Chapter Six
Hudson
As a rule, Hudson didn’t get nervous. Yes, he could get buzzy with anticipation, or worried about someone, but nervous wasn’t a thing he did. Solid, steady, reassuring—that was his role and he loved to play it. But he was nervous now.
“Dude. Do I need to take that bunny away from you?”
Ian shot him a raised-brow glance as he flicked on the turn signal to pull into the parking garage at Clover City General Hospital.
“No,” he grumbled, fixing the light green bow around the stuffed animal’s neck that he’d crumpled. Wouldn’t do to have the stuffie looking all disheveled. She was brand new.
Ian had gotten impatient with him for taking so long to pick her out, but she had to be perfect. He wasn’t going to give Cosy some random ass plush and call it a day.
“Why are you freaking out?”
“Are you kidding me? I’m freaking out because I haven’t seen Cosy for four days and the last time I saw her she was crying and calling my name while strangers bundled her into an ambulance. I’m freaking out because Eric pulled a lot of strings and put his reputation on the line to make this happen. I’m freaking out because this needs to go well.”
He left the “if she’s going to come home with us” unsaid. They’d cross that bridge when they came to it. So what if they were barreling up to where the bridge was supposed to be and he only saw a cliff?
Stomach in knots, he tried not to annoy Ian by telling him how he should drive in the parking garage or where they should park. He could’ve driven himself but he was really worked up and he didn’t trust himself to devote 100 percent of his attention to the road. About 99 percent of his brain was thinking about Cosy, and had been for the past four days.
After she’d been taken away in the ambulance, they’d looked up the info her top had given when they came to Hive. But the guy’s profile on the kink site was basically an internet Potemkin village—looked fine when they’d scanned it before letting him into the club, but give it a push and there was nothing behind it. Same with the email and phone number he’d provided. Guy was a ghost.
Eric said he and her social worker and some other hospital staff and some cops had asked her about her top but she wasn’t giving up squat. Loyalty was an admirable trait for sure but not when it came to the fucker who’d almost killed you. Maybe he’d be able to coax more information out of her. Maybe he’d be able to make whoever had done this to her pay.
Especially because Eric had said her reappearance had closed a cold case—a sixteen-year-old Cosima Valtolina had disappeared eight years ago without a trace.
It should’ve been a victory to find someone alive after so long but seeing what had happened to her and knowing she’d suffered at this guy’s hands for eight fucking years? Hudson would never say so but he was sure some people wh’d say she would’ve been better off dead.
Eight goddamn years. That would haunt him until the day he died.
They made their way to the front desk and a receptionist directed them to the elevators that would take them up to the floor where Cosy’s room was. He paced in the elevator and Ian made excuses for him to the strangers who stared.
There was another desk when they walked out of the elevators, this one staffed by a woman who looked like a nurse—wearing light blue scrubs with a name badge on a lanyard around her neck.
“Can I help you?”
“Yes, I’m here to see Cosima Valtolina.”
He’d practiced saying her name a thousand times so it would sound like he knew her, like they were old friends—not like Eric had told him her last name yesterday.
“You must be Mr. Lindberg,” she stated and then shot a suspicious look at Ian. “You’re the only one with permission to see Miss Valtolina.”
“I’m just the chauffeur,” Ian volunteered before clapping a hand on Hudson’s shoulder. “It’s gonna be fine okay? Just chill.”
Chill was not something Hudson was good at and Ian knew it. He could be and often was calm and steady but chill was not his thing. Ian did chill very well but he also had a temper. Luckily he was employing his chill now and went to sit in the small waiting room across the hall.
Hudson relaxed a bit when he saw Eric walking toward him. He ducked his head to the nurse and met Eric with a handshake.
“Hey, thanks for doing this.”
“No problem. She’s really looking forward to seeing you.”
His heart did a little jump. He was used to having people at the club looking forward to seeing him—especially bottoms, most especially littles. He liked them and they liked him back. But there was something special about Cosy that made the pleasure in his chest burn brighter.
As they walked down the linoleum-covered floor, Eric cleared his throat.
“I know you saw Cosima a few days ago so you know she’s going to look rough. But I wanted to remind you the first day isn’t the worst day. You know that.”
Yeah he did. Bruises usually showed up best after a day or two and then there was the whole fading into greenish-yellow territory. That wasn’t pretty.
“I’m trying to tell you she looks really bad. And maybe you’ll have better luck than I did but she doesn’t smile, she doesn’t laugh, she doesn’t say all that much. Her social worker told me she doesn’t even cry, no matter how much pain she must be in. So if she’s withdrawn, it’s not you.”
“Okay. I got it.”
They stopped in front of a wooden door with one of those narrow glass panels over the door handle and Hudson tried to peer over Eric’s shoulder to catch a glimpse of Cosy but Eric grabbed his arm before he saw her.
“Be careful, alright? And I’m talking about for both your sakes. I am no way saying Cosima is lying about anything but I know for damn sure she’s not telling the whole truth.”