Chapter 16

Newt

I awoketo the sound of endless beeping. I was so tired, all I wanted to do was go back to sleep, but the beeping wouldn't stop. It was driving me mad. Although my eyelids felt like they each weighed twenty pounds, I eventually opened them just to see what was making that sound and how I could shut it up.

The sight that greeted me was a familiar one. White walls and white bed sheets draped over a small bed with railings on either side. It'd seen so many hospital rooms over the course of my career, but never from this side of things. I was no longer the paramedic bringing someone in on a gurney, or the nurse standing bedside. This time, I was the patient.

What the hell happened?

I didn't normally curse, but those words ricocheted around my skull so hard I visibly flinched.

In the seat next to my bed, Frankie jolted out of the doze he seemed to have fallen into.

Maybe my question hadn't stayed contained inside my head like I thought. I didn't remember using my vocal cords, but either I'd spoken out loud or Frankie had coincidentally woken up at that exact same moment.

"Newt. You're awake." Frankie practically fell out of the chair he was sitting in when he rushed to my side. "How do you feel?"

"Tired. Dizzy." I coughed and pain shot through my lungs. "My chest hurts. Frankie, what happened? Why am I here?"

He fussed, tutting as he carefully used his hands to smooth out the thin blanket covering me. "What do you remember?"

I shooed his hands away and pushed the blanket down in order to sit up properly. "Sebastian and I were alone. We..." I recalled our moment in the shower, and the several moments we shared afterward. My face burned hot and my headache throbbed.

Frankie didn't need to hear about any of that.

"We were alone in the apartment. Sebastian heard someone and called out to them, but they didn't answer. Then he grabbed me off the bed and..."

I remembered hitting the floor and feeling annoyed when I smacked my head. Then there was nothing. My memory just went black.

"Sebastian heard someone in the apartment?"

I looked up, startled by the unexpected voice, and found Damien standing in the doorway staring at me with the most serious expression I'd ever seen.

I nodded, but quickly stopped when the room spun. "Um, yeah. He thought it was one of you guys, but when he called out to them, they left. Then he opened the door and..."

The smell of smoke assaulted my nose, and I looked around expecting to see something on fire. "I don't know what happened."

Damien looked like he was about to say something, but at that moment a doctor and several nurses bustled into the room.

I recognized them. I'd worked with all of them in the past. They were good people, but at that moment I didn't have any patience for them as they took my vitals, asked how I was feeling, and told me information I already knew.

I had a concussion. That was no surprise.

A deep cut on my head needed stitches. Even more obvious than the concussion.

My lungs had smoke damage. This was a little odd, but not unexpected. I could tell there was something wrong with my lungs every time I took a breath.

None of this told me how the injuries happened, and none of my fellow coworkers seemed inclined to tell me.

Finally, after an extensive examination, I was left alone with Damien and Frankie to demand answers.

The pair looked at each other, seemingly daring the other to speak first. Eventually, Damien sat by my bed and leaned forward so his elbows rested on his knees in a defeated position.

"Some sort of explosion went off in the apartment. We don't know the cause yet, but I doubt it was accidental. The entire apartment was destroyed. Those of us who were downstairs at the time are fine, but you and Sebastian barely survived. He..."

Damien's voice cracked and I was startled to see tears drip from the man's eyes.

"Sebastian. What happened to him?"

A new thought occurred to me.

What was Damien doing here with me?

If Sebastian was hurt, Damien would want to be with his brother.

Unless...

I couldn't breathe.

"He's not... Damien, tell me Sebastian is alive." My heart thumped beneath my breast and my monitor went wild.

Breathing deeply through his nose, Damien managed to find some composure. "He's alive, but he's in surgery right now. In order to get the two of you out of the apartment, he had to jump out the window. His leg couldn't take the impact. It re-broke worse than before. The doctors are trying to fix it right now, but... He may not be able to walk again."

Before I knew what I was doing, I'd thrown my blanket aside and was halfway on my feet.

"Absolutely not. He can't... I won't let that happen."

