Actual Stop (Agent O’Connor #1)(86)

Rory was silent for a while. “You didn’t tell them, did you?”

I shook my head. “No. But I thought about it.” Had teetered on the brink of revealing the truth the entire visit, in fact. I’d even opened my mouth a few times, intent upon confessing everything, but in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.

“Why not?”

“If she’d wanted them to know, she’d have told them herself. Besides, that would’ve been for me, not for them. To make me feel better.” She probably had no idea what I was talking about, but that was okay. She didn’t need specifics. “I couldn’t take advantage of them like that.”

Rory favored me with a pitying look that grated on the underside of my skin like a thousand splinters. “Ryan, you know that—” Her pager went off, cutting off whatever she’d been about to say, and I sagged against my pillows, relieved. She checked it and stood, a dark frown washing over her features. “I’ve gotta go. I’ll come back and check on you later.”

“I’d rather you get some sleep,” I called after her.

She waved over her shoulder and strode purposefully down the hall. I shimmied around in the bed for a bit after she’d gone, trying to get comfortable, but it just didn’t seem possible. The best I could do was settle into a position that produced the least amount of pain. But the physical aches were a welcome distraction from the shame and guilt bubbling like a witch’s brew inside me. So that was something, I supposed.

My work phone chimed to announce a new email and intruded upon my wallowing. With a sigh, I retrieved it and awkwardly typed in my password with my left hand. God, I wished I knew how much longer it’d be before I could use my right.

The message wasn’t from Allison. Speaking of nada, zip, zero, and zilch, I hadn’t heard squat from her since the day I’d been shot, and that cut me to the quick. News traveled faster than the speed of light in this agency, so she’d surely heard what’d happened. I’ll admit it, I’d sort of been expecting her to call to check up on me. That she hadn’t even emailed was devastating.

Whenever I threatened to drown in thoughts like that, my pragmatic side reminded me she was overseas on a protection assignment. She had responsibilities and couldn’t just drop everything to confirm what everyone in the agency had surely already told her—that I was going to be fine. Besides, she and I were just finding our way back to one another. I had no right to expect her to magically appear at my bedside.

I sighed. Pragmatism be damned. I was equal parts hurt and saddened that Allison hadn’t asked to be released from her assignment to come home. And the frustration and regret that sliced through me at the thought that she hadn’t even called or emailed me was painfully acute.

I clenched my hand impossibly tightly around the phone before I slung it onto the nightstand. It clattered before coming to rest against a pitcher full of water. A bitter taste like bile rose in the back of my throat, and I gritted my teeth against all the negative emotions pulling painfully on my insides like they were so much taffy. Unfortunately, all the teeth-gritting caused some pain to my outside, too. I winced at the stab along the right side of my jaw.

“Oh, good, you’re awake,” a tentative voice said from the doorway.

I glanced up and saw Meaghan hovering there, looking a touch uncertain. I smiled at her and nodded, waving her inside. Agents from the office had been taking turns coming to visit me throughout my stay. Though I didn’t always remember much about the visits due to the painkillers my doctors kept pumping through me, in my lucid moments, I appreciated them immensely.

“Hi, Meg. How’s it going?”

“Are you, you know…?”

“Sober?”

Meaghan nodded.

“Mmm. Ish,” I told her honestly. I’d been moderately successful at getting my doctors to back off on the drugs a bit. But I was still out of sorts.

Meaghan entered the room and took a seat in the chair Rory had recently vacated. Her eyes took in my battered face and my sling, and a strange expression flickered across her features. She reminded me of a little kid, for some reason, and I immediately wanted to put her at ease. “You sure about that?”

I frowned. “Reasonably. Why?”

“Eric Banks is running around telling everyone that when he was here you said you were going to take his badge and smack him hard enough on the forehead with it that it’d leave a permanent indent.”

I laughed. “He is, huh? Nice.”

“So is it true?”

“Absolutely. Though I’m still not sure why he was even here. I barely know him. I think we’ve met like once.”

“He came over with Anna. She wanted to see you. She seemed pretty shaken up by the whole thing. And for some reason Eric decided to tag along. At least that’s what Anna said.”

“It was sweet of her to be concerned. She’s a nice girl.”

“I think she’s got a crush on you.”

“Come on. She does not.”

“If it’s not that, then she thinks you’re the reincarnation of Wonder Woman. So maybe ease up with threatening the rookies. Don’t want to tarnish your image.”

“Not rookies. Just the one. I’d never say something like that to Anna. She’s squared away. And you’re right. It was the drugs talking. I’d never have said that out loud if I hadn’t been all doped up.”