Evidence of Mercy by Terri Blackstock Page B

Had some woman’s angry boyfriend or husband beaten him to a pulp? Had he been in a car accident?
    He opened his eye, and a cruel, blaring light forced him to close it. Confused, feeling the beginnings of panic, he squinted the eye open and tried again to orient himself. Before his eye was able to make out the room, his other senses detected the smell of iodine and alcohol, a soft beeping, and the electrical hum of machinery. Focusing, he saw the white walls of intensive care, the camera in the corner with which he was monitored, and the impressive machinery around his bed.
    Yes, he thought through the haze in his brain. He’d been in an accident. But not a car crash.
    A plane crash.
    Catching his breath as the horror of his landing came back to him, he tried to sit up, but something held him down, and the pain stabbing through his face and head warned him not to try again.
    His throat felt as if he’d swallowed a bucket of sand. He needed a drink, he thought desperately. He needed a drug. He needed to die.
    â€œHe’s waking up!”
    He looked up to see a pale, skinny nurse standing over him on one side, and a man with a stethoscope on the other.
    â€œJake, can you hear me?” the man asked in a voice so loud it thundered through his brain. “Jake, you’re in the hospital.”
    No kidding , he thought, but when he tried to speak, his throat rebelled. The nurse set something cold against his lips, something wet—ice chips—and he opened his mouth gratefully and let the cold water ooze into his throat.
    â€œHow long?” he asked in a raspy whisper.
    â€œSince the crash?” she asked. “Almost twenty-four hours. How do you feel?”
    He thought of the worst hangover he’d ever had and decided it was a mere annoyance compared to this. “My head,” he said, raising a lead-heavy hand to touch the bandage covering his eye.
    â€œYou have a gash down your face, Jake,” the man said gently. “Your eye was pretty badly injured.”
    Jake looked up at him with horror. “My eye?”
    â€œYes. Do you have any feeling in your legs yet?”
    His legs. There was no pain in his legs, he realized for the first time. They were numb. He tried to slide his leg up, to feel his toes, but it wouldn’t move. Closing his eye, he wished he could block this out, that he could have stayed asleep, never to wake up and face the ways his body was failing him.
    â€œJake?”
    â€œTell me about my legs,” he whispered, looking up at them with dread.
    The doctor laid his hand on his shin. “Can you feel me touching you, Jake?”
    â€œYes!” he blurted, as if that proved that things weren’t as bad as they seemed. “I feel pressure. Weight.”
    â€œThat could be a good sign,” he admitted weakly. “We need to run some tests.” He started listing orders for the nurse, but Jake grabbed the sleeve of his coat and stopped him.
    â€œWhat’s broken?” he asked desperately. “My legs? My neck?”
    It was obvious the doctor wasn’t ready to be pinned down. “No broken bones, Jake, but you have deep lacerations in several places. The numbness is probably a blessing, considering the pain you might be feeling.”
    â€œI don’t need any blessings like this,” he bit out. “Besides, my head is enough to do me in.”
    â€œWell, if you need a stronger painkiller—”
    â€œYes,” he cut in. “I need it.”
    â€œAll right.” But he didn’t rush off for a hypodermic, as Jake had hoped. “Jake, your chart says you’re new in town and no relatives have been notified. Is there anyone we could call for you?”
    He thought of the one relative he still had, the one he’d woven stories about to make his past sound charmed, the one he had pretended was dead. “No,” he said finally. “The last thing I need is people crying over me, waiting like