Page 71 of Ballistic

HEENT: normocephalic, PERRL, TM intact, oropharynx red, swollen, neck supple. Piercings noted in ears.

Social history: Patient is a fourteen year old girl who attends high school in Detroit. No drugs. Previous attempts at suicide.

Family history: Father left the home when patient was seven years old. No known comorbidities. No medications. Mother has history of alcohol abuse, CAD.

Vitals: 37.9, pulse 76, RR: 16, BP: 115/ 75, O2 sat: 97 RA

Observer notes bilateral bruising of arms and legs, as well as multiple lacerations across thighs. Vertical scars along forearm indicate previous attempted suicide.

Prior consultation postponed as patient was crying, refusing to be examined, and several bouts of lashing out at staff noted in progress notes following a shower, during which the patient appeared to have suffered a panic attack. Social worker Henderson has spoken with her. Patient agrees to be seen at this time.

Patient’s appearance upon arrival noted to be unkempt and disheveled. Mood and affect through most of the examination is flat and blunted with only occasional eye contact. Alert and oriented x3. She claims to have no recollection of the attack against her mother’s boyfriend. When asked about her relationship with him, she becomes defensive to the use of the word, ‘relationship’. When asked about her prior hospitalization, patient refuses to discuss the events. Mood and affect appear to be much more exaggerated and hostile, a very pronounced change in patient’s behaviors. Will continue to follow patient’s progress.

I flipped on the shower, tossing my phone onto the bathroom sink, wishing I could punch the shit out of something. Just reading about the girl was enough to twist my stomach inside out. I couldn’t even imagine Nicoleta, having stumbled upon a video like the one she’d told me about. Watching those cocksuckers rape and murder her, then dump her body.

Livvie’s had set me off on an impulsive rampage, and all I remembered about it was the blood on my hands and an intense appetite for more.

At the thump of the front door, I stripped out of my clothes and stepped inside the shower, letting the hot water run across my skin. I flinched, thinking about the burn marks on her flesh, and though I didn’t know the girl, the anger swelling inside of me didn’t feel unwarranted, or irrational.

It felt kindred.

I’d suffered burns, the deep scarring sears of the finest cigars. I’d heard the crackle of my own skin beneath the unforgiving heat, and had worn my fair share of bruises.

Palms plastered to the tiles, I didn’t hear the bathroom door click, but as Nicoleta’s hands came from behind, brushing across my stomach, I twitched at her touch. Gripping her arm, I let her rest her head against my back, where she kissed the spot close to my spine that marked a stab wound where my foster dad had tried to kill me and failed. Twisting around to face her, I lifted her naked body up into my arms and turned so the warm water hit her back. Water slicked across where her pussy pressed into my stomach, and I backed her against the wall, rolling my hips to spread her all over my skin.

Her muscles tightened as I gripped the bottom of her thighs and pressed my lips to hers, tasting her. Arms wrapped around my shoulders, she locked her feet together behind my back.

“Dax,” she whispered. “I was thinking … what if you and I run away together?”

“What do you mean? Leave Detroit?”

“Yeah. We can go out west. Live in the mountains.” She smiled and leaned forward to kiss my throat. “We’ll be mountain people.”

“I’m more of a beach guy. Ocean breeze, good music, beer in my hand, and you on my lap.” I kissed her again, digging my fingers into her thighs. “You still have one more on your list, though, yeah?”

“Yes. There’s one more, but—”

“I’ll help you. I’m with you ‘til the end of this.”

Gaze cast downward, she frowned. “Why?”

“We’re a team.” I rested my forehead against hers. “Me and my vicious little lynx.”

“I’ll still tell you where to find Tesarik. Even if you don’t help me.”

I shook my head, refusing to consider something so ridiculous. Having read that medical record gave me a little more insight into her friend. More reason to make things right. “I’m not letting you do this alone, Nic.”

“And what happens at the end?”

The same question that’d been spinning inside my head all night. I didn’t know what would happen at the end of it. I’d have liked to believe that Nicoleta and I would ride off to Mexico together and leave all the shit behind us, but I knew better. You didn’t wage war with a dangerous criminal and walk away unscathed.

I shrugged, nabbing the showerhead from behind her, letting the massaging pulses beat down her back and across her ass. “Sometimes you just gotta live in the moment.”

“You should write fortune cookies, you know that?”

I chuckled, playfully spraying her in the face with the water.

Instead of laughing, though, she gasped and coughed water into my face. She kicked her head to the side and wheezed.