I could tell she didn’t believe me, but she didn’t argue. For a while she sat beside me while I waited, but I could tell she was in pain. Between the beating she’d taken and the car accident afterward, she should’ve been in bed. After a while, she reluctantly left with a promise to call Sarai.

*  *  *

They discharged Sarai the next morning. Bram and Ani had driven over to Sean’s place to pick up my truck and left it at the hospital for me so we’d have a way home, and they were waiting for us as Sarai shuffled through the doorway to our apartment.

“Let’s get you into bed,” Ani said, immediately taking over. She must have seen how completely overwhelmed I felt. I’d been trained in rudimentary field medicine, but I wasn’t a doctor. How the hell did they expect me to watch over Sarai when I wasn’t even sure what I was supposed to be watching for?

“How’s she doing?” Bram asked as he followed me into the kitchen.

“She’s tired,” I said. I looked around the room. Ani must have cleaned up the spilled smoothie that we’d left in our rush to get to Hailey.

“Her wrist bothering her?” he asked, sitting down at the counter.

“No,” I replied. “They gave her some good pain meds.”

I wasn’t sure if it was a curse or a blessing that we hadn’t started buying anything for the baby yet. I knew it would have hurt to have the reminders around the apartment, but I thought that not having anything felt worse. It was as if he or she had never existed.

“Where you at?” Bram asked, waving a hand in front of my face.

“I’m fine,” I muttered, running a hand down the back of my neck. “Tired.”

“Why don’t you go take a nap?” he suggested. “Ani and I will take care of dinner tonight.”

“You sure?”

“Yep. Give me the name of that restaurant you guys like, and I’ll pick something up.”

I told him how to get to Mr. and Mrs. K’s restaurant, then made my way into the bedroom. By the time I got there, Ani had already helped Sarai get into a pair of pajamas and was sitting next to her on the bed.

“Room for me?” I asked, kicking off my shoes.

“Change your clothes first,” Ani ordered.

I looked down at myself and realized that there was blood all over me. Suddenly I felt grimy as hell, but I was too exhausted to take a shower.

“I’ll strip,” I said tiredly, pulling my shirt over my head. “Once you get out.”

“They’re always kicking me out,” Ani told Sarai, giving her a small smile. “Like they’ve got anything I’d want to see.”

“You’ve seen it all,” I said. “Bram and I are identical. Now scoot.”