Stranded

careful,” she told him. “Gwen would kill me if something bad happened to you.” Then she started for the lilac bushes hoping they might find a stray cat inside.

CHAPTER 7

    MERCY REGIONAL HEALTH CENTER
    MANHATTAN, KANSAS
    Noah awoke to white walls and machines humming. He startled so violently he ripped a needle from the back of his hand and beeping erupted above his head. He crawled over the bed rail in one easy, frantic move but when his feet touched the floor pain shot through his body. That’s when he noticed swaddled gauze at the ends of his legs. They looked like enormous stumps and for a brief moment he panicked.
    Oh my God, did they amputate my feet?
    A nurse hurried into the room and her motion made him jump.
    Fight or flight
.
    The instinct still raw inside him.
    “Stop. You’ll hurt yourself.”
    She was small and quick and amazingly strong as she grabbed him by the shoulders. In seconds he was cradled back down into the pillows. Before he could protest and try again, he felt a wave of nausea.
    “I’m gonna throw up.”
    She didn’t flinch. Instead she helped him sit forward and placed a plastic wash basin on his lap.
    There was nothing left in his stomach to vomit. His dry gags scraped his sore throat and his jaw ached. When he was finished, the nurse eased him back down and pulled the covers up over him. The flimsy hospital gown stuck to his sweat-drenched body and he started shivering so badly he was certain he must be having some sort of convulsion.
    He felt the prick of a needle before he could fight it. Warm liquid flooded his veins. His body almost immediately began to relax. He melted deeper into the pillows as his head began to swim. His heartbeat quieted but his chest still hurt.
    His eyes darted at every sound and every movement in the room. Blurry green and red lights flashed on equipment he didn’t recognize. A face appeared at the door. Another peered down over the bed at him—the nurse. Only now he was seeing three of her.
    Eyelids heavy. Don’t close them
.
    He didn’t want to see Ethan’s face again.
    It felt like only minutes later when Noah opened his eyes. This time his mother’s face hovered over the bed and he blinked hard, trying to clear her from his view.
    “Oh look, Carl, he’s waking up.”
    Noah’s head swiveled to find his father standing by the window. Another man was with him. Noah jerked up, eyes popping wide open before he realized he didn’t recognize the other man.
    “I’m sure there’s an explanation for everything,” he heard his father tell the stranger. Neither seemed as pleased or as excited as Noah’s mother was that he was waking up.
    “I hope so.”
    His father turned to Noah but stayed by the window as the other man came closer. His mother stepped aside and her smile went away, too.
    “Noah, I’m Lieutenant Detective Lopez with the Riley County Police Department.”
    Noah could hear a slight accent and he glanced at his father. The man was shorter than Noah’s dad. His face was lean, skin a bit weathered, his button-down shirt tight where his arm and chest muscles bulged.
    “Do you know where you are, son?”
    Noah’s eyes darted to his father again to see if he would object to this man addressing him as “son.” His father didn’t move, didn’t shift, just stared at him, waiting for Noah’s answer.
    “Hospital,” Noah managed to say.
    “Do you remember how you got here?”
    Noah looked at his mother. She smiled but it was forced and nervous, a twitch at the corner of her lips.
    He shook his head.
    “Do you remember what happened last night?”
    When Noah didn’t answer, Detective Lopez prompted, “At the rest area?”
    He didn’t want to remember.
    Don’t tell. Don’t tell. I promised I wouldn’t tell
.
    Noah shook his head again, but his heart started racing.
    “Do you remember being on the road last night? Stopping at the rest area?”
    He shook his head. This time too quickly. He could see the detective didn’t believe him.
    “When they brought you here you were covered in blood.”
    His eyes darted to his father to be met with a hard stare. His mother’s smile was gone for good now. Her hand covered hermouth. Brow furrowed. It wasn’t just concern. There was something else.
    “It was a lot of blood,” Detective Lopez continued, “too much for the injuries you sustained.”
    Noah heard it now plainly. Suspicion. Could the detective hear his heart banging against his rib cage?
    So much blood. Ethan’s