Free Spark by John Lutz

thinking.”
    “Bet you’re not. Bet you’re feeling.”
    “Feeling lousy,” he said.
    He moved to struggle to a sitting position, reaching for his cane with a stab of pain. Then he remembered the casual destruction of the cane after it had been used to beat him. It had been a skillful beating, bruising but not breaking, and he was reasonably sure there was no long-term injury. He was also sure the man who’d assaulted him was a professional thug. In the unlikely event of an arrest, by the time the victim of such a beating made it into a courtroom, the bruises would have long since faded. Prosecutors were left to try to prove that photographs, if there were any, weren’t images of faked injuries.
    Beth worked an arm beneath one of his and lifted gently, but it still caused a jolt of pain and he ground his teeth.
    “You oughta see,” she said. “You got welts all over you. You oughta fucking see!”
    “I don’t have to see to know they’re there. I don’t have my cane.”
    “I know, lover. I’ll help you out to the car.”
    He leaned on her strong, lithe body, taking it slow, making it to the door with its useless locks. Have to make repairs.
    Outside, he squinted against the glare, and the heat hit him like a falling wall. A few people by the pool stopped what they were doing and stared as Beth helped ease him into the passenger side of her LeBaron convertible. A small, shapely woman in a red bathing suit slung a towel across her shoulders and gazed openly with her head cocked to the side. He leaned back in the seat and closed his eyes to the brilliance and heat of the sun.
    Great! Beth had the car’s top down. That was why she wore the flowered sweatband, to keep her hair from flying in her face.
    Quickly, she started the engine, raised the canvas top, and switched on the air conditioner.
    Then she drove fast and artfully, leaning forward to peer through the windshield intensely and gripping the steering wheel with both hands in the ten-and-two-o’clock position. On turns, she shuffled the steering wheel through her hands instead of crossing her arms. Knew her stuff. Maybe she’d driven getaway while living with her drug-czar husband. Wheel moll, if there was such a thing.
    Unfair of him to think that, Carver decided. He wasn’t one to muck around in the past, anyway. It made no difference to him what she’d done in that phase of her life; being judgmental was a game he didn’t play. Who was he, Albert Schweitzer?
    The car’s interior had barely cooled down when she swerved into a circular driveway, then parked by the tinted glass doors of a hospital emergency entrance.

12
    A NURSE PLACED COLD compresses on Carver’s arms and shoulders to contain the swelling, while a young doctor whose name was Doris Loa swabbed his throat with disinfectant.
    “This is about all we can do for you, Mr. Carver,” Dr. Loa told him, still with the cotton swab pressed against his tonsils. Apparently she didn’t expect an answer. She was a dark-complexioned, dark-eyed woman of about thirty with Asiatic features and an air of calm competence.
    Finally she removed the swab, leaving him with a stinging sensation at the back of his throat and a persistent taste of iodine. She stepped back, dropped the used swab into a plastic-lined receptacle, and said, “How’d this happen?”
    “Accident,” Carver said, before Beth could speak.
    “That right?” She looked at Beth, who shrugged and nodded simultaneously. “Fell down some stairs, I bet,” Dr. Loa said.
    “Fifteen steps,” Carver said. “Loose throw rug. Dangerous. When’s this bitter taste gonna go away?”
    “Soon. What about the throat?”
    “I was eating a Popsicle when I fell.”
    “Those damned wooden sticks,” Dr. Loa said. She smiled hopelessly; she went from plain to attractive when she smiled. “I’m too busy to pry. I’m going to write you a prescription for pain pills and an antibiotic to reduce the possibility of infection. Call me if there