Page 8 of Silver Lining (The Diamond Trilogy 3)
In the kitchen I pull down a single fifth of vodka from the cupboard over the fridge. It’s never been opened. The top refuses to give, my fingers slippery around the ridges, until I take a deep breath and force it.
Back in the living room, Adam has dropped the t-shirt and has one hand pressed next to the wound. Not on top of it, but close, as if he can’t bear to touch it. He takes the vodka with his free hand and drinks and drinks and drinks until I’m forced to think about stopping him. How much alcohol is too much when you’re trying to save yourself from a gunshot wound?
The bottle’s half gone when he puts it down on the floor and holds his hand out for the tweezers.
I take a deep breath. “Are you sure—”
He snaps his fingers, and I drop them into his open palm.
Adam doesn’t hesitate. For a guy who’s just downed too much vodka, he’s surprisingly deft as he flips them into his fingers and digs them into the wound. My entire body freezes, watching this. Watching the serious lines in his face get overtaken by the pain. His teeth catch his lower lip and press down hard. My heart goes wild with how useless I am, with how raw this is, and I’m going to explode. I’m on the verge of begging him to stop when he gives the tweezers a sharp yank.
A bullet dangles from the end of them. Adam holds it up in front of his face. Inspecting it? Reassuring himself that it’s out? His eyes roll back in his head and he’s out before I can ask.
I put a hand on his shoulder and rub. “Adam.”
No answer.
I check his pulse. It’s still there.
“This is really not funny,” I tell him, and he doesn’t respond with so much as a twitch of his eyelids. Because now I do have to Google how to wash and bandage the wound. What the fuck was he going to do with the towels? I can’t just dry off the blood and hope it seals itself up.
I open up a private browser on my phone and type in the search.
Keep the wound clean and dry. Wash with clean water twice per day.
Apply Vaseline to the wound. Cover with clean bandage or other cloth.
Jesus. I have Vaseline, I think, but if I need bandages I’ll have to run down to the store. And I should do it soon, before the wound bleeds anymore or gets infected because all I could come up with was a ratty t-shirt ripped into strips.
I take my last bottle of water out of the fridge and use it to wash out the bullet hole while he’s still unconscious. It seems like the smart thing to do, even if the Google search result didn’t explicitly say so.
And then I check the living room window.
Nothing looks too suspicious down on the street. No lurking figures or white vans. Still, my heartbeat gets faster, louder. “The NSA definitely tracked that search,” I murmur to my reflection in the window. “I hope this was worth it.” I hope you were worth it, Adam.
My reflection has no answer for that.
4
Elijah
Muffled keystrokes on the other end of the phone line punctuate a distracted silence.
“Howie.”
Silence. I shift in a pew five rows back from the front and watch the last of the sunset fade through the last of the stained glass. Not all of the original windows have survived over the years. I’ve had them replaced with plain, clear glass. Now that I have time to look at them, I’m regretting the decision. It would at least be more interesting to look at while I wait for Howie to come out of his trance.
He is probably the last person on earth named Howard. The nickname might be a joke, come to think of it. You never know with hackers.
“I don’t believe your name is Howard,” I say.
There’s a sharp rustle, like plastic wrap up against his speaker. “What?”
“Are you going to update me or not?”
“I was checking up on our happy couple. They’re all settled in at the resort. Nothing new to report there. The rental car was checked in a couple of hours ago, and I’m still waiting to see—”
He takes me through the list of red herrings. Sooner or later, the Army’s going to realize they’re all false leads, but for now they’ll be busy. We sent a couple matching our description on an all-expenses-paid trip to the Bahamas. We paid another guy to rent a car with a planted alias and drive it across the country. Three separate women have checked into mid-tier roadside motels at various locations. There are others. There will be more if necessary.
For now, Holly is safe with me in the abandoned church.
