primary school, perhaps. The disinfectant fumes didn't help. I tried to speak, but no sound came out. I cleared my throat and tried again. "It's okay, Caitlin. You've been hurt." My voice shook, but I made myself continue. "We're trying to help you get better."
The nurse snorted again, louder this time. "You're in hospital as a patient now and all of us on the clinical team here are doing our best to help you get better. Your roommate is sleazy and, if I were you, I'd wake up fast so you can ask for a room transfer."
I'd like you to wake up, too, I thought but didn't say.
I tried to focus on the nurse's hands, not the wounds she was treating. No matter what the nurse thought, I didn't want to stare at Caitlin's bare skin as she slept. Conscious and consenting was one thing, but she was neither, and she wouldn't be until she recovered, if ever. It took a real fucked-up bloke to look at her in her current state and feel anything but pity, sympathy and the fist-clenching desire to cause some righteous pain. Which I couldn't do a fucking thing about until she woke up and told me how to find them.
The grumpy nurse gently rolled Caitlin on her side so she could reach some the dressings on her back. The first one she pulled off revealed more nasty-looking ulcers and a patch of scraped skin. She reached for the eye-watering disinfectant wipes again as I winced and wanted to look away.
I wished that Caitlin was wearing more than her hospital-issue nightdress. Normally, that meant she'd be showing a whole lot of skin, but there were so many dressings on her that she seemed swathed in white, like a badly beaten angel. She may as well have been an angel fallen to Earth, she had so little with her. The police had taken all her clothes, so the hospital gown was all she had. I felt guilty for wearing the clean t-shirt my sister had brought.
It seemed an eternity before the nurse was finished, but I didn't take my eyes away from her until she left, without saying another word.
Released from my vigil, I squeezed my eyes shut. My head in my hands, I tried to knead the livid images out of my forehead with my fingers. Under every dressing on Caitlin's body were wounds that screamed of repeated abuse, over and over again during the weeks they had her.
Not for the first time I wondered how anyone could force themselves to look at that every day, job notwithstanding. I didn't know how I could stand to watch a nurse bare her every cut, bruise and break again tomorrow, or force myself to sit through this every day until she woke up.
How did she manage to survive, driving herself to keep going as those sick bastards inflicted countless wounds on her body and mind, time and time again?
Fuck. I didn't know. Wake up, Caitlin, so you can tell me the answers. Fucked if I knew.
20
The door was open.
Someone calling me a little bitch.
Attacked him.
Hit me.
Hit the floor.
Blood, pain.
Pushing me down, on top of me.
Bound my hands.
Broke my fingers.
Screaming. Pain.
Couldn't see for tears.
He had a knife.
Cut my clothes off.
Tried to kick him.
Couldn't see, too dark.
He caught my legs.
Pushed them down, apart.
Unzipped.
Oh God please no
21
Any time Caitlin was quiet, I closed my eyes and tried to sleep. But it was a hospital and there were always doctors and nurses coming to check on her. Once there was a med student, too.
I tried to ignore them and kept my eyes closed, but I couldn't help listening.
Maybe it was the sound of her voice – cute and young, but serious, too, like she really cared about her patient. "She's probably pregnant. With rape a possibility it's best to know as early as possible," she argued.
My heart contracted, as if I were crushing it in my own clenched fist. Hadn't Caitlin been through enough? She needed to recover from her ordeal and one day learn to forget. She didn't deserve a lifelong reminder, a child belonging to one of the bastards who'd hurt her. She'd have scars enough as it was.
"No, she isn't. We checked twice. Both were negative." The other voice was calmer but sad.
I breathed a sigh of relief.
"Like I said, it could have been a mistake or too early to tell."
The sad voice sighed heavily. He sounded Irish. "Or she was very early into the pregnancy and she miscarried. But that would have been before she was admitted..."
There was blood everywhere. Her eyes were open, staring at the stars in the sky. I'd thought she was dead.
"Do we know for certain she was raped?"
Another sigh. "If she was awake, I could ask her. But she's a seventeen-year-old girl who's been through hell and a lot of pain, given how long she was missing and the state she's in now. I'd say it's pretty much a certainty. I've left a note in her file and I'm leaving it at that. There's no need to ask her or even mention it. She's definitely not pregnant."
