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lower down were a mess, he was still beautiful with his sharp red face and his proud purple chest and gold belly. He aimed for a bougainvillea perch and gazed sagely past her right arm. Across from him, over her heart, her timid wren hid in his nest as though the events of the night had spooked him.
    He wasn’t alone. Wren lifted the gown a little higher.
    The top of her cherry blossom tree was still visible, but the rest of it disappeared under bandages. She’d have to wait to assess the damage.
    Wren glanced at her snoring neighbor. The woman was about Mamaw Gigi’s age, seventy, or so. She slept on her back with her mouth open. A tube that looked disturbingly thick snaked down from the side of her bed and ended in a pouch half-full of rust-colored fluid.
    Wren made a face and looked toward the door, not wanting to think of the tube or its unfortunate owner. She was aware that she was both half-starved and nauseated, but the thought of eating anything in the dingy hospital room nearly made her gag.
    I need to get out of here… What the hell time is it, anyway?
    There were no windows in the room, but she felt sure that only a few hours had passed. She looked around in search of her purse and clothes. They were nowhere to be found. Did Rocky have them? Wren remembered her boss hovering over her when they strapped her to a gurney in the hospital’s drive. Rocky must have brought her in his car.
    The ride she didn’t remember, but she did recall a nurse helping her out of her clothes and into a mint-green gown in the ER. Wren looked down. The one she wore now was blue. Any number of things could have happened to her between the time the doctor with the blue eyes nearly killed her and the moment she’d awoken here.
    The thought sent an unpleasant shiver up her spine. There was no telling how many people had seen her naked since she’d arrived. What made it worse was that in the moments before she’d passed out the second time, she hadn’t even cared about that. The pain in her middle had been so bad, she’d been ready just to die and be done with it.
    But she hadn’t died. She’d survived. Again. Still, Wren knew all too well that surviving wasn’t always everything it was cracked up to be.
    She pressed the button labeled Nurse and heard a pinging off in the distance. Moments later, a young nurse with awesome Bantu knots charged into her room.
    “Good morning!” she sang. “How you feeling today?”
    The greeting caused her roommate’s snore cadence to trip and stumble, but it found its rhythm again.
    “Hi… um… what day is it?” Wren asked, trying to remember what day it had been when she’d touched up Bear’s BACA tattoo.
    Thursday. It’s Thursday.
    “It’s Friday morning. Almost Friday afternoon! My name’s Riva. You feel like you could eat something? I can get you some lunch.”
    “Friday afternoon? ” Wren felt her eyebrows climb to her hairline. She should have driven Mamaw Gigi to her hair appointment that morning. Had Rocky gotten in touch with her? Mamaw had probably called her cell half-a-dozen times by now. “Do you know where my stuff is? I really need my phone.”
    Riva smiled. “Sure thing, honey. Everything stays under your bed.” Riva bent down and retrieved Wren’s patchwork satchel.
    She took it from the nurse and dug out her phone.
    Seven missed calls. Four from Gigi. Two from Rocky. One from Cherise.
    “You had a visitor earlier, too, but until patients are alert, we don’t allow anyone but next of kin. Gang violence, you know.” Riva waved her hand as if Wren understood everything about gang violence.
    “Was it someone named Rocky? Shaved head? Lots of tattoos?” Who else would it be? Did anyone else know she was here?
    “Yeah, that’s him… Boyfriend?” Riva gave her a doubtful frown. Wren wrinkled her nose, recoiling at the thought.
    “Boss.” Rocky was forty-one. And married. With three little girls under the age of seven, a dog, and a litter of puppies. And