Irrevocable

  “I was playing with the dog. Um…teaching her to fetch.”

  “What was the date?”

  “April…um…” I try to think as my memory focuses a little better. Rinaldo died on the fourth, and the funeral was on the seventh. Four days later Alina was collecting the last of her things. “April eleventh? Twelfth?”

  “Mr. Arden,” Dr. Reiss says as she places her clipboard on the bedside table and leans closer to me, “I’m going to tell you some things that are going to be distressful. I need you to try to stay calm for me. Do you think you can do that?”

  “Yeah.” I lick my lips. My mouth and throat are still dry. Talking and breathing seems to make it worse. I glance up at the water on the table, and the doctor holds a straw up to my lips again before she continues.

  “Today’s date is May twenty-eighth. Mr. Arden, you’ve been in a coma for nearly seven weeks.”

  I hear the words, but they don’t quite register. They don’t even make any sense. No one sleeps for seven weeks. I can barely sleep for seven hours.

  “How did I get here?”

  “Mr. Arden,” she says softly as she leans back on the stool and holds the clipboard to her chest, “you were picked up in an alley. You had a very serious gunshot wound.”

  She reaches over and touches the side of my face, right below my jaw.

  “The bullet entered your head here.” She lifts her hand and places it on the left side of my head, just above my temple. “It exited here. Odds against surviving such a wound are astronomical, Mr. Arden. Quite frankly, I’m surprised to see you conscious, let alone talking to me coherently.”

  Dr. Reiss goes on to explain that I have had multiple surgeries and even had to be resuscitated at one point. The bullet entered with high velocity and miraculously exited without exploding. I had been conscious and talking the entire time I was riding in the ambulance and even joked with the paramedics.

  I don’t remember any of it.

  “It’s fairly common when you’ve suffered such a massive head trauma,” she tells me. “The events just prior to that time never make it to long-term memory.”

  I can only stare at her. I hear what she’s saying, but I can’t quite make sense of it.

  Maybe I’m still dreaming.

  It doesn’t feel like a dream though. It all seems quite real.

  “Where’s Alina?”

  “Would that be Miss Marino?”

  I nod.

  “She’s been here very often, actually. She’s made quite a name for herself.” The doctor chuckles softly. “It’s against hospital policy to allow non-family members into this unit, but when your only listed emergency contact turned out to be deceased, we had to make some accommodations. The administrator wasn’t at all happy when your brother showed up, and we discovered you really did have a next of kin.”

  “My brother was here?”

  “Twice now,” Dr. Reiss says. “I believe he lives out of state.”

  “He does.” I don’t know what to think. How did Bastian even know I was here? Who would have contacted him?

  Jonathan. Who else?

  “You obviously have a lot of people who care about you,” Dr. Reiss says. “They had to have some adoption records unsealed just to verify the relationship, especially after Mr. Ferris also claimed to be your brother.”

  It hurts to smile, but I can just see Jonathan trying to pose as my kin. I’m actually surprised he didn’t have an app for it.

  He probably does now.

  “Can I see Alina?” I ask.

  “It’s two in the morning, Mr. Arden,” she tells me. “However, I think this might just warrant a late-night call.”

  I start to say something, but I’m abruptly tired. I can’t hold my eyes open.

  “Rest, Mr. Arden. I’m going to want to run some tests on you in the morning.”

  I nod. At least, I think I do.

  *****

  “Evan?”

  I try to say something, but my lips won’t move. It hurts to try, and my throat is still too dry to make a sound.

  “Can you hear me?” It’s Alina’s voice. “I think he’s awake.”

  “Mr. Arden?” I recognize Dr. Reiss’s voice.

  I will my eyes open and stare into Alina’s beautiful, tear-streaked face.

  “Don’t cry,” I say as I try to lift my arm. Alina wraps her hand around mine.

  “Thank God!” She squeezes my fingers tightly.

  I want to grip back, but that part of my body isn’t responding well. Alina strokes the side of my face, rubbing underneath the oxygen tube. It’s itchy there around the tape, and her touch is just what I need.

