Grudge (Virtue & Vice Book 5) Read online

  “Four to six months?” Tag repeated. He pushed himself up onto his elbows and stared at Martin. “You fucking kidding me?”

  “No,” Martin said. He lowered the chart. “Look, these things take time. We have to strengthen the right muscles and do it in a way that it all stays balanced. A contracture could keep your prosthetic from fitting right, we have to develop your balance, endurance, and —”

  “I just need to be able to walk around on the damn thing,” Tag said. “No way is that gonna take half a year, right?”

  “I guess that depends on you,” Martin said. He went back to the chart and finished the last of his notes.

  “So what else happens today?” Tag asked.

  “This is it,” Martin said. “It’s an assessment day, I have to consult with Scott about my plan for you.”

  “Right, I forgot,” Tag snorted. “You’re not even a real fucking PT. Probably don’t even know what you’re talking about. Why’d you even take my case, huh? So you could fuck with me? Gloat over how I got what was coming? You gotta be loving this.”

  Martin kept his mouth shut. Be the professional, he chanted to himself, over and over again. Tag is messed up, and in pain. He’s not himself right now.

  Except, the reality was that Tag had always been this kind of person. Losing a leg and maybe getting screwed up from combat hadn’t suddenly made him who he was at the moment. This was just more of the same. Lashing out at everyone nearby to make himself feel better.

  Still, Martin took a deep breath and carefully set his chart aside, and retrieved Tag’s cuff and leg for him. “I know what needs to be done, Tag,” he said more calmly than he really felt. “You have to trust me if you want to be able to get back some kind of normal life. I spent four years in school for this.”

  “And I’m just a dumb jarhead, right?” Tag asked. He snatched the cuff from Martin’s hand and waved off Martin’s offer to help him sit up. “I gave up a god damned limb for this country, you’d think they could give me a real PT. It’s not like you’re a fucking doctor or anything. PT’s are a dime a dozen, aren’t they?”

  “Yeah,” Martin sighed. “Sure. Look, I can talk to Scott about getting you reassigned if you don’t think you can work with me. How’s that?”

  Tag rolled the cuff the rest of the way up his thigh and pulled his shorts down. He gave Martin an odd look — maybe satisfaction, maybe something more pained. Maybe a mix. After a second he nodded. “Yeah. That’d be better for both of us. Give me my . . . give me that.”

  Martin handed him the prosthesis.

  “Alright,” he said when Tag managed to get the socket over the cuff on his own. “I’ll talk to Scott when I see him tomorrow. Here.” He handed Tag his cane. “Check with the nurse’s station about your next appointment.”

  Martin only waited long enough to see that Tag was on his feet before he left. Technically, he was supposed to walk Tag to the nurses station and drop him off, but if he spent another moment there he wasn’t sure if he was going to scream at Tag or break down into tears. Maybe both.

  It was hard not to think that Tag was still just an asshole, like he always had been. There was guilt that came with it, of course. The man had lost a leg for god’s sakes, and there was no telling what he’d been through on deployment. But maybe someone who didn’t know him would be a better match. Someone who didn’t have the same history and could be more objective. Someone who wasn’t bothered by the fact that whatever Tag had been through over there, he certainly hadn’t changed because of it.

  Someone who wasn’t Martin.

  8

  Taggart hobbled out of the PT room and looked around to see if Martin was still in sight. He wasn’t — probably already off with his next practice dummy.

  For a moment, he was lost. The nurse who had brought him in had taken him on a winding route to get here. He picked a direction and started moving. Eventually, he spotted a middle aged man on crutches, being led by a guy in scrubs, and followed them. Sure enough, they ended up at the nurse’s station as well. He waited behind them while they arranged the next appointment.

  “You’re doing really great, Tom,” the guy in scrubs said. “A lot of progress. Just keep up the exercises at home, and I’ll check up on you over the weekend.”

  Tom clapped the man in the scrubs on the shoulder. “You don’t have to go outta your way for me, Mitch. Glad you think I’m getting better at this, though. Doesn’t feel that way.”

