For a split second, I relaxed. Angelo used crutches sometimes. But the set of the man’s shoulders were broader than the ex-ballet dancer who’d helped me reacquaint myself with my stomach muscles last year. This man was taller, older, and Iknewhim, but I didn’t know why.
Contemplating it carried me halfway across the distance between us.
I glanced back at Lili. She was fine, Joe was fine. Me, though—I had one foot on a different fucking planet, and it had happened to me before, at the sea pool, when I’d run into a prison guard from my time at Woodhill.
The man threaded his arms into his crutches and looked up in the same moment I refocused on him. Recognition flared in his gaze and he smiled. “You look well.”
“Do I?”
“I think so. Come closer so I can get a better look. I’m not sticking these damned crutches in the mud again.”
His voice, somehow refined, rough, and Welsh all rolled into one, kickstarted my brain again. The vibrant scent of the farm morphed into the deathly disinfectant of the hospital, and I realised I was gawping in the face of the doctor who’d saved my life when my scarred guts had tied themselves in enough knots to kill me.
Dr. Ramsey.
Marc.
My cousin’s friend.
I traversed the muddy slope between us and jumped the last few feet to the cobbled yard. “I didn’t recognise you.”
Marc’s easy smile widened. “You weren’t awake much when I had you in A&E. We had some good conversations in recovery, though.”
“We did?”
“You told me you read Thoreau in prison.”
“Wow. Okay.”
“It’s not true?”
“No, it is. I just haven’t ever said that to anyone before, especially not Joe.”
Marc laughed. “Can imagine. How are you doing? You really do look well.”
“I am well. That surgery changed everything for me. If I don’t stress too much or eat a lot at once, I can forget I ever had it.”
“That’s good to hear. You had me worried for a while when they brought you in.”
“I don’t remember much of that.”
“You don’t need to. It’s done. And time only moves forward, eh?”
“I like that philosophy.”
“So do I, when I remember it.” Marc shifted on his crutches.
I glanced down and did a double-take. “You lost your leg?”
“So they tell me.” Marc’s tone turned dry. “And I keep waking up without one, so I’m inclined to believe it.”
“When?”
“Fifteen years ago, maybe? Left it splattered in Iraq somewhere.”
He’s a soldier.I saw it now, clear as day. But the timeline didn’t match the few nuggets of information I’d retained about Joe’s doctor friend. “I thought you worked on the HEMS choppers.”
“I did until my prosthesis got damaged on a run. Don’t think I’ll go back to it now. I’m too old for all the running around.”