But I also couldn’t put any weight through my left leg. The bullet had entered through my hamstring muscle at the back and exited through the quadriceps at the front. The fact that it had bypassed bone, arteries and major nerves on its way was a miracle but, even so, I had all the strength of a runt chicken in my lower limb.
In the end, the physiotherapist gave me one crutch for the left side and walked slowly alongside me as I staggered half a dozen paces down the corridor getting the hang of leaning on it. All the way, I dragged my left foot and damned near bit through my bottom lip in an effort not to break down and weep with the sheer bloody effort it entailed for apparently such small reward.
One of the nurses found me a chair to collapse onto and the physio held my hand while I shook and gasped like a marathon runner at the end of the home stretch and contemplated the vast distance back to the sanctuary of my bed again.
“It’s going to be a long road back, Charlie,” he told me, disgustingly cheerful, “but you’re lucky to be here at all, and it will come, if you’re prepared to work hard.”
I’d spent a lot of time thinking about work-about my job — since I’d laid there and listened to Sean and my father discussing me so coldbloodedly In the absence of anything better to occupy my mind, I’d picked apart every sentence, second-guessed every nuance, and come to a couple of conclusions that were more painful to contemplate than any physical injury I might have suffered.
Those words, more than any others, haunted me. What was the point of coming back, if there was nothing to come back to?
It had nothing to do with me having let my emotions dictate my actions out there in the forest. I’d tried over and over to analyze those final few minutes, but however I looked at it, I couldn’t have justified shooting Lucas as he stood there holding Ella. Whichever way I dissected the facts, he hadn’t been threatening her life-he’d merely been trying to save his own.
If I’d taken the shot, I wouldn’t just have traumatized the child, I would have been guilty of murder. If it had been the first time I’d used lethal force, a good legal team might have swung some kind of a plea.
But it wasn’t.
I tried to work out how many lives I’d taken and found, to my horror, that I couldn’t precisely remember. And that made it so much worse.
What if Sean had lost his faith in me? And who could blame him? I’d failed to protect a principal. Not only that, but I’d allowed a principal to be killed, not by a lone assassin or a known threat, but by the very people who should have been coming to our aid.
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that as far as Sean was concerned-as far as the reputation of his company was concerned- it was a disaster. I knew that if it got out that he and I had anything other than a professional relationship, that would make things ten times worse. Sean was known to be a highflier. His staff were well paid because they were the best, and proud of it. But in truth that also meant there were plenty out there just waiting for him to crash and burn. Above all else, I hated the idea that I might be the cause of his downfall.
Suddenly it was like being back in the army, just after my attack. I wasn’t just physically at a low ebb but mentally bruised and emotionally battered as well. I needed Sean more now than I’d ever done, but I knew I could not-would not-drag him down again.
W
hen Sean walked in that afternoon, my unsettled thoughts must have made my greeting wary in some way. He studied me for a moment before responding, as though he could read my mind. No surprises there. He’d always been too sharp for comfort.
They’d propped me more upright in the bed, so I was able to watch the easy way he moved round the room. He didn’t take the chair next to the bed, choosing instead to lean on the wall near the window, tilting his shoulder against it and folding his arms. I desperately wanted him to touch me but knew I’d chew my own tongue off rather than ask.
“The nurse said they got you up today,” he said.
“I went for a stroll along the corridor,” I agreed lightly.
He nodded. “I wondered how long you were going to just lie there and loaf.”
That was all it took. My eyes started to burn, the lower lids filling so that I daren’t blink or he would have seen the tears. He saw them anyway.
Now he approached me, stroked gentle fingers down my cheek, thumbed away the wetness.
“Hey, come on, Charlie,” he said softly “Fight it, or it will ride you all the way to the bottom.”
“Fight it?” I said, almost a snort. “At the moment I can’t fight sleep. I let you down-I’m a total, utter waste of space!”
