Redemption Road (Vicious Cycle #2)(15)

Vaguely I remembered men arriving at the compound. Even though I had been in such agony, I remembered the chaos around me—the screaming¸ the explosions, the loud, threatening voices. But Mendoza had beaten me so badly I couldn’t do anything but lie on the floor and await my fate. Just as I felt myself fading, I had seen Jesus. He had gotten me out of Mendoza’s quarters. My savior had told me his name. I racked my brain to try to remember it. Finally it came to me.

“Rev?” I questioned.

The doctor’s brows shot up in surprise. “He’s just outside. If you want him, I’ll have him come in.”

For reasons I couldn’t understand, I wanted the stranger with me. “Please.”

He nodded. As he turned to the door, the room began to grow darker. I fought hard to stay awake to see my savior. When I saw him framed in the doorway, I couldn’t fight any longer, and I once again fell under the harsh tide.

When I resurfaced, I found myself in a darkened room. Relief flooded me as I imagined I must’ve made it out of surgery. When I shifted in bed, pain tore through my abdomen, causing me to gasp. A warm hand met mine, and I immediately jerked away, recoiling from the touch. I could hear the panic in the muffled cry of apprehension that escaped my lips. Who was touching me? Where was Dr. Edgeway? I didn’t like the nearly constant uncertainty I now felt.

“Shh, Annabel, it’s okay. I’m not going to hurt you.”

That voice. It didn’t belong to the doctor from before, but somehow it was still familiar to me. Slowly I turned my head on the pillow, searching through the darkness for him. A light flicked on over my head, and I was finally able to see him. His kind blue eyes met mine, and they instantly eased some of the fear. The striking color seemed such a contrast to his mahogany hair. He sat in an uncomfortable-looking chair pulled up against the bed. In the silence, I drank in his comforting appearance—his long, jeans-encased legs, the T-shirt that appeared to be covered in blood or dirt, his shoulder-length hair that was swept back from the face that gave me a reassuring smile, his broad chest.

When I realized we were alone in the room, sharp jabs of fear prickled over my skin. My rational mind told me to be frightened of him. He was a stranger—a strange man at that. He towered over me with muscles that could inflict great harm. But everything I needed to know about him was in his eyes. Searching them showed me that he was a gentle giant, and he seemed like someone that I could trust.

At what must’ve seemed like my continued apprehension, Rev held his hands up. “I’m not going to hurt you, I swear. As long as I have a breath in me, no one is ever going to hurt you again. You’re safe.”

I stared at him, weighing his words. “Y-You saved me,” I whispered.

“I guess you could say that,” he replied. I was shocked when he shyly ducked his head. The reaction seemed so foreign from the tough-guy persona he exuded.

“You got me away from Mendoza and that horrible place.”

“Yeah, I did.”

“So you saved me, and I’d like to thank you.”

He glanced up to give me a sad smile. “You’re welcome.”

When I tried pushing myself up in bed, pain once again charged through my midsection like a locomotive, causing me to wince. “Do you need more pain medicine?” Rev asked.

“No!” I answered a little more loudly and emphatically than I should have. I felt embarrassed at Rev’s raised brows. “I’ll be fine,” I added more calmly. The truth was I didn’t like feeling woozy and incapacitated. The last time I had been drugged was when I had been kidnapped.

Once I had ridden out the pain, I asked, “How long have I been out?”

“A day.”

I gasped. “I was out that long?”

“After being beaten and going through surgery, you needed it.”

“How bad was I?”

Rev grimaced. “Breakneck wasn’t sure you would make it through the surgery.”

“Breakneck?”

Rev chuckled. “I mean, Dr. Edgeway.”

“He was very kind to me when I woke up before surgery.”

“He’s an amazing doctor. If anyone could have saved you, it was him.”

Staring into Rev’s face, I recalled more of what had happened before I went into surgery. “I asked him to get you, didn’t I?”

He nodded. “And I came to you.”

“Yes, you did,” I murmured as I vaguely remembered his standing in the doorway before I’d slipped into unconsciousness again.

“I stayed by your side the entire time you were in recovery. It’s probably good we are in Mexico because I’m pretty sure an American hospital wouldn’t have allowed me to stay.”

I couldn’t rationalize why I found myself so drawn to him or why I had felt the need to have him with me during surgery. After all, he was a stranger to me. Sure, he had proven himself to some degree by rescuing me from the depths of hell, but I still knew so little about who he was. Was Rev really a knight in shining armor or had I once again met a wolf in sheep’s clothing?

When I shook myself free of my distracting thoughts, I found Rev staring at me. I hadn’t cared about my appearance since I had been kidnapped. Although I had been forced to look good for Mendoza, I didn’t seek his approval. For some strange reason, though, I now found myself worrying about what Rev thought of me. I brought my hand, which was currently tethered to an IV pole, to my hair. “I must be a mess.”