Free Mafia Trilogy 03 - The Scythe by Jonas Saul Page B

me?”
     
    “No, just underwear and socks.”
     
    “Then how can you help me remember who I am?”
     
    “We took your prints and photo and sent it in this morning. We would have done it yesterday when you got in, but the emergency department was full. There was a large bus accident out on the highway. Two tour buses collided right outside of here. We had fifty people show up in emerg twenty minutes after you rolled in. We cleaned you up and left you to sleep.” The doctor moved to the door.
     
    “How long before they get back to you with who I am? I mean, what if I have a wife, kids. They could be worried about me.”
     
    From the doctor’s expression, he clearly wasn’t buying it. “I’ll hear back from them later this afternoon or tomorrow morning.”
     
    “Thank you.”
     
    “I’ve got rounds to do. If you think of anything, buzz the nurse. She’ll page me. When I know more, I’ll come back and see you.”
     
    Darwin nodded.
     
    The doctor stepped out of the room and closed the door behind him. He didn’t lock it. Darwin was free to go.
     
    Yeah, if I can walk.
     
    He tried to get up, but lay back down as pain shot through his abdomen.
     
    “Fuck, didn’t they give me any Demerol or morphine?”
     
    He tried again, gritting his teeth against the pain. Once he was sitting on the side of the bed, his head spun. He closed his eyes and waited for it to go away. He slid off the bed and touched his feet down gingerly, in case he was stepping onto wounds from the glass.
     
    He couldn’t believe how lucky he had been. He was no longer the pudgy Canadian boy the Mafia first encountered on that side road out by the abandoned airplane hangar so long ago. He was a man now. His innocence had been torn from him and the void was filled with determination and anger. He was pissed off with what they had done to him and his wife, and he was determined to hunt them down until this nightmare was over.
     
    Nothing would stop him now. Bolstered by his escape from the glass prison in Yuri’s basement, he realized that nothing could stop him.
     
    Yuri was in Florida because he thought Arkady was down there. That meant that Darwin needed to get down to Florida as soon as he could.
     
    Maybe he could locate Carson Dodge and enlist him to use his resources to help find the Russians.
     
    But first he needed to get out of this hospital. Then he would figure a way to get to Florida.
     
    He walked across the floor, favoring the pain a little. It wasn’t too bad once he got up and walking about.
     
    In the closet he found a pair of track pants and a T-shirt.
     
    They probably grabbed it out of lost and found.
     
    The pants were a little tight but they fit okay.
     
    Shoes? They have to have shoes.
     
    He couldn’t find any.
     
    He used the bathroom, splashed water on his face and wet his hair, styling it a little. The bruises on his cheeks were dark purple and made his cheeks puff up like a twisted clown’s idea of macabre makeup.
     
    Disguise wouldn’t work. Nothing he could do would cover the condition his face was in. He turned slightly and saw the stitches at the back of his head had been removed.
     
    Thanks, Doc.
     
    He moved to the door, trying to walk as normal as he could. It felt good to be out, to be free.
     
    Maybe when this was all over and he and Rosina were living in Italy or Greece, he would write his memoirs.
     
    This kind of stuff never happens to anybody, he thought. It’s stranger than fiction.
     
    Dressed in blue track pants and a white T-shirt with nothing on his feet—they must have discarded his ruined socks—Darwin opened the door and walked out into the corridor as if he had just been here visiting someone. Although the bruises and bandages that covered his hands could give him away.
     
    No one tried to stop him as he headed down the hall. He went through a door that led to the stairwell, descended a floor and walked down that corridor.
     
    At each room, he slowed enough to