  “You always know the right thing.” I’m mumbling, and I’m not sure if I’m making sense. My thoughts are disjointed, and I’m not completely sure this isn’t all a dream. It feels like one.

  “I just about gave up hope, Evan.” Alina bites down on her lower lip, but the tears flow anyway. “I didn’t think you were ever going to wake up.”

  “I’m awake.” Seeing her so obviously distressed focuses my thoughts. “You know me, I don’t sleep that much anyway.”

  She smiles and shakes her head.

  “You’ve made up for it,” she tells me. “I think I prefer it when you wake me up every night.”

  “You’re going to have some more sleep coming your way,” Dr. Reiss says. “It will help you recover as much as anything does. You have a long road ahead of you. I have a lengthy list of tests for you. We need to get some kind of idea how much damage you have suffered.”

  “But he’s awake and speaking,” Alina says as she looks at Dr. Reiss. “That’s definitely good.”

  “Without a doubt. I’m not too concerned that he doesn’t remember the night he was brought here, but there may be additional memory loss. I’m going to count on you, Alina, to alert me to anything you consider abnormal.”

  “In what way?”

  “Specifically, anything you would consider unusual for Evan to do or say. He suffered major trauma to the left frontal lobe of his brain and possibly some to the temporal lobe, too. I’m pleased that he’s speaking. There could have been damage to the speech center of the brain. If either of you notices any problems with speech or comprehension, let me know, but I’m more curious about personality changes. Mark Duncan should be able to help in that area as well.”

  “Mark?” I look back and forth between the two women. Mark Duncan had been my military psychologist.

  “He’s been here to see you,” Alina tells me. “I met him, and he seems really nice. He said you worked with him before.”

  “Yeah, a while ago.” Talking is wearing me out quickly.

  Dr. Reiss starts talking about tests she wants to run and when I can try eating solid food. I tune it all out and just stare at Alina’s hand wrapped around mine. For seven weeks, she’s been coming here and sitting with me. Seven weeks she’s been waiting.

  I spend the day being poked, prodded, and questioned. Alina stays in the room with me the whole time except when I am taken to have X-rays and an MRI done. I’m exhausted by the time they’re all finished with me, and then I hear something about physical therapy starting the next day.

  Fabulous.

  The nurse leaves us alone after Alina points out the exception to the visiting hours rule. I get settled back into the bed and drink some of the juice that’s been left for me. No solid food yet, but Dr. Reiss said I could try some tomorrow.

  “Evan, I need to ask you something,” Alina says as she looks toward the door and then leans close to me. “I hate to even bring it up, but I know you have to have some somewhere.”

  “Some what?”

  “Money.” Her cheeks tinge with red. “I had enough to cover the apartment bills and everything up until a couple of weeks ago. It’s been tight since then. I was…well…”

  I grip her hand and take in a breath.

  “You had to work to keep current?”

  “Not yet,” she says as she shakes her head. “
I was really close last week.”

  The relief I feel to know she didn’t have to go that route floods through my body, leaving me feeling a little loose and gooey. I give her the combination to the safe in my closet.

  “There’s plenty in there,” I tell her. “You shouldn’t have any trouble.”

  “Thank you.” She leans over and kisses my forehead. “I hated to even say anything, but I didn’t think you wanted me to—”

  “No,” I say, interrupting, “I don’t.”

  “I didn’t.” Her reassurance is comforting. She reaches behind my head and starts massaging my neck. “Maisy misses you. She keeps running around the apartment with that little yellow ball in her mouth, looking for you. She won’t give it to me though. As soon as I touch it, she wants it back.”

  I laugh.

  “She just barely got the hang of it,” I say. “I think she brought it back to me about three times the entire afternoon.”

  “She does like carrying the ball around.”

  “That’s the last thing I remember,” I tell her. “I was trying to get her to fetch.”