  “I’ll show you the tape from your first session next week,” Mitch said.

  Tom groaned. “Jesus. I think I’ll just take your word for it. And I expect you to burn that tape.”

  They had a chuckle before they parted. Tom got his next appointment from the nurse at the station.

  “Sounds good,” he told her when it was scheduled. “I’ll see you next time, then, pretty girl.”

  The woman behind the counter was in her fifties or sixties, and rolled her eyes at Tom. She was smiling, though. “Take it easy, Tom.”

  He left, and Taggart ambled up to the counter. “Private Taggart Coulson,” he muttered. “Need my next PT appointment. Uh — maybe with someone different, though. I don’t think it’s gonna work out with me and that intern.”

  The nurse’s name tag named her Maria. Maria looked at her screen briefly, clicked something with her mouse, and frowned. “You’re with Martin Warner?”

  “That’s him,” Tag said.

  “Has he done anything inappropriate?” Maria asked seriously.

  “Does that make a difference?” Taggart asked.

  Maria raised an eyebrow. “We take allegations of abuse or harassment of any kind very seriously, yes.”

  He rubbed his jaw. It wasn’t like he wanted to screw Martin out of a job or anything. “ Nothing like that. We’re just not quite . . . compatible.”

  The older nurse’s expression changed to one of slight impatience. “I see. Well, if you want to be placed with another physical therapist, it will be about a four month wait.”

  Taggart gaped. “Four fucking months? You’ve gotta be kidding me, lady.”

  “You were already on a waiting list, Mister Coulson, along with almost four hundred other patients,” Maria said. “If you want to work with another therapist, we have to put you back on that list, at the bottom. Unless there was some kind of complaint you wanted to make about Mister Warner’s conduct, we can’t simply reassign you to another therapist who already has a full patient roster and we can’t force other patients to continue waiting while you find a therapist you like.”

  “It’s not about liking or not liking anybody,” Taggart said. “It’s just not gonna work.”

  Maria only spread her hands helplessly and waited for his decision.

  Taggart shifted as his leg started to ache and put more of his weight on his cane.

  “Shall I put you back on the waiting list or schedule your next appointment?” Maria asked.

  He sighed. “Whatever, lady. Just . . . fine. When’s my next appointment?”

  She scheduled it, and handed him a reminder card, which he stuffed in his pocket.

  “You’re customer service here is piss poor,” he muttered as he left her.

  “Have a nice day, Mister Coulson,” Maria called after him, with maybe a hint of sarcasm that he didn’t care for.

  He made it home with a couple of hours to spare before Angie was supposed to drop by, and spent those hours cleaning his Beretta 92. It wasn’t the M9 he’d had in the marines, but it wasn’t that different. Cleaning it was nowhere near as cathartic as cleaning his old M16A4, but they didn’t let you keep souvenirs when you discharged and he couldn’t afford a military-grade rifle on his own. At least not at the moment.

  There was something simple and coldly mechanical about a gun. It all came apart into bits and pieces that wouldn’t make sense to anyone who didn’t know how they went together — but you put the thing back together the same way every time, and when you did, it went from being a mess to a functional wea
pon. No matter how many times you took it apart and put it back together, that was true. It didn’t have feelings, didn’t get stressed or traumatized by the process and didn’t complain.

  It was one of the few rituals he had which actually soothed his nerves. If he focused enough and turned the heat up, he could almost imagine his crappy little house fading gradually away. After a while, he could almost sense the space of the barracks around him, and hear other marines disassembling and cleaning their own weapons. As long as he kept his eyes on his task, he could just about believe he was back there.

  The knock on his front door was quiet, tentative — but enough to shock him out of his reverie. He fumbled the firing pin and it bounced to the linoleum of the kitchen floor, just out of reach. Taggart grit his teeth, swore, and shouted toward the living room, “Coming.”

  He had to squat on one leg after he struggled out of the chair, but he got the firing pin and put it back on the towel where the rest of the parts were. He made his way to the door, his fake leg thumping along heavily over the cheap flooring. Anyone on the other side would know he was coming.

