And There He Kept Her (Ben Packard #1)(38)

He’d spent most of the morning in the basement, too nervous to let her out of his sight for too long. Breakfast was another egg-and-sausage sandwich and a can of peaches in syrup that had probably been in the cupboard since before Myra left him.

His own pain, in his back and down his leg, was a dull buzz thanks to the pills. He’d topped four hundred pounds the last time he went to the doctor to have his ailments cataloged as part of getting his prescriptions renewed: emphysema, type 2 diabetes, an enlarged heart, arthritis, and psoriasis. His knees and hips were all bone on bone, his fingers knobby claws that could still hold a beer or a pinch a cigarette but not much else.

Pull a trigger. They could still do that.

The girl suddenly moaned loudly, causing Emmett to twitch in his chair. He reached for the cigarette in the ashtray and found it had burned down to the filter and gone out. He was on pill time again. Cigarettes burned down, TV shows ended, rooms got dark without him noticing. Keeping track of time on oxycodone was like trying to carry water in his hands.

Emmett crushed the empty beer can, tossed it on the overflowing garbage pile, then rocked a couple of times to get the momentum he needed to propel himself from the chair. His breath came in quick, shallow gasps as he shuffled back to the room.

The girl was on her side under the blanket, her back to the door. The fresh air hadn’t done much for the smell inside.

“You should get clean,” he said. “There’s a place to shower out here. We should look at that hand, too.”

The girl sat up and unwound the bandage on her hand, revealing something that looked like it had been chewed by a dog.

“It hurts so much,” she said.

“It’s supposed to hurt. You were shot. Not supposed to feel like getting licked by kittens.”

Emmett put her in leg irons and handcuffs before unlocking her from the chain on the wall. He pulled the blanket away and helped her rise up and steady herself. Her naked body made both of them uncomfortable. She hunched forward while he tried not to stare. She twisted the plastic port on her belly and detached her insulin pump, leaving it on the cot.

They made their way to the sink where a length of green garden hose went from the faucet up and over a hook in the floor joists. Emmett turned on the tap and adjusted the temperature.

The water made the girl jump and yelp like a rake was being drawn across her wounds. Emmett stood close by, prodding her with a finger to stay under the downpour. He grabbed her by the wrist and shoved her hand directly under the water when he saw she was trying to keep it from getting wet.

Suddenly she stopped fighting and went completely limp. Emmett let go and let her crumple to the floor.

“Sonofabitch,” he said.

He turned off the water. She was clean enough. He found a first aid kit on the shelves behind his rocker, took out a brown bottle of hydrogen peroxide, and poured its contents over her hand and her leg. If she wasn’t already passed out, she would have been after that.

In another part of the basement he rummaged through a bag filled with old T-shirts Myra had set aside to be used as rags. He grabbed one the girl could dry off with and one to wear. He left them on the bed in the cage, along with the gauze and the tape and the bandages from the first aid kit.

He went back to the girl. She was on her back, twisted to one side on the wet floor. Her short hair was wet and flat against her head. Pink streams of blood thinned by water and peroxide ran in rivulets from the wounds on her leg. The flesh around the pellets under her skin was bruised and red.

Emmett staggered to his feet and eased down low enough to where he could reach her. He smacked her cheek a couple of times. “Come on. Wake up. Get up, girl.”

She stirred. Her eyelids fluttered, then filled with hopelessness as she came to and moved her shackled hands and feet.

Emmett helped her up and led her back to the cage. She sat on the edge of the bed, shivering and silent. She reached up with her handcuffed hands and brushed the hair out her eyes. She did as he told her, using one of the T-shirts to dry off. Every few seconds she cringed in pain.

“What is all that?” he asked as she reconnected her pump and checked the tape around the button on the other side of her navel.

“This is a continuous glucose monitor,” she said, pointing to the button. “It tells me if I need more or less insulin. This tube delivers insulin from the pump as I need it.”

“I’ll be damned,” he said. “No needles?”

“Both of these have needles embedded in me,” she said. “It’s fewer needles overall. Fewer injections.”

“I’m supposed to test my blood and use needles but I don’t.”

“You have type 2. It’s still bad if you don’t control it.”

“Costs too much. Can’t afford to treat the diabetes and the pain.”

“My insulin pump is down to thirty percent,” she told him. “I’m turning the power off and only giving myself minimal boluses to make it last. I get tired and weak when I don’t get enough insulin.”

Emmett didn’t have any response to that so he ignored it. He undid the handcuffs so she could put the other shirt on. It came down to her knees and elbows, fitting her like a nightgown. It was yellow with a Ferris wheel on the front and the words Sandy Lake Labor Day Festival 1986. This girl wasn’t even born when he got that T-shirt.

He lit a cigarette and leaned against the far wall while he watched her dress her wounded hand. He could feel the need for another pill coming on. His back was tight from all the walking and bending. Pain traced a red-hot wire through his right buttock and all the way down his leg.