  Dr. Reiss comes in the room to go over some of the test results. Most of the physical stuff came out normal, but the memory tests were a little suspect. Apparently, they aren’t bad enough for the doctor to be concerned.

  “The counselor will be here tomorrow,” Dr. Reiss informs me. “I want him to do a full psychological profile on you before you are discharged. In the meantime, rest.”

  “Can I stay with him?” Alina asks as she turns toward the doctor.

  “Yes, you may. I’ll make a note that it’s approved. Just let him rest though. No more talking. I’ll be back in the morning to check in on you both.”

  Alina agrees and Dr. Reiss leaves.

  The next day, I get additional visitors.

  “There he is! Back from the dead!” Jonathan saunters in and leans over the bed to hug me. “It’s good to see you with open eyes, brotha.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Looking good, LT.” Eddie-boy shakes my hand. “They giving you anything decent to eat around here?”

  “Better than rations,” I tell him, “but not by much.”

  I take Alina’s hand and tell her to go check on Maisy and the apartment. She narrows her eyes but complies with my request. She knows I just want her out of the way but doesn’t make a fuss about it. Jonathan scans the room for any kind of monitoring devices before the guys sit down to talk business.

  “Tell me what happened.” I adjust the pillow behind my head and try to sit up a little straighter.

  “What do you remember?” Jonathan asks.

  “Nothing. Not a damn thing. Who shot me?”

  “Whoa.” Jonathan inhales audibly. “I’ll start when you called me, then.”

  Jonathan tells me everything he knows about that night. I had been worried about a text from Alina and had contacted Jonathan and Eddie-boy to find her. Eddie-boy fills in a few gaps about meeting me at Walgreens and taking Alina to safety, but I still don’t remember a thing. Jonathan tells me about being stuck in traffic and arriving just as Becca and Joshua Taylor were about to kill me.

  “This guy right here,” Jonathan says as he points his cigarette at Eddie-boy, “saved your ass. If he hadn’t shoved you right then and there, you would’ve been killed.”

  “That’s when I was shot?”

  Jonathan nods.

  “I thought you were dead for sure,” Eddie-boy says quietly. “I mean, who gets shot in the head and lives? You weren’t moving much, but you were still talking.”

  “What happened to Becca and Joshua?”

  “Jonathan stayed with you,” Eddie-boy says. “I went after them. Let’s just say they had an unfortunate car accident on their way out of town.”

  He turns to Jonathan.

  “You know, the electrical systems on those new cars are pretty nifty.”

  “Nifty?” Jonathan laughs. “Where do you military guys get all your lingo?”

  The casual way they talk about killing two people makes my gut cramp up. Becca had been working with us for a long time—even before she was doing Rinaldo’s books. Now she’s dead, and I can’t even remember exactly why. I don’t understand why she would want to kill me. I’d never done anything to her.

  I understood Joshua’s motivations—I’d killed his brother. It was no wonder he wanted me dead. Now I was responsible for the death of both brothers.

  I can’t take that back.

  “We took care of Donald Hansen,” Eddie-boy says. “He was there in the alley. I looked him up.”

  “I recognized him,” Jonathan says. “He was the dude you set up in that hotel.”

  There’s a brief flash of Don’s blank eyes as I roll him over, and then nothing.

  “I saw his tat,” Eddie-boy tells me. “We made sure he had a proper burial. He had a sister in Indianapolis, and we got her here for it. I’ll take you to where he’s buried when you get out.”

  “Thanks,” I say quietly. “I appreciate it.”

  I ask a few questions to try to piece together the rest of the night, and they answer one after another. Nothing sparks any other memories. Listening to people talk about a situation involving me and not remembering any of it is a little unnerving.

  “How did Bastian end up here?” I ask.

  “I called him,” Jonathan says with a shrug. “I knew you’d been talking to him, and well…honestly, brotha, we didn’t think you were gonna make it.”

  “Did you talk to him?”

  “Briefly. He had to get back home to his family, but he said to call him if your condition changed. I gave him a shout this morning. I have the feeling he’ll be booking a flight pretty soon.”

