“Keep pressure on the wound,” she said to Susan. “Tell them he was in liver toxicity. He took about forty pills about three hours ago.” Her lips were smeared with the blood from the knife.
She whispered something in Archie’s ear, kissed him on the cheek, leaving a bloody lip print, and then laid his head gently on the floor and was gone out the door to the deck. Henry fired a shot in Gretchen’s direction and then launched himself after her. Susan heard him fire three more shots into the woods.
Susan ran back to the bar, grabbed a plaid dishtowel, then ran back to Archie and held it against the wound in his neck. “Don’t die,” she said to him. She used the sleeve of her shirt to gently rub the bloody kiss off his cheek. “You better not die.” Outside, the sound of sirens got louder.
CHAPTER
66
You’re still alive,” Henry said. “And she got away.”
There was a sprinkler head directly above Archie’s hospital bed. This was the first thing he saw. The second thing he saw was Henry, standing over him. Then Debbie, sitting in a chair on the other side of the bed, a magazine open in her lap.
Oh, God. Debbie.
“She fled into the fire,” Henry said. “There was a lot of smoke.” He ran his hand over his head. “We’re still searching the area. She might have gotten caught in the fire. But I won’t believe it until we have remains.”
Archie closed his eyes again and curled onto his side. His skin burned with sweat and his whole body hurt. He shifted on the bed, trying to find a tolerable position. The movement made his gut cramp. His hands shook so violently he clamped them between his knees. He opened his eyes. Even the light hurt. “What’s wrong with me?” he asked weakly.
“Withdrawal,” Henry said. “You’re on an antinarcotic called naloxone. You OD’d. The naloxone blocks your opiate receptors. So it’s cold turkey, friend.”
Archie searched his memory for any clue as to what had happened and came up with nothing. The bedsheets were cold and wet with his sweat. His last memory was of Gretchen, holding him. A wall of pain shuddered through his body like electricity, and Archie curled further into a fetal position. They had found him too soon. But he didn’t understand how she had gotten away. Then he felt the deep ache in his throat and reached up a trembling hand and let his fingers trace the rough bandages around his neck. He didn’t know how that had happened. But he knew this: She’d escaped. It was all for nothing.
He started to laugh.
“She used you as a hostage,” Henry said. “She used the naloxone to save your life. Then she cut your throat.”
“I slept with her,” Archie said. It was half the truth.
The magazine slid from Debbie’s lap and slapped onto the linoleum floor.
Henry leaned down over Archie and put a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t ever say that out loud again,” he said.
“I just thought you both should know,” Archie said. He swallowed hard, causing his neck to throb. “I don’t suppose I could get some pain meds for my throat,” he said.
Debbie’s hands were fists, the knuckles white, like it was all she could do not to throttle him with her bare hands. He didn’t blame her. He wished she would try. He wished she would put a pillow over his head and suffocate him. It would be the humane thing to do.
“It’s not real,” she said. “Whatever you think you have with her.”
He had to concentrate to talk. Every muscle in his body felt starved for oxygen, cramping in pain. Over the past few years, he had thought about what withdrawal might be like.
This was worse.
“I thought I could catch her,” he said helplessly.
A nurse appeared in peach-colored scrubs. She adjusted the drip on Archie’s IV. “This will help you sleep,” she said.
Archie nodded gratefully.
Henry pinched the bridge of his nose. “Maybe let us in on the plan next time.”
They both knew Henry could have stopped him.
“You let me go,” Archie said. “You let me go to the bathroom by myself. That wasn’t like you.”
Debbie turned and looked at Henry.
Henry glanced at Debbie, then back at Archie. “I would never let you use yourself as bait,” he told Archie. “You’re lucky to be alive.”
Lucky to be alive. For what? What had it all been for?
“You found the confession?” Archie asked.
“Yeah,” Henry said.
There was that at least. He’d accomplished that.
“You can close it,” Henry said with a grunt. “You can close that one case. Fourteen years old. A runaway without any family. And you closed it. Was it worth it?”
Archie closed his eyes and smiled. He could feel the sleep drugs hit his system. It was a small measure of relief. “Yes,” he said.
He must have drifted off because when Archie came to again Henry was standing over him on the other side of the bed. Debbie was gone.