"Whoa, Newt." Frankie grabbed my shoulders and forced me back onto the bed. "Calm down. What are you going to do, storm the operation room and perform the surgery yourself? The doctors are doing their best to fix his leg, and then afterward you and I will make sure he recovers. All right?"

The surge of adrenaline drained me, and I collapsed back against the thin hospital pillows. "Fine. You're right. I just..." I pressed my hands against my eyes, trying to hold my tears at bay. "It's not fair. He was finally getting back on his feet. Do you know when he's getting out of surgery?"

"It should be soon," Damien said, right before Gabe stepped into the room distracting him.

"I've set security around the building. This room should at least be safe, so we'll have the doctors bring Sebastian here once they're done."

Damien gave an absent nod as he stood and casually wiped the wrinkles from his clothes. "Safe. Right."

With no warning, he suddenly lunged forward and punched Gabe across the face. The force of the blow sent the FBI agent slamming into the wall.

Damien loomed over Gabe and grabbed the other man's lapel like he meant to punch him again.

"This room is safe? Just like the apartment was supposed to be safe? This is the second time your agency has promised to protect us and failed. Someone got into the apartment and planted an explosive. How were they able to do that when you were supposedly protecting the place?"

Pulling out a handkerchief from his pocket, Gabe wiped the blood from his split lip. "Supposedly? You think I was lying to you?"

Damien's knuckles cracked when his fists clenched. "One of your people betrayed us. It's the only explanation. God, this is just like last time. Nothing has changed. Russo still has spies in your agency."

Gabe eyed Damien's hands warily, ready to dodge another punch, and wisely didn't try to come any closer.

"We don't know for certain that David Russo is involved."

Although Damien stood with his back to me, I could still tell he rolled his eyes just from the sound of his voice. "After what we just discovered. Of course he's involved."

Not wanting to disrupt the argument, I leaned over to Frankie. "What did they discover?"

Frankie kept his voice to a whisper as he also cautiously watched the two arguing men. "Right before everything... blew up. Agent Adder brought some new information. The FBI has been looking into the adoption agencies that we know kids have disappeared from. They found donations to those agencies made by companies that are suspected fronts for David Russo and the Mariano family."

"So, this Mafia Boss guy is paying off the agencies to supply kids to his pedophile ring?"

"Looks that way." Frankie shrugged. "At least, that's what it seemed like when I was eavesdropping on their meeting."

While we spoke, the argument between Damien and Gabe became more heated until Frankie had to intervene. Technically, Gabe never yelled, but he did seem twitchy and on edge compared to his usual stern appearance.

Damien, however, was obviously struggling to control himself. He excused himself from the room by claiming he was going to check on Sebastian's situation.

I groaned and lay back against the pillows, pulling a blanket over my face to block out the world. It was too much. I wanted to go back to the moment right before the explosion, when everything had been looking up.

That had only been a few hours ago.

How could so much change so quickly?

Gabe eventually also left the room, though he stayed just outside the door to keep watch over things. If there was a traitor among the FBI, which was looking more and more likely, I doubted Gabe was involved. He'd literally lived with us for weeks. If he wanted to harm us, he wouldn't have had to go so far as blowing up the apartment. He could have simply shot us in our sleep.

It was a morbid thought. During my time as a nurse and a paramedic, I'd faced death and injury almost every day, but never my own. Before this whole incident, the closest I'd ever come to mortal danger was when I fell out of a tree as a kid because I wanted to befriend the squirrels that lived in its branches.

That was a much happier thought than worrying over Sebastian's surgery. I refused to acknowledge the doctor's concerns. Sebastian would walk again. Even if I had to spend the next several years personally nursing him back to health, he was going to walk again. Then, we'd go to a park and feed the squirrels, and I'd tell him about the time I climbed to the top of a tall tree because I wanted to be a Disney princess. Every Disney princess has an animal companion they can talk to, so I thought the squirrels could be mine.

He would definitely find the story funny.

When Frankie and I were the only ones left in the room, we passed the time playing cards. With only two people, the games we could play were limited, but it kept us occupied.