  He threw the bolt, turned the deadbolt, loosed the chain, and unlocked the door while he steeled himself for what was coming.

  Angie was on the other side, waiting patiently, her brown, frizzy hair pulled back into a ponytail. She looked sporty, and she was alone.

  “Thought you were bringing the whole tribe,” Taggart said as he stepped back and let her in.

  Angie walked passed him into the house and looked around at the mess briefly before she turned to him as he closed the door. “Casey had to take Aubrey to tryouts. She wants to play soccer over the summer.”

  “Okay,” Taggart said.

  Angie shrugged off her coat. “It’s burning up in here.”

  “I get cold,” Taggart sighed. “Here, I’ll hang that up.”

  His sister hesitated, glancing at the hooks on the wall near the door, but handed him her coat instead of hanging it up herself. Progress.

  She pointed at his new leg. “They put anything cool in that gear? Lasers, a rocket, something fun like that?”

  Taggart snorted, and balanced on the cane as he used his free hand to hang her coat. “Not exactly. Damn thing’s just as hard to walk on as the other one.”

  “Learning to walk the first time was pretty hard,” Angie said. “I’m sure you’ll be a pro again in no time.”

  “Sure,” Taggart grunted. “Sorry about the mess. I haven’t had much time to clean.”

  She took his excuse without comment, but spotted the gun parts on the kitchen table. He could see what went on in her head as clear as if she was wearing a sign around her neck.

  “I was cleaning it,” Taggart said, and hobbled toward the kitchen. It was separated from the living room by one big square doorway that could have been a double door at one point. The short pile cheap carpet ended in a thin metal divider and turned into old linoleum that was cracked in places, and then you were in the kitchen.

  Taggart sat back down at the table and went back to putting the handgun together. “It’s just a hobby. I’m not gonna off myself.”

  “I didn’t say anything,” Angie sighed as she sat across from him and watched him put the gun back together. She smiled. “Crazy how all those little pieces add up, isn’t it?”

  Taggart shrugged.

  “So,” Angie said, changing the subject about as obviously as if she’d taken a hard right turn at a hundred miles an hour. “Casey and I are having some friends over next week. Just a little low-key, casual thing. Casey’s friend Steven will be there.”

  The empty clip clicked into place, and Taggart laid the reassembled gun back down, safety on, chamber cleared, and sighed. “I take it I should know who Steven is.”

  His sister eyed the gun for a moment but managed to do a good job of pretending to ignore it when she looked back at him. She raised an eyebrow. “Yeah — Steven Locke? He’s blond, about my height, gorgeous. You two met when you first got back. When we had your coming home party.”

  He’d blacked most of that night out. Also, he’s still been on a lot of pain meds after the surgery. “Oh, right,” he said. “Steven. Sure. Sounds fun.”

  She stared at him, and then snorted as she shook her head. “You don’t remember him. It’s okay, he knows you’re — that you’ve got stuff going on. I thought you two kind of hit it off. He’s a really nice —”

  “Let me stop you there,” Taggart said. He rested his elbows on the table. “Look. I know you mean well, Sis. But I’m not interested in Steven. Or anybody else. I’m fine on my own here, okay? I’m not gonna hang myself or blow my brains out. I don’t need anyone looking after me. And for all I know, once I get to moving around on this hunk of metal, you know — they might just re-enlist my ass. I don’t need to be tangled up in anybody.”

  Angie was very still, and while he couldn’t see her hands in her lap, he saw the slight movement in her upper arms that told him she was wringing them, like their mom always did. She looked a lot like her. So did Taggart, for that matter. Neither of them got their fathers’ slightly lumpy, soft features. Only Angie had gotten his freckled complexion. Those freckles accentuated the way her eyes pinched at the corners now. “You’ve got to be kidding me, Tag,” she said quietly. “You wouldn’t really redeploy, would you? Now? After . . .”

  “I don’t know,” he admitted. “Look, I’m sorry. I just don’t like anybody trying to meddle. You know that. I don’t need you to hook me up with anyone, and I’d appreciate it if you didn’t go around telling people about me like that.”

