Troublemaker Read Online Free Page B

fogginess, this sense of disconnect from everything except pain, would become permanent. Maybe the damage was too great to heal completely. Maybe this was his new reality. But—no. He could sense his own improvement, though from “near death” to “really shitty” wasn’t that long a road.
    To hide his unease, he said, “Hey,” to MacNamara, then scowled because the word sounded mushy, his voice thin and weak. He shifted himself around, intending to reach for the foam cup sitting on the rolling table beside him, only to discover that he was still strapped down—and that pain meds on the decline also meant he had to deal with his shot-up and patched-together body that protested every movement. Both the pain and his helplessness pissed him off.
    â€œGet these . . damn straps . . . off me,” he rasped, anger lending some strength to his voice.
    Axel didn’t budge. “You gonna try to rip the IV lines out again?”
    The idea was tempting, but he knew if he did, the straps would come back. He wanted to be in control of his body.
    â€œNo,” he said grudgingly.
    MacNamara deftly released him, then pressed the button that raised the head of the bed. Morgan got dizzy for a minute, but he took deep breaths and willed himself not to show any sissy-assed weakness such as passing out. He’d never live that down.
    â€œYou up to answering questions?” MacNamara asked in that abrupt way of his, no time wasted in pleasantries or even asking how Morgan was feeling.
    Morgan kind of half-glared from bleary eyes, mainly because his default mood was that deep and festering rage. “Ask,” he said, reaching again—this time with results—for the foam cup, which he sincerely hoped held some water. The movement was just short of agonizing; his chest felt as if someone were hacking at it with a cleaver. He ground his teeth together and kept stretching his arm out, partly because he was damned if he’d give in to the pain and partly because he really wanted that water.
    Anyone else would have gotten the cup for him, but not MacNamara. Right now, Morgan appreciated the lack of sympathy; he wanted to do it himself. He closed his shaking hand around the cup and lifted it. There were a couple of inches of water in the cup and he sucked it dry, then fumbled the cup back onto the table. He sank back against the pillow, as exhausted as if he’d just finished a twenty-mile run.
    â€œDo you remember what happened?”
    â€œYeah.” Maybe he was mentally fuzzy, but he wasn’t amnesiac.
    MacNamara pulled a chair around and dropped into it. He was lean to the point of spareness, just a little above average height, but no one would ever mistake his lack of size as a lack of power. He was intense and ruthless, just the kind of guy the GO-Teams needed to watch their backs.
    â€œDo you know who shot you?”
    â€œNo.” Morgan drew a breath. “Do you?”
    â€œHe was Russian mob.”
    Morgan blinked, flummoxed as much as he was capable of being flummoxed. Russian? Mob? What the hell? He didn’t have anything to do with the Russian mob. “No shit?”
    â€œNo shit.”
    â€œI don’t know . . . anyone in the Russian mob.” He’d started to say he didn’t know any Russians, but remembered that he did in fact know a number of Russians—none of them in the mob, though. “What’s his name?”
    â€œAlbert Rykov. Was. He’s dead.”
    Good, Morgan thought. He didn’t have a lot of forgiveness for people who shot him . . . none, in fact. “I’ve never heard of him.” A sluggish thought occurred: “Maybe he was after someone else?”
    â€œNo.” Axel’s tone was flat, certain. He wasn’t entertaining any doubt whatsoever.
    â€œWhy would the Russian mob target me?” That didn’t make any sense at all. He scrubbed his hand over his face, felt the rasp of