I'd just won my third hand of go-fish when someone new walked through the door. There was barely enough time for me to recognize my sister before she rushed over to me, grabbing me in a hug and knocking the cards to the floor.

"Newton, oh my God," she said as she squeezed me. "I got a call from the hospital saying you were in some sort of accident. What happened?"

Accident?

Really?

Was that what the hospital was calling it?

"Um, hey, Rosalind." I awkwardly patted her back. Our lunch meeting hadn't ended on a positive note, and I had no idea where the two of us stood with each other. "I'm okay. Just a bit of a concussion which should clear up."

She held me out at arm's length to get a better look at me, eyeing me up and down. "Okay? You're black and blue all over."

"It's not that bad."

Maybe it was. There hadn't been a chance for me to look in a mirror yet, but no matter how bad I looked, Sebastian must be in a worse state. It felt selfish to complain about a few bumps and bruises.

My sister finally noticed Frankie sitting beside me and held out her hand like it was a business meeting.

"Hi, I'm Rosalind Clary. You must be Frankie Zolnai, my brother's roommate."

It was an oddly formal introduction, but at least she'd gotten his name right.

Frankie accepted her hand but didn't bother replying as she was already talking again.

"Thanks so much for taking care of my brother. Are you the one who brought him in?"

I shouldn't have been surprised when Damien chose that moment to return. The hospital may as well have installed a revolving door with how often people kept coming and going from my room.

The minute I saw Damien, my sister was immediately forgotten. "Any news?"

Damien's expression was neither happy nor sad, but his hands toyed a pair of sunglasses, betraying the man's agitation. "Yeah. He's out of surgery, though he's still unconscious. They won't know how well it went until he wakes up."

"Can I see him?"

"Yeah. They're bringing him in now." It was only then that Damien noticed my sister. "I'm sorry, who are you?"

"Rosalind Clary. Newton's sister. Who are you?"

I could see Damien mouthing the syllables of my name in confusion. He'd likely never heard my full name before, and even if he had, it was so seldom used that most people forgot the name on my birth certificate wasn't actually Newt.

"Dami—Daz Roth. Bastian's brother. Look, you may need to clear out. We're going to need more space for my brother."

Just as Damien had stumbled over my name, I noticed my sister equally puzzled by Bastian's name as she quietly repeated it under her breath.

As though it had been planned, the hospital staff chose that moment to wheel Sebastian's bed through the door. He was unconscious, lying among a sea of white sheets. His normally healthy complexion looked pale, and there were heavy bags under his eyes along with several places where stitches could be seen on his skin.

The worst, however, was once again his leg. This time, instead of a cast, they had his right leg suspended in full traction. There was also a brace around the ankle and knee of his left leg, but those were barely noticeable in comparison.

He looked horrible, but his chest moved. He was still breathing. That was all I could ask for.

The bed was placed only a few feet from mine, and I rose to go to him, but a hand on my shoulder stopped me.

"Newton, where are you going? You need to stay in bed. And you." She turned back to Damien. "I'm sorry for your brother, but why are you here? Surely the hospital has enough rooms. They can't expect patients to share like this."

The nurse who'd helped bring Sebastian into the room looked between everyone, obviously confused. I felt bad for her. She was being reprimanded by my sister for something she'd been explicitly ordered to do. I'd been caught in the same non-winnable situation many times during my own shifts. It was never fun.

At that moment, however, I didn't care. I just wanted to get to Sebastian's side.

"Rosalind, move. I know you're confused, but right now my boyfriend is injured, and I don't have the patience to explain."

I didn't wait for her to agree and just shoved her aside. She looked surprised to be so easily moved by me despite her significant height advantage. I was stronger than I looked, and years of assisting patients as both a nurse and a paramedic had made me particularly good at moving people who didn't want to be moved.

There was only a few feet of space between our cots, but my legs were still shaky and I had to catch myself on the edge of Sebastian's bed to keep from falling over.

"Careful," Frankie scolded as he helped me sit on the bed properly.