  His sister rolled her eyes. “Tag, nobody cares if you’re gay anymore.”

  He flinched at that word and covered it by rubbing his neck. “I don’t give a shit about that,” he muttered. “Look I just need some more time before I even think about . . . that sort of thing, okay?”

  ‘Closeted’ was a word that Tag didn’t care for. It was no one’s fucking business what turned him on, for one thing — and for another, he’d been married to his M16 for almost four years and that was just about the best relationship he ever had. Gay, straight, bi, none-of-the-above; that was shit you didn’t have to worry about in the barracks. Tag was a marine, his sexual orientation was combat, as far as he was concerned.

  Angie looked away, scanning the kitchen instead of meeting his gaze. She sighed when she saw the sink, and stood.

  “Don’t,” Tag said.

  She didn’t listen, though, and went to the sink and turned the water on. That was their mom, too. Cleaning when she was frustrated. If he let Angie go on long enough, she’d be laying new carpet, and organizing his limited collection of glassware by height and color — which would be easy, given that he only had three glasses in his cabinet.

  She squeezed soap onto an already old sponge, and picked up a plate to scrub it.

  “Damn it, Angie, I said leave it!” He stood, but put too much weight on the fake leg. He started to topple and had to catch himself on the edge of the counter.

  Angie had already crossed half the space to catch him. He waved her off, and she withdrew but kept an eye on him.

  She went back to washing dishes. And hell, what was he gonna do about it? Fall on her?

  Taggart watched her wash the first plate and set it aside. After another moment, he got his balance under him and braced himself on the counter to walk toward her. He grabbed a towel from the drawer, and picked up the plate to dry it.

  “I just want you to be able to keep moving forward,” Angie whispered. “That’s all. I don’t expect you to go back to being who you were before, Tag. I just want you to . . .be here.”

  “I’m here,” Tag sighed. He opened the cabinet over the microwave and put the dried plate in it.

  Angie handed him another and caught his gaze. She looked sad, and he hated it. He almost hated her. And he hated that he felt that way, too. He hated that he felt anything, he supposed, if he got right down to it.

  “No, Tag,” Angie said.�
�You’re not.”

  They washed the rest of the dishes in silence before she said a hurried goodbye. When she was gone, he sat down at the table, and set about taking his Beretta apart again.

  9

  The nature of the patient population at a VA hospital was such that most of Scott’s patients — and by extension, Martin’s patients — were amputees. However, that wasn’t universally true, as he learned when Scott introduced him to The Captain — Arnold Zuckerman, an elderly army vet who’d just undergone back surgery.

  “Fresh meat?” Arnold asked when Scott introduced Martin as his primary PT over the next six weeks. “What’d you do to get stuck in this hole?”

  Martin hesitated, until Arnold’s face split into a wide grin.

  “Arnold here is a regular,” Scott said. “I’m sure you’ll get along fine.”

  “One more surgery and I’m officially an android,” Arnold confirmed.

  Martin chuckled and shook the old man’s hand. “You’ll have to let me know if you dream of electric sheep.”

  Arnold laughed, and glanced at Scott. “I like this one! Why don’t you have more like him around here?”

  “We do,” Scott said, “they just don’t last long enough for you to meet them. Did they have you fill out a pain chart?” He flipped through the pages he’d been given for Arnold’s intake.

  “I think the nurse was distracted by my dashing good looks,” Arnold said. He winked at Martin.

  “This place.” Scott muttered. “Alright, I’ll be back.”

  He left them alone, and Arnold smiled as he regarded Martin. “So. How long you been here?”

  “Just over a week,” Martin said. “I didn’t get stuck here, though. It was in my top three, and the first place I applied.”

  Arnold nodded and rubbed his stubbled chin. “You got service members in the family?”

  Martin’s eyebrows rose. “I do. Did, I mean — my brother. He was in the army as well.”

  “Oh,” Arnold said, his voice low and rough. “I’m sorry for your loss.”