“Dad?” she asked, voice a little sharp, needy.
“Your young man here made sure to come get me so we could check on you together,” Edmund said, moving in at the other side of her bed, reaching down to put a hand on her ankle as I touched her shoulder. “How are you?”
“The meds they gave me are sweet,” she said, giving us a dopey smile.
“Yeah, your old man made sure you’re getting the good shit,” I agreed. “Hear you have a pretty good concussion this time,” I said, my hand massaging her tight muscles. “Kind of a good excuse not to think too hard for a week or two.”
“I don’t think I could think if I tried,” Theo admitted, too drugged to be concerned about that fact.
“Have you had concussions?” Edmund asked, looking at me, the concern etched on his face.
“Yeah, a few. She’ll be fine. Might feel like shit for a few days, and she will need to rest both her mind and her body. But after that, she will be okay. Did they stitch your head, babe?” I asked. “Were you hurt anywhere else?”
“Everywhere hurt,” she told us, making my stomach clench hard. “Then… nothing hurt,” she added. “Boom,” she said, opening and closing her hand like a little explosion.
I nodded my head behind Edmund to where the doctor was standing, waiting to talk to him.
I waved him on, wanting to stay with Theo, figuring I could read her chart when they admitted her later to get all the nitty gritty details.
“Toll?” she asked, suddenly shocking out of her drug stupor for a second.
“Toll is conscious,” I told her. “He got knocked in the head something fierce too. So I imagine he’s enjoying the feel-good drugs you are right now. Maybe you will get to see him in the morning,” I added. “Danny is with him now.”
“That’s good,” she decided, nodding slowly.
“Do you have any idea what happened?”
“No… I was just… leaving work. And bam!” she said, mocking a whack to her head. “Then… pain,” she said, shaking her head a bit. “Am I allowed to sleep yet?”
“Yeah, baby, go ahead and sleep. They’re just gonna wake you up every once in a while to check on you, that’s all.”
“Stupid,” she grumbled as her eyes were already starting to drift closed.
With her out, and having been originally attacked from behind, I was holding out hope that maybe Toll was conscious and talking, that he’d seen more than she had, since he’d probably walked out during her attack.
“Is she sleeping?” Edmund asked, coming back in.
“Yeah. Those meds are hitting her hard.”
“The doctor is going to keep her for the night. Maybe two. She has a pretty bad concussion. And more stitches on her head. A bruised rib. She said that her body is one big bruise,” he told me.
Knowing she was safe, that she was in good hands, the rage that hadn’t reared its ugly head back when I first saw her started to spread through my system right then.
“They’ll pay,” I said, voice tight.
“I don’t doubt that,” Edmund said, nodding. “I wish I could be a part of it,” he said, looking at his daughter. “Your friend out in the hall would like to speak to you about Toll,” he told me. “Don’t worry,” he said when I hesitated. “I will stay right by her side.”
“I’ll be right back,” I told him, moving out in the hall to find Fallon standing there, looking beat.
“How is she?”
“Concussion, stitches, lots of bruises. But they jacked her up on pain meds, so she’s out cold now. Toll?”
“It’s a third-degree concussion,” Fallon said, face grim. “The doctor said he doesn’t remember shit. Which is normal with such a severe concussion. Said he could be struggling for weeks. We gotta figure out how to take care of him. He doesn’t have anyone.”
“We’ll figure that out. He’s gonna be here a few days, right?”
“Yeah. And we are gonna have guys stationed here while he and Theo are in here.”
“Did the cameras show anything?”
“A guy in a ski mask. Not much to go on. Brooks is probably already getting copies of the videos sent to everyone, so we can all analyze it.”
“Okay good. I need to find this fucker.”
“You will. But maybe right now, fight back the murderer and bring forward the caretaker. Think maybe Theo is going to need that for a while.”
“Yeah,” I agreed. It wasn’t exactly in my wheelhouse, but I was going to figure out how to do it.
“Dezi,” Fallon said, ducking his head a little.
“Yeah?”
“She’s gonna be alright,” he assured me, clamping a hand on my shoulder, giving it a squeeze, then moving away when Danny came out of Toll’s room.
“How is he?” Edmund asked when I walked back into the room.
“Gonna be a long recovery,” I told him honestly. “Is she going to move up to a floor soon?” I asked.