seem okay because she hid all the truths from me. I wasn’t sure I could take the truths tonight. I just needed to believe that everything would be all right.
Dawson
CLARITY
“Hold still right before we crash 'cause we both know how this ends.
A clock ticks 'til it breaks your glass and I drown in you again.”
Performed by Jacquie Lee
Written by Robinson / Bair / Zaslavski / Hafferman
Violet hung up on me, and I cussed silently. I tore through the night toward the hospital, pushing the pedal down on the Aston Martin and refusing to give in when the tires squealed around a sharp corner.
My head was flooded with thoughts of another stormy night like this one. Another dark night with blood and rain and hospitals. Violet needed me as much tonight as she had that night. I’d fucking let them all down. I should have gone back to the house as soon as I’d realized Ken’Ichi wasn’t in the group Malone had pinned down with the guns.
There’d only been four men. Saito-san, the guy I’d seen at the Crab Shack, and Leskov’s two goons. It was nothing. Without Malik and Ken’Ichi there, we were screwed. If any of the men talked, we’d be lucky. It had been a wasted bust.
When I’d realized it, I turned my anger on Malone. “What the hell? Why are we blowing our cover for a handful of nothings and a stash of guns?”
“Dawson, we’re done here. This was our last chance. Headquarters has written off the op. If we’re lucky, we can squeeze these assholes for information,” Malone had thrown back.
I’d turned to go back to the house, to collect Violet and Jada and get the hell out of the house, and that was when Nolan had caught up to me.
“He’s got Jada and Violet,” he’d said, waving the phone he’d been monitoring Jada’s wire on all night. “There’s a safe room in the kitchen.”
The sight that had hit me when the safe room door had opened overwhelmed me all over again. Complete absolute terror like I’d never felt before. Violet and Jada on the floor. Blood all over the goddamn place. I’d let them both down. They were there because of me. Neither of them would have been in the situation if I hadn’t put them there.
I’d about lost it.
Jada with blood. Violet with blood.
I’d promised myself never again. I’d promised her joy wouldn’t be ripped away.
My throat closed, and the screech of the tires brought me back to where I was.
I came up behind a vehicle moving so slow it could have been stopped. I shifted down into a lower gear and then passed them on the right without a second thought. The town finally came into view, and I blew through two lights with horns squealing at me. I pulled up to the hospital just as two black-and-whites showed up. I flashed my badge, told them who I was, and then headed into the hospital with them on my heels.
I posted them at the doors to the operating room and then made my way to the waiting area. At first, I didn’t see her. She’d curled up as small as she could make herself, and she was in a pair of pink scrubs with unicorns on them that were way too big for her. The happy unicorn faces were laughing at me. Taunting.
“Vi,” I croaked.
She looked up, and I could see she was still crying. I wondered if she’d stopped once since I’d shown up in the safe room. I swept her up and pulled her onto my lap.
“She’s going to be okay,” I said, smoothing my hand over her hair. The words were for me as much as they were for her. Jada had to be okay, or I was never going to allow myself a moment of peace.
Vi held on to me tightly and said through a tear-clogged voice, “I know. She’s a fighter.”
God, was it true. She was, but she shouldn’t have to be. This hadn’t been her fight.
“You might not want to talk about it, but can you tell me what happened?” I asked. “It might help us find him.”
“He’ll need medical attention,” she said quietly.
“What? Why?” My heart pounded.
“I threw bleach in his face.”
I sat there stunned for a moment, and then a chuckle rolled through me. Because it was so exactly Vi. My beautiful, science-loving genius taking a chemical and using it as a weapon.
“He knew you and Jada were the reason for the FBI being there,”