human, Alex blue.

Finally, I took the rest of him in.
 
Those beautiful eyes were framed with rings of black, his nose had a bandage on it, obviously broken. His left arm was casted as well as his right leg.
 
The rest of his visible skin looked pretty black and blue as well.

“I’ll give the two of you a bit of time alone,” the other man said as he wheeled Alex closer.

“Thanks Derek,” Alex said with a smile, glancing in his direction before he left and closed the door behind him.

I drew in a quick breath, biting my lips together, a tear of my own slipping onto my cheek.
 
Slowly I reached a hand out, letting it brush Alex’s yellowed cheek.
 
He may have been broken.
 
But he was alive.
 
And he was human.

“Hi,” I breathed.
 
The smile that spread on my face hurt a little, yet it felt so good.

“Hi,” he said, his face breaking out into a smile too.
 
He winced, an
ouch
slipping between his lips, followed by a chuckle from the two of us.

“We’re alive,” I said, my voice filling with wonder.

“We’re alive,” he repeated, taking my hand in his un-casted one.
 
“I am so proud of you.
 
You were…”

“Stupid?” I said with a chuckle.

He laughed.
 
“Stupid, yes.
 
But brave.
 
Beyond brave.
 
I can’t even think of a word for it.”

I just smiled at him, in wonder of the being that was Alex.
 
“Are you going to be okay?” I finally braved to ask.

He shrugged, wincing as soon as he did.
 
“No big deal.”

“This kind of looks like a big deal,” I said, narrowing my eyes at him.
 
“Cole beat you to death.”

Alex shrugged.
 
“My left arm and right leg are broken.
 
So is my nose.
 
I had a pretty major concussion but the doctors don’t expect any permanent damage.
 
So yeah, I’m going to be okay.
 
I’ll need quite a bit of physical therapy.
 
That’s who Derek is, my therapist.
 
But in a few months, I’m going to be right as rain.”

I smiled again, feeling something inside of me that had felt tense for what seemed like a lifetime relax.

“What about me?” I finally asked, feeling a little scared again.
 
“What happened with me?
 
I feel… better.”

A sly grin started spreading on Alex’s face.
 
“That’s one I’m going to let the doctors explain.”

“What do you mean?” I started to question, when suddenly a doctor in a white lab coat and a nurse stepped in.

“Mrs. Wright!” the man with the thickest gray hair I had ever seen said joyously.
 
“You’re awake!”

“How long have I been out?” I realized I had forgotten to ask.

“Two and a half days,” he said as he gathered what I assumed was my chart under his arm and pulled up a chair.
 
“You were in pretty bad shape.
 
I’m Dr. Knight by the way.”

“What…” I stumbled over my words.
 
Everything seemed so quiet, I nearly felt like I was deaf.
 
“What was wrong with me?”

Dr. Knight opened my chart and pulled a pair of glasses down to his nose from the top of his head.
 
“This was kind of a strange case, Mrs. Wright.
 
You contracted a case of malaria.”

“Malaria?” I questioned.
 
“Don’t people usually get that from a mosquito bite in really hot, humid areas?”

“Yes,” he answered, looking back up at me.
 
“And you were recently in Costa Rica, your husband informed me.”

I glanced over at Alex, catching that knowing look in his eyes as he nodded.
 
I hadn’t caught malaria in Costa Rica.

“But the really strange thing is that the string of malaria looks like it has been in your blood for a while.
 
Your husband said you haven’t been anywhere you would have contracted this in the last several years.
 
Is that correct?”

“No,” I said.
 
“I haven’t been anywhere other than Costa Rica in the last few years.
 
England once, but nowhere warm enough for malaria.”

The doctor’s face was very serious looking.
 
“Uh huh.
 
Strange indeed.
 
There are not many cases of malaria in Costa Rica.”

“So that explains the chills, the fever?
 
Why I couldn’t keep anything down?
 
Why I felt like my head was going to explode?” I asked.
 
Alex squeezed my hand a little tighter.