Shit. Too harsh.
She tugged at my stethoscope. “Why? Do you think you know him?”
No. But he’ll know me tonight.
“One way to find out. Tell me his name.”
“Eric Voss.”
The name etched itself into my brain like a patient’s time of death. A moment where everything after would be measured as before and after.
Eric Voss. I’m going to fucking end you.
18
BLAKE
“Ryker, I need advice,” I said into my phone.
“Nothing I can do. Your face will always be ugly.”
“Your humor never gets old. Now, I’m serious. For the next minute, you’re my lawyer. I just wired you twenty bucks to make it official.”
“The hell?”
“I’m about to do something illegal. If I get caught, I need to know my odds. Prison won’t stop me, but Knox says it’s something I should avoid.”
“Blake.” His voice sharpened. “What the hell is going on?”
“Can’t tell you.”
“Then how exactly am I supposed to help?”
“By speaking in hypotheticals.”
“I can’t defend you without details.”
“Fine. I’m going to hurt someone.”
“Who?”
“Can’t say.”
“Then why are you hypothetically going to hurt this hypothetical person?”
“Does it matter?”
“Does motive matter in prosecution? Yes, motive fucking matters. If you can’t tell me who, at least tell me why. Because if a prosecutor can trace the motive?—”
“Hypothetically speaking,” I cut in, “if someone had attacked one of your family members, would that information fall under attorney-client privilege? As in you could never breathe a word of it? Especially to them?”
A pause.
“Did someone in my family show up in your ER?”
Yes. And lucky for me, my shift just ended, and I have a few hours before Tessa’s labs will come back.
“Answer the question,” I said.