  It occurs to me that the only time I have been in physical contact with Bastian since finding out we were half-brothers was when we were trying to kill each other. We had come to a truce, but my intent was to end him.

  How could I have considered that? He’s my only known relative.

  The callousness of the thoughts I had at the time shock me. All my life, I’d wondered who my family might have been. I tried to find substitutes in the Marines, but that ultimately failed. When I discovered I had a true, flesh-and-blood relative, I’d held him in my crosshairs and nearly pulled the trigger.

  I close my eyes for a moment, remembering. It feels so different, so strange. I’d thought only of strategy to keep Rinaldo’s businesses on top of the Chicago mafia chain yet nothing of the potential relationship I could have with a real brother.

  The only thing that mattered was what Rinaldo wanted.

  But he’s gone now.

  His family is long gone at this point—back to Italy where the crime families over there can keep track of them. All the businesses belong to me, and I don’t give a shit what happens to them. I have more money stashed away than I will ever be able to spend. I’d lived to be in his service, and now that he is dead and his family gone, what do I have that matters?

  Alina.

  She never gave up on me even when no one else thought I was going to make it. She kept coming here and checking on me. Dr. Reiss said Alina would sit next to me, hold my hand, and talk to me for hours. I remind myself once again how well she understands me. She knew who I used to be, and apparently thought that man still exists inside of me somewhere.

  Does he? Can I be that person again?

  I’m not completely sure if that is good enough. I had a rough start, and I don’t think I’ll ever fit anyone’s idea of Prince Charming. I’m on too much medication right now to remember any dreams, but I doubt my nightmares will just disappear when I go home. I still have the occasional panic attack, and I’m ultimately a mess to anyone in my life.

  Alina’s seen all that in me. What’s more, she saw a different side of me first. It might not have been in person, but she knows what I went through and seems to get it.

  I fucked it up with Lia. I am not going to let that happen again.

  I open my eyes a
nd realize Jonathan and Eddie-boy have been talking the whole time.

  “Omarie and Junko were definitely working with them.” Eddie-boy brings something up on his phone, but I don’t look at it. “We recovered all the guns from a storage place out in the west side of town.”

  “I got a plan for them,” Jonathan says. “I got security putting it together now.”

  “No,” I tell him. I shake my head vigorously, which makes me a little dizzy. The last thing I need is more blood on my hands. I already have a spot in hell right next to Lady Macbeth.

  “No?” Jonathan narrows his eyes at me. “What do ya mean, brotha? They were in on it. We gotta take care of them.”

  “No, we don’t. If what you said is right, they were being paid off by Taylor, Beni, and Becca. All three of them are gone now, so there’s no one left to pay them. They aren’t a threat anymore. Let them know they’re getting their one and only pass, and make sure they stay in the south.”

  “All right,” Jonathan says with a shake of his head. “If you say so, boss. I’ll call off the dogs.”

  “I do.” I look between both men and take a deep breath. “I’m tired, guys. I think I need to get some sleep.”

  “You got it, boss.”

  I don’t chastise Jonathan for his reference, but it leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. They both stand to leave, and I reach out for Eddie-boy before he can get away.

  “You saved my life,” I say as I grip his hand. “Thanks, Eddie-boy.”

  “Aw, shit, LT. You saved my ass plenty of times. You’re going to have to get shot a few more times before we’re even.”

  “I’d rather not if that’s okay with you.”

  He laughs.

  A nurse walks in and places her hands on her hips.

  “Visiting hours ended twenty minutes ago. Mr. Arden needs his rest now.”

  “Don’t get your scrubs all in a bunch,” Jonathan says to her. “We were just goin’.”

  I really don’t know what I’m going to do.

  Chapter 24—Different Outlook

  “Hello, Evan.”

  I look at Mark Duncan for a long moment. He’s thinner and a little greyer than the last time I saw him. There’s also a ring on his finger that didn’t use to be there. I’m actually pleased to see it—he’d been dwelling on a love long gone.