He whirled around at her ear-shattering yell to see Mike standing, outside Vanessa’s door, her blouse pulled out from the waist of her pants, her ponytail straggling over one ear, and how had that happened? If he wasn’t mistaken, her eyes were still glazed, and that was nice, but—
Her hands were on her hips, then she actually shook a teacher’s finger at him. She was now standing not two feet from the crowded nurses’ counter, surrounded by techs, doctors, nurses, and there was an orderly standing in the doorway of a room, holding a bedpan. No one was moving, every eye on them. Craig Swanson stood behind her, and the bastard was smirking.
Time stopped.
She took one step toward him, drew up, shook her finger at him again. “How dare you say you’re sorry, that it shouldn’t have happened, that it was a mistake, and then you bolt?” She shook her finger again at him and yelled, “Bad dog!”
The silence was deafening.
No, she hadn’t said that, she couldn’t have. He cleared his throat. “Bad dog? I’m a bad dog?”
“You’re worse than a bad dog, but that’s not the point. Now you’re all sorry you smashed me against the wall? Sorry you had your hands all over me? You regret turning into a wild man? You want to talk? Talk? Well, forget that, Special Agent Drummond, because that will not happen. I will never talk about this, do you hear me? I will pull my own tonsils out through my ears if I’m ever even tempted to talk about this. Do you understand me?”
“You’re yelling, of course I understand you.”
“Good. So that must mean your brain is functioning again.” She looked neither to the right nor to the left, marched right up to him, saw him open his mouth, and shoved him back. “No, you keep your mouth shut. We need to get downstairs. I believe Dillon will be there, although I don’t exactly remember what we’re going to do with him, but it will come to me.”
She smacked her hand again against his chest. He started to grab her wrist, but didn’t. Nicholas stared at her furious face, saw the pounding pulse in her throat, the snap and fire in her eyes, and couldn’t help himself. He laughed, then cleared his throat and called out to all the staring hospital staff, at all their now-blooming smiles, the stirrings of laughter, “As you were! No charge for the show,” and he punched the elevator button and they waited, silent, side by side. Nicholas heard Craig Swanson hoot with laughter, and others joining him, talking, laughing, a couple of them even shouting suggestions to the Bad Dog. He even heard a bark and a woof.
When the doors opened, a nurse stepped out, humming the theme from Frozen, “Let It Go.” She took one look at them and said, “Whoa,” and hurried off.
“What!” Mike yelled after her. “We have our clothes on! What’s wrong with you?”
As the doors closed, they heard more rolling shouts of laughter. A couple more barks.
He opened his mouth.
“Be quiet unless you can verify that Dillon is meeting us in the lobby.”
“I believe so. It’s about the video feeds from that diner in Baltimore. I think. Then we’re going home with him to have lasagna for dinner. But I suppose that could have changed, what with no power. I’m not really one for cold lasagna, are you?”
“No.”
“Would you like me to call Savich? Verify?”
She shook her head, kept staring at the slow-moving numbers. The elevator stopped on the second floor, the doors opened, and there stood two white-coated doctors talking about nausea. One look, and by mutual unspoken agreement they turned and walked quickly away.
When the bell dinged and the doors opened onto the lobby, he watched Mike march out of the elevator, head high, never looking at him, not looking at any of the dozens of people in the lobby. She spotted Dillon, waved, and continued her march toward him.
She had to stop when three teenagers, one of them with his arm in a brand-new cast that was already covered with lewd drawings and scrawls, blocked her way. She couldn’t knock the kid out of the way, he was hurt and drug-addled.