“Either you do it with your medical training and steady hand, or I’ll do it with a knife,” I say, arching a brow.
Exhaling, he pulls a sealed package from his bag, ripping it open and revealing a kidney shaped bowl, with a scalpel, gauze, and a suture kit. His hand is shaking as he examines each arm, finding the spot where the tiny implant is sitting beneath her skin. Turning away from her, he fills a needle with something and injects it into arm, near where he was examining.
“Anything bigger than a scratch on her skin and I’ll mark you in the same way you mark her,” I warn.
His face pales to a sickly gray color, but he drags in a shaky breath, and when he exhales and lifts his hand again, it’s steady. My eyes watch as he cuts through her skin with the scalpel, making a tiny incision. Taking a pair of metal tweezers I hadn’t noticed from the bowl, he pushes them into her arm and after a few moments, pulls out a thin plastic rod about an inch long.
Blood is coating the rod, the tweezers, and dripping down her arm, and I clamp my jaw together, stopping myself from killing him for making her bleed.
Dropping the tweezers into the bowl, he picks up the gauze and presses it against the cut on her arm. “I numbed the area before I made the incision so she won’t feel any pain for a few hours and it should be nothing more than sore once it wears off. I don’t think it’ll need a stitch, but I can put one in, if you wish. Alternatively, as soon as the bleeding stops, I can just put a band-aid.”
“Whatever you think best,” I tell him stiffly.
Five minutes later, there’s a band-aid over the tiny wound on her arm, and Dr. Wood is pointedly avoiding my gaze while he peels off his gloves and drops them into a medical waste bag that he’s already put all the other used equipment and needles into.
“There’s a helicopter waiting to take you to the testing facility on the mainland. They have assured me the results can be provided within an hour, so I’ll await your call.”
“Of course, Mr. Belov. I’ll call you as soon as I have them. Please let me know if you have any concerns on any other medical related issues.”
“Thank you.” Dismissing him, my gaze moves back to the girl sleeping in the bed.
CHAPTER 12
alabama
Waking up, my body feels heavy, like I’m being weighed down by something. It’s not the normally lethargy that comes with sleep, but a strange otherness that makes me feel like a foreign entity within my own body.
The first thing that I register when my limbs start to feel like my own, is that whatever I’m lying on is comfortable. When I first moved in with Monica, it took weeks for the panic to abate when I woke up warm and dry, safe and alone.
After sleeping on the floor in the closet even for one night, not feeling, hard, cold wood beneath me feels foreign and strange. Blinking my heavy eyes open, I look up at a white ceiling and a modern air conditioning vent. The weight I can feel is actually a heavy comforter that’s covering me to mid chest, and the comfort I’m feeling is because I’m lying in the middle of the enormous orgy bed.
Bolting upright I feel a tugging at my arm. Movement to my right makes me realize I’m not alone, and I shriek as I try to climb from the bed. Pain laces up my right arm as I scramble to free myself from the comforter and then there’s strong hands on me, holding me down.
“Settle,” a familiar voice orders, gruff and annoyed.
I open my mouth to scream, but he lifts a hand and speaks before I can. “You passed out while we were talking, and I called a doctor. You were extremely dehydrated, so Dr. Wood hooked you up to some IV fluid, which is what is currently still attached to your arm. If you rip the needle out, you’ll hurt yourself and will only need to have it reinserted. So, settle down and try to behave, so you don’t cause more injury to yourself.”
I let him gently reposition me in the bed so I’m close enough to the IV stand that has a half empty bag hanging from it. “A doctor?” I croak, my throat dry.
“Here,” he says, opening a bottle of water and putting in a straw before bringing it to my lips. “Drink.”
Taking the end of the straw between my lips, I suck, and cold, refreshing water fills my mouth. When I stop drinking, he takes the bottle and places it on the bedside cabinet. Making sure not to disturb the IV, I wiggle up the bed until I’m sitting up, looking down at the gray T-shirt I’m wearing.
“Where are my clothes?”
“The doctor removed them so he could examine you,” Dimitri tells me calmly.
“So where are they?”
“He had to cut them from you.”
“What?” I gasp.
“You were unconscious, it was an emergency situation.” His shrug is so unaffected that I want to scream.
“I passed out, that hardly classes as an emergency,” I scoff.
“You have been out for almost four hours,” he says coldly. “Dr. Wood was concerned it was something more serious, so he performed a full physical and took bloodwork to rule out more serious conditions. He rushed via helicopter to the mainland to get the results. He called me about an hour ago to inform me that other than the dehydration and some signs of malnutrition, you’re in perfect health.”