Deja Who (Insighter #1)(16)

“Got that right.”

“But when you get out of here, we are going to see It. Also, you will need a new job because you will not be spying on me any longer. Tell It to hire someone else.”

“Got that right.” He paused. “Are you calling your mom It?”

She ignored him. “Dr. Drange, are you admitting him?”

“It’s Derange,” the doc, whose ID badge was smeared with blood corrected, and what an unfortunate name for a physician. He was scribbling in Archer’s chart. “Overnight at least, yeah. Couple of stab wounds would normally warrant a longer stay, but they’re pretty shallow. Messy, but not dangerous.”

“What do you know about my stab wounds? You’re a future veterinarian! I happen to think they’re messy and dangerous.”

“I think,” Derange added, raising a blond brow at her, “your heart wasn’t in it.”

“Shows what you know.” Archer was out of his foaming rage and entering Sulk Mode.

It did, actually. My heart wasn’t in it. Well, the second time.

“I said I was sorry,” she said when they were alone.

“You apologized for one grotesque wound, not both.”

“As I am certain,” she continued, “you are sorry for spying on me and scaring me.”

“Scaring you? No way in hell. An IRS audit wouldn’t scare you. Goddamned Typhoid Mary wouldn’t scare you.” Since Leah had met Mary Mallon just last year, he was correct. “You don’t scare.” A half-second pause, followed by, “Okay, sorryIscaredyoubutyoudidn’thavetostabmetwice.”

“You’re right.” She thought for a few seconds. Am I really going to do this? Yes. I am. “Can I get you anything?”

He blinked those dazzling eyes at her. “What?”

“You say ‘what’ a lot. Magazines? Gum? A cigar? Do you want me to call anyone?”

“. . . no.”

He doesn’t have anyone. Like me. The thought brought another unwitting smile to her lips.

“Why are you looking at me like that with your sexy shark eyes?”

“I . . .” Because I can’t see you, and I would like to. “I apologize.”

“I’ll tell you what I’d like.” He shook his head. “I can’t believe I’m saying this. I can’t believe I’m even thinking it. But . . .”

And that’s how she found herself spending the night curled into a surprisingly comfortable chair beside Archer’s hospital bed, the beeps and boops of the monitors around her lulling her into a sleep almost deeper than Archer’s drugged one.





EIGHT


Three days later, they were ready to knock on It’s door. Three days of Leah making several trips to the hospital to check on a private investigator who had the perfect name for a private investigator (or perhaps an action star): Archer Drake.

“Really?” she couldn’t help asking. “You didn’t make it up? Or legally change it?”

A shadow had crossed his face when she wondered aloud if he’d changed it and why, but it was gone so quickly she wondered if his wounds were bothering him and she had misinterpreted his expression.

“Go away, it’s my real name, stop coming around and challenging the reality of my name, you awful—Laffy Taffy! Mmm, bring banana-flavored next time.”

“I will not. There is no worse taste in the world than artificial banana. Well. Lava, perhaps.”

Two days of frustrating sessions with clients while all the time wondering what nonsense patient Archer Drake, condition satisfactory, was getting up to. Two days of anticipating and dreading the confrontation with her mother. Ha! Confrontation . . . her mother would never stoop to acknowledging any of Leah’s righteous fury. What was the word to describe a confrontation of one?

And as if all that wasn’t nerve-racking enough, two days of repeatedly staring hard at Archer Drake and verifying that, yes, she could not see him.

Unprecedented.

All that to say, for three days she almost forgot to be resigned to her untimely murder.

Upon discharge, Archer had insisted on taking a taxi to his apartment, and they’d agreed to meet at her office later that day. “Are you sure?” she asked for the third time, walking him through the hospital lobby. He was wearing scrubs, a reluctant gift from the admitting physician (his clothes were, of course, ruined), and walking carefully but energetically. “Perhaps you should take the day to rest.”

“Cluck-cluck, Leah. No. I want to get this over with. Also, I have a thousand questions for your mom. Your mom! I still can’t get over that.”

“Ugh.”

“Yeah, well, it’s happening, honey.”

“Do not,” she warned, “call me honey.”

“Whatever you say, sugar bear.”

“Good God.”

“Hey. Thanks for taking care of me.” His odd eyes were sparkling at her—she was unaware that people’s eyes could actually sparkle in real life. He was like a live-action anime cartoon. “Which you should have anyway since you put me in the hospital with multiple stab wounds but I’m beginning to see you had your reasons. Maybe. I dunno. You’re a weird chick, Nazir.”

“Call me a chick again, you will be right back in here.”