Hit List - Laurell K. Hamilton [61]
My arm chose that moment to spasm so hard it almost dropped me to my knees. Edward had to catch me, or I would have fallen. When I could talk, I said, “Yeah.”
“Is this the worst injury you’ve had since you got lycanthropy?”
“Without preternatural healing, yeah,” I said. My voice still sounded breathy.
“So you don’t know if painkillers still work for you, or if like all lycanthropes drugs run through your system too fast.”
I stared up at him. I was already sweating and pale; I couldn’t pale anymore without passing out. “Fuck,” I said.
“See, I told you you’d curse.”
Edward drove me in the SUV with its new scorch marks on the back. We followed the ambulance to the hospital, where we’d find out if painkillers still worked for me. I was betting they didn’t. Fuck.
24
THEY GAVE ME a local directly into my arm, and then Dr. Fields cut open the scar. Apparently he’d attended the same seminar as Matt, the EMT, so it was Dr. Fields’s first time seeing if the theory worked in practice. He was very honest about it. “I’m not a hundred percent certain it will leave you scar free, but it will probably make the muscle and tendon issue better.”
“So we could do all this and I could still scar and still have some mobility loss,” I said.
“Yes.”
I think I started to get off the examining table, but Edward was there, and he put his hand on my shoulder. He just shook his head. Damn it. Edward made me lie back down and held my hand like he said he would. Double damn it. An hour later, I was cut open, and the local had worked for that. It wasn’t pleasant, and the shots were a bitch, and I really hated feeling my skin part under the scalpel, but it was nothing to feeling my skin being tugged into place with a needle and stitches. That was always a creepy feeling even if it didn’t exactly hurt. Matt, the EMT, had forgone sleep to watch, and so had a lot of other doctors and interns. No one had seen the practical application of the theory and they wanted to, though everyone was in face shields and full gear just in case blood spread. It was technically contagious, though my variety seemed not to be up to this point. I was medical miracle enough to excite the med students all to hell.
Fields and I had already discussed that it needed to be the kind of stitches that dissolved, just in case my body tried to grow over the stitches. “You heal that well?” he’d asked.
“I’ve seen other people with lycanthropy do it. I’d rather not risk your having to operate on me to remove stitches below my skin.”
He’d just agreed.
We were about halfway through the stitches when the local began to wear off. “Painkiller is wearing off,” I said.
“We’d have to wait for the shots to take effect again, and you’re healing, Ms. Blake. I might have to cut more of the wound again and start over, or I can stitch ahead of the healing.”
Edward said, “Anita, look at me.”
I turned and he was on the side opposite the doctor. He gave me calm eyes and I nodded. “Do it,” I said.
I held on to Edward’s hand, gave him some of the best eye contact I’d given anyone in a while, and Dr. Fields tried to stitch me up ahead of my body’s healing. Even with the ardeur days from being fed I was healing too fast for normal medical help. Fuck.
Edward talked low to me. He whispered about the case, tried to get me to think about work. It worked for a while, and then the painkiller was all gone and I was still being stitched up. I couldn’t think about work. He talked about his family, about what Donna was doing with her metaphysical shop, about Peter in school and in martial arts. He was working on his second black belt. Becca and her musical theater, and the fact that he was still taking her to dance class twice a week, that amused me enough for me to say, “I want to see you sitting with all the suburban moms in the waiting area.”
He’d smiled Ted’s smile for me. “Come visit us and you can help me pick Becca up from class.”
“Deal,” I said, and then I just concentrated on not screaming.
“It’s okay to yell,” Dr. Fields said.
I shook my head.
Edward answered for