A Demon's Drink {Book Three-Kat}

Chapter 47

Bruce had, in fact, been stopped by a swarm of reporters outside the hospital lobby. I was laying in the bed fidgeting with one of the bandages wrapped around my left palm when he walked through the door.

He was in one of his black work suits and a matching grey tie. His hands were clenched in fists while his thumb tried to crack each knuckle; a nervous tick of his. Bruce was seldom at a loss for words when I was around and his eyes darted around the room quickly before coming closer.

"Are you okay?" His voice was tight.

"Define okay."

Bruce sat down where Tim had previously been. One of his hands closed gently around my own. He didn't smile, he didn't lecture me, he just sat there and kept my hand in his.

"I'm sorry."

"Bruce," I sighed. "This was not yo-"

"I told you I would help you, I would keep you safe. I made that promise to your parents." He took a deep breath and closed his eyes. I tightened my fingers around his hand to the best of my ability.

"You can only do so much at one time. This was not your fault."

"The last time I saw you was on a monitor in Arkham. And then you were gone. We knew that you broke Bartok out for him, that you were operating under your debt, and I was still so angry that you did it. If you had gone home, we would have brought you to Gordon."

I stayed silent. Bruce opened his eyes and a few tears ran down his face.

"But you didn't go home. We couldn't find you, and then the city all but went to hell. For weeks we searched for you, but the city got worse and I couldn't ignore it. A year, an entire year went by with you gone."

"You did what you could and what you had to. I'm not going to fault you for that."

Bruce squeezed my hand before releasing it and sitting back in the chair. He ran a hand through his hair and looked toward the door.

"Where did Tim go? I know he's been here with you for a while."

"We got hungry," I shrugged. "He's looking for a candy bar in a machine somewhere. Hopefully it'll be chocolate of some kind."

The days at the hospital blurred together. I was still healing at an incredible rate, but the doctors wouldn't budge on releasing me early. They were concerned about how I would end up healing and whether or not my body would do so dangerously. I endured hours a day of physical therapy for simple tasks like walking or feeding myself under close supervision. Worst of all was when they were right.

Some days it felt like I was experiencing the same torture from the previous year. I would wake up in the middle of the night screaming in pain. The first time it happened Tim was sitting nearby, flipping through the TV channels to stay awake. I was barely aware of the nurses rushing in and doping me with obscene amounts of morphine.

The only thing worse than reliving the physical pain was the hallucinations. I would frequently see Ra's al Ghul staring at me from the far end of the room. Occasionally he would appear on the left side of my bed, grinning as Tim spoke to me or a nurse changed my IV. I must have been a pro at hiding my fear because neither Bruce nor Tim picked up on it when Ra's was in the room.

Richard had visited me a few times and would typically bring a board game or a movie I had missed from the last year. Unlike Bruce and Tim, he didn't treat me tenderly. He had always been good about being real with me.