Cocky Biker(24)

“Oh, here’s somethin’ interesting. That money she stole? The credit card thing?”

I look over at Fuse. “Yeah?”

“There was a van parked down from the palace of misery. It was stolen. Cops broke in right in front of us. Stacks of sealed up, brand new comforters.”

“What the hell?” Honey Badger asks, frowning.

I look at Sunshine again. “Fuck. She thought she was gonna save those women. The blankets were for them.”

Fuse’s voice is low as he explains, “Scratch figured that out, too. He told the cops. Adds to her being there for noble reasons. Clears any doubt of…” He trails off.

“Good,” I whisper, holding her hand to my forehead and closing my eyes.

Fuse and Honey go silent.

We stay like this.

From time to time I hear the slurping of coffee, but nothin’ else.

After who knows how long, footsteps, the door opening, and Scratch’s familiar voice, makes me turn my head. I feel stiff everywhere.

“Jett.” He lays a heavy hand on my shoulder. “We got a hotel room. Go get cleaned up.”

“I’m not leavin.’”

He wants to argue, but decides against it.

“Where’s Tonk?” Fuse asks while Honey waits by the door.

“It’s a fuckin’ mess with those women. Social services and detectives all over the place. Some of them have distant relatives; some even had parents who didn’t know where they were. Tonk’s askin’ about Carmen.”

“That’s her name?” Honey Badger asks.

“Yeah. She was clingin’ to him for dear life until the cops made her let go. She’s only eighteen.”

“You know that for sure?”

“Yeah. There were records of the girls. He demanded to know if she was underage on top of everything. Some of them were younger than eighteen when they got impregnated.”

“Fuckin’ animals,” Honey Badger growls.

“You said it. Carmen turns nineteen soon, so she wasn’t a minor. Tonk looked like he was gonna kill someone if she had been. He’s taken a real liking to the girl.”

The door opens again and a man in a lab coat enters.

I stand up for answers. “Is she gonna make it?”

He glances around the room. We’re a sight, the four Ciphers. Only our hands are washed clean. Fuse looks like a truck hit him. After him, I’m the worst and it’s mostly her blood.

The doctor pauses to gather his cool and turns wary eyes to me. “Look, it’s against our protocol to give you information when you’re not family.” He raises his hand as I begin to speak. “BUT I am making an exception. I heard about what happened. I think you guys deserve to know, after what you all did.” He glances around our somber faces. “She’s in a coma. The bullet skimmed the side of her skull. It didn’t hit her brain tissue, but there was internal bleeding. As a result, she’s in a coma and we don’t know any more than that.”

Grasping for straws, I ask, “She’s not going to die?”

“I didn’t say that. Not everyone makes it out of a coma. I’m sorry, but they are unpredictable. The body has gone to sleep to heal from the trauma, but she might not…I’m sorry.”

The Ciphers are all staring at me with stone faces. I blink back to her and rasp, “How long are comas? For how long? I mean, is there a normal amount of time?”

“People have come out in days, weeks, months…sometimes years. There’s still much we don’t know about them.”

“There’s still much you don’t know about a lot of shit,” Fuse grumbles.

The doctor pauses and glances over. He sighs. “True. But we will do the best we can to save her life. This is one of the best hospitals in the country.”

“Can she hear me?”

“People have reported hearing things when they were unconscious, yes. Not everyone, but I think it’s worth doing, just in case. It certainly can’t hurt.” He pauses, walking to thumb through her folder. “I thought you might want to know that we have to call her Jane Doe.”

My head whips to him and his steady gaze falters.

“What the fuck,” I growl.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Cocker, but the police don’t have a record of her. There are no fingerprints in their system. She had no I.D. in her backpack or on her person.” He sees the storm brewing in me, and cautiously adds, “And they said you didn’t know her name.”

“Jesus,” Scratch mutters.

I grab the folder from him, looming over the guy. “Give me that pen.” Hesitating, he hands it to me. I cross out the fucking Jane Doe and scrawl above it, Sunshine.