I hovered my hand over Sebastian's face, too afraid to touch. There were so many little cuts and bruises. Many more than I had, despite living through the same disaster.

The reality of the situation finally hit me. Damien said Sebastian had to jump out the window for us to escape.

Us.

Sebastian had been carrying me when he jumped. He'd probably protected me from the initial explosion as well, based on the discrepancy between our injuries.

That meant his injuries were partially my fault. If I'd only been conscious, I could have made the jump on my own. Even if I broke my leg, it would have been better than expecting Sebastian to carry my weight.

Tears dripped down my face. A few landed on Sebastian's cheek and I wiped them away before they could soak into his bandages.

"Where's his medical file? I want to see it for myself."

The attending nurse tried to stop me, but I grabbed the clipboard from the pocket at the bottom of the bed.

Everything was spelled out so clearly in black and white. Sebastian's recently healed femur had completely snapped, and the bottom half of his leg was shattered. Several metal pins had been implanted to try and piece the bones back together.

His previously uninjured leg wasn't great either. A hairline fracture in his ankle and torn tendons in his knee would have been hard enough to heal on their own. With the two legs together, Sebastian would certainly not be walking any time soon.

On top of all that, there were other injuries as well. His previously cracked ribs were damaged again, there were burns over his hands and arms, and his lungs showed severe smoke damage.

In fact, the only injury he didn't seem to have was a concussion, the one injury I did have.

Between the two of us, we ran the full gambit of pain.

Frankie carefully pried my hands from the clipboard. "Okay, Newt. I think that's enough for now. You're smudging the ink."

I looked down at what he was talking about and realized I'd been crying all over the medical report and wet drops now stained the page.

"Sorry." I let go of the clipboard, and with a little help, I returned to my own bed. As much as I wanted to hold Sebastian in that moment, his injuries needed to stay isolated and not be jostled around too much.

Damien spoke with the nurse, probably discussing Sebastian's care. I should have paid attention to what they were saying, but I was so tired, I just wanted to sleep. I lay back on my own bed with my head propped up on pillows, but I could already tell sleep would evade me. I couldn't even imagine closing my eyes for a while.

The hospital's firm mattress barely moved when Rosalind sat next to me. "Hey, Newton. That man..."

She trailed off, looking over at Sebastian with a mix of confusion and surprise.

"What about him?" I watched her, trying to figure out what was causing her odd reaction.

Then I thought back on our conversation several weeks ago and it hit me. I couldn't help it. I laughed.

It was not a happy sound and made several people wince.

"Surprised? Yes, I was telling the truth about my boyfriend. You believe me now?"

"Yes, I..." She grabbed my hand. "I'm sorry I didn't before."

I just shrugged. "It doesn't matter now."

"It does," she insisted. "I shouldn't have assumed like that. Um, Bastian, was it? When Bastian is awake, I'd like to meet him."

There was no way Sebastian would want to meet anyone while he was in such a state, but I wasn't about to tell Rosalind that. Instead, I just shrugged and said "Maybe."

I was spared from any further awkward conversation when Gabe stormed back into the room. His eyes immediately locked onto my sister, and with his usual tact he just pointed at her and said, "You. Get out."

"Excuse me?" Rosalind jumped to her feet with an offended flush to her cheeks. "You can't tell me to get out. I'm Newton's sister. I have a right to be here."

Gabe barely paid her a spare glance as he headed for Damien and the nurse. "And I'm the agent in charge of this investigation. Now get out. No extra liabilities are allowed inside this room."

"Investigation?" Rosalind turned to me with concern. "Newton? What's going on? The hospital said it was an accident."

"We're still not sure what happened," I told her, which wasn't technically a lie. We still hadn't figured out who or what exactly caused the explosion. Only that it was deliberate. "For now, maybe it's best if you leave. I'll explain everything later."

That was a direct lie. Even once we had all the answers, I would not be telling her everything, but that assurance was the only way to convince her to leave. I would have felt bad for lying, but part of me was still bitter over her early accusations.

She'd assumed I was lying when I told her about Sebastian the first time. Now, I actually was guilty of the thing she accused me of.