“I don’t love. It’s a pointless emotion that makes men weak.”
“Samara is the love of your life,” Hunter continues, forcing the subject on Archer.
I touch a hand to Hunter’s shoulder, but he doesn’t look at me, so I ask in a whisper. “What are you doing?”
“Tell me about Samara.” The man who I’ve come to care for keeps going, taunting Archer, who flinches at the words. “You kissed her. Touched her when you were teenagers. She was yours, and you fucking left her to die. Do you know what the fuck you did?” Hunter’s body is vibrating with anger, and I know when he’s in this mood, nothing can stop him. I’ve seen him torture before, but seeing him do this to Archer is too much.
“Stop.”
He rears his fist back, slamming it with a loud crunch into Archer’s nose. “Tell me, you asshole! You fucking let her get raped and violated.”
Archer flinches. His head drops forward as if he’s passed out, and I take a step toward him. His head lolls back and forth, then he meets my gaze and speaks. “One, zero, two, nine, nine, three.” My mouth falls open, realizing what he’s reciting. “One, zero, two, nine, nine, three,” he repeats.
“My birthday.”
Hunter’s gaze burns into me from my left, but it’s Archer’s who holds my attention.
“Mara,” he says before his eyes snap closed and he passes out.
“We need to get that fucking thing out of his head,” I tell Hunter who’s watching me with those green eyes that hold all the love in the world for me.
“We’ll do it. I need a blade, sharpened, and we’ll need to use alcohol to sanitize it.” I move quickly around the room as Hunter gets the handheld X-ray machine that we’ve used many times before to remove bullets. I watch him work, in awe of how still his hand is.
“Do you think you’ll find it?”
“Yes, we need to make sure we know exactly where this fucking thing is.” When the device reaches the back of Archer’s head, it beeps loudly in the small space. “Stay back, because I don’t know what this is going to do.”
“I’m helping,” I insist.
“Dammit, Sam!” Hunter’s deep growl is enough to shake the basement walls. “I want you safe,” he tells me, softening his tone somewhat.
“Fine,” I tell him, but I don’t move. He shakes his head, lifting the knife I’ve sanitized, and places the sharp tip against Archer’s scalp. He makes a slow incision, which has tension tightening my shoulders. Blood oozes from the cut as he makes it large enough to be able to get tweezers inside.
“I don’t know how deep this is,” he says, concentration on what he’s doing. I lift the metal tweezers, rounding him so I’m closer to Archer. We work together, slow and steady as I push the metal into the open wound of the man I love. I’m drenched in blood. My hands are a dark wine color by the time I hit metal inside the lower part of Archer’s skull. When I finally get a grip of it, I tug.
With the small metal chip clamped in between the tips, I set it down on the table and watch as Hunter stitches the cut back up.
“Do you think he’ll be okay?” I ask, meeting my best friend’s gaze.
He pulls me into a hug, warm and calming, planting a soft kiss on my head. “Yes, he’ll be just fine, Buttercup,” he promises, but I don’t know if he’s right.
Can Archer really be the boy I fell in love with again?
After all he’s done, the guilt will probably eat him alive.
That’s if he remembers everything he’s done.
Chapter 20
Archer
It’s the strong metallic scent that overwhelms me first. It wraps me up in a tight blanket, but it’s not one that gives hope. No, not at all. It constricts the movements I’m able to make. I want to run, but I can’t. That’s when the noises come. The anguished cries mixing with agonizing pain. There isn’t a part of my body that doesn’t hurt. The blood comes again. I look down at my hand, and the crimson lifeforce is running through my fingers and along my arms. It should be beautiful to me, but instead, it’s a sight that turns my stomach for the first time since my youth.
What the hell is happening?
A shadow in the corner of my eye has me lifting my head from its perusal of the blood.
Am I dead? Is this hell?
A figure steps out from the shadows. It’s my predecessor, Dr. Hickson; I recognize his old weather-beaten face immediately. He has his arms wrapped around his chest; I think it’s odd because he is an animated man and always had his hand flying around in the air no matter what. Slowly, he moves them away from his core and reveals where his chest is cut wide open and oozing crimson onto the floor in front of him. I can see his heart and lungs, the life-giving muscle beating slower and slower each time. I count the seconds between each beat, one, two, three, four, thump. One, two, three, thump.