"I'd ask, Dr Lannon, just to be thorough. What if..."
"Did you see her when she came in?" he demanded.
Blood and bruises everywhere. So cold. Twisted, broken fingers. Haunted eyes. Screaming...
"Have you been here when she has nightmares?" he pressed.
Endless screaming, wanting to run...
"No, I've just read her file because she was on my patient list today." Her voice sounded subdued.
I'd never seen such a long list of injuries. Line after line of damage.
"This girl was beaten and raped repeatedly for weeks then left on a beach to die. It's been all over the news. Would you want to be the one to remind her and make her relive all the gory details?"
No, but I didn't have any choice. I had to ask her. I needed to know.
A pregnant pause. A quiet, "No, Dr Lannon."
"Besides, she'll tell us everything we need to know when she wakes up. She's a med student," said Dr Lannon with satisfaction.
Even the fucking doctor knew more about her than I did.
"Do you know her?"
The doctor laughed. "She stole my parking spot on her first day on prac here."
A sharp intake of breath. "What did you do?"
"I parked somewhere else and told her what happens when you steal a doctor's parking space." Dr Lannon sounded amused.
"What?"
He took a deep breath, no longer laughing. "A midwife I met when I was an intern told me I'd be at that doctor's beck and call, running paperwork to the airport with medical evac patients and the like." He paused and sighed. "But that was a country hospital, a long time ago. Here, she'd probably just get me coffee."
Caitlin's medical chart clacked as it was dropped into the slot at the end of her bed.
"Did she buy you a coffee?"
Dr Lannon laughed again. "No, my wife would kill me if I let strange girls buy me coffee."
"Which country hospital were you an intern at, Dr Lannon?"
Footsteps leaving.
"Albany Regional." I heard the voices fade away down the corridor. "I'd feel more comfortable if you called me Aidan. I still look around for my father whenever someone says, 'Dr Lannon,' though it's been me for six years now..."
I drifted into sleep, trying to shut out the images of what Caitlin had looked like when I found her. Instead, they blended into a nightmare that I couldn't run from.
When Caitlin's scream woke me, it was almost a relief.
"Angel, it's all right. I'm here. Wake up, angel. It's over," I said as I settled into the chair by her bed, hoping her nightmares would keep me awake for a while.
22
Cold and alone. Sand.
Couldn't feel anything anymore.
Stab of pain.
One of them, hurting me.
Too much pain.
Too weak to fight any more.
Saw a gun. Time to end it.
Gunshots. Screaming.
NO.
Won't let them hurt me again.
Promise?
Angel.
It's all right. I'm here.
Wake up, angel.
It's over.
23
"Hello?" Caitlin tried to sit up, struggling against the sheets that tucked her tightly in the bed. She looked around, bewildered, stretching her hands out as if reaching for something. "Where are you?"
Relief flooded through me. Finally. "I'm here, Caitlin. I haven't left." I stood up so that all she had to do was look up to see me.
Her eyes focussed on me, but she looked troubled. In concern, I reached for her hand. Too late I realised that I might hurt her. As my fingers grazed the gauze, I snatched them back. She looked at her hand in wonder at my touch as if she'd felt it through the bandage.
"I'm not dead, am I?" she asked in hushed tones.
I almost laughed but caught myself. She looked as if she might cry if I said the wrong thing. "You're doped up to the eyeballs and wrapped up like a mummy, but you're alive. Very much alive – and in hospital, where you should be."
"What happened?" she quavered.
I was at a loss for where to begin. I didn't know how to describe what she'd been through – just thinking about it was enough to give me nightmares. "You were hurt..."
She started to shake her head, then grimaced as this caused her pain. "No, I know that. There was lots of yellow with cartoon animals on the ceiling... but now I'm here and Winnie the Pooh is gone." She glared suspiciously at the ceiling.
If I were Winnie the Pooh, I'd be hiring a bodyguard, I thought, hiding my smile. She looked as if she was ready to put him on a hit list.
Her eyes fixed on me again, her voice firmer and more urgent. "What happened?"
This time I didn't hesitate. "You fought the nurses. You were so scared. I think they gave you something to make you sleep – you've been asleep for a while."
She swallowed as if remembering was an effort. "I called for you. You weren't there. They said that you were being