She found the wound at six AM.
He was asleep when she came in. He'd left the bathroom light on because the stitches had bled through the first bandage and he'd had to redo them at four and he'd been too tired to flip the switch. She must have seen the blood on the gauze in the trash, the hydrogen peroxide on the counter, the pink stain in the sink. She must have come into the bedroom and pulled back the sheet.
He woke to her fingers on his ribs.
Pressing. Testing the edge of the bandage, her thumb following the line of the cut underneath, and the sting of it brought him all the way awake and he flinched and opened his eyes.
She was sitting on the edge of the bed. Still in her work clothes from the penthouse job, the catsuit unzipped to her waist, a gray t-shirt underneath. Her hair was down. Her face was still.
"Who."
One word.
He sat up. The stitches pulled and he put his hand over the bandage. Her eyes tracked his hand.
"Three guys. They jumped me on Forty-Fourth. They wanted the Silvermane documents."
"Three."
"Yeah."
"And you handled three."
"I handled one. Maybe two. The third one got the knife in."
Her jaw worked. She was looking at the bandage, at the red seeping through the white, and her hand was still on his ribs, her fingers resting on the gauze. She pressed again. He winced.
"Who were they."
"Black clothes. Masks. Trained. One of them said they were with the organization that Silvermane works for."
"The Hand."
"You know them."
"I know enough to not steal from them." Her voice was level. Her fingers pressed harder on the bandage and he could feel her pulse in her fingertips, fast. "How did you get away from three trained Hand operatives with a knife wound."
He let the silence sit.
"Someone helped."
"Who."
"I don't know her name."
He'd said her.
Her hand on his ribs went still. Her fingers flat on the gauze, not pressing anymore, just resting there. Deliberately still.
"A woman."
"Yeah."
"She was at the fight ring. The one in Meatpacking. She's been watching Silvermane's network. She said we walked into her operation."
"We."
"Her word."
Felicia stood up. She walked to the kitchen. He heard the faucet run. A glass filling. She came back and handed it to him and sat in the chair by the window instead of on the bed.
Two feet further away than the bed.
"What else."
"She killed two of them. In seconds. The third ran."
"And then."
"She checked the wound. Told me it was shallow. Told me the Hand would come back. Left."
"That's it."
"That's it."
She drank her own water. Looked at him over the rim. Green eyes, and the green was bright in the early light, and she was looking for whatever he wasn't saying.
"You're leaving something out."
He wasn't going to lie. Lying to Felicia was a losing bet because she'd figure it out and the figuring would be worse than the truth.
"She gave me a number. In case they come back."
"A number."
"Yeah."
"Where."
"I memorized it. She showed me a screen."
"Show me your phone."
He handed it over. She scrolled through his contacts. His recent calls. His messages. Her face didn't change while she looked. She handed it back.
"It's not in the phone."
"I told you. I memorized it."
"You memorized a stranger's phone number after getting stabbed."
"It's ten digits."
She set the water glass on the windowsill. Hard enough that the glass rang against the wood. She crossed her arms. The catsuit bunched at her elbows.
"I don't care if you got your ass kicked." Her voice was tight. Each word placed. "I don't care if three of them or thirty of them came after you. I care that you didn't call me. I was four miles away on a rooftop with my phone in my pocket and you didn't call."
"It was over in a minute."
"I didn't want to-"
"To what. Worry me." She said the word like it tasted wrong. "You don't get to decide what worries me. You got stabbed, Troy. You got stabbed and a strange woman with no name showed up and killed people and gave you her phone number and you came home and went to sleep. And I found out because I pulled back a sheet."
He didn't have an answer.
She looked at the bandage. Her arms were still crossed. Her jaw was tight and the muscle in her cheek flexed once and she was angry.
"Is she pretty."
The question came out flat. Clinical.
"That's not-"
"Is she pretty, Troy."
He looked at her.
"I got jumped by three assassins and you're asking if the person who saved my life is attractive."
"I'm asking."
He could lie. He thought about lying. She was sitting in his chair by his window with her arms crossed and the early light on her face and she'd come through his door at six AM with blood on the gauze and her first word had been "who".
"I don't know what she looks like. It was dark. She was fast."
Felicia held his eyes. Three seconds. Four. Then she looked away. Uncrossed her arms. Her hand went to the windowsill and her thumb rubbed the condensation on the water glass and she didn't say anything for a while.
She stood up. Walked to the bed. Sat beside him. Her hip against his.
Her hand went to his ribs. Over the bandage. She pressed, light, enough to make him aware of the wound but not enough to hurt. Her palm was warm through the gauze. She held it there.
Then her hand slid up. Over his ribs, across his stomach, to his chest. She stopped over his heart. Her fingers spread. She could feel his heartbeat. He could feel her pulse in her palm.
The room was quiet. Early light through the window, amber going white. Her hand on his chest, her fingers on his heartbeat, and her face was turned away from him and he couldn't see her expression but he could see her throat working on a swallow.
She pulled her hand back. Put it in her lap.
"I'm stealing your shower."
She stood. Walked to the bathroom. The door closed. The lock didn't catch. He could hear it, the latch not clicking into place, the door resting against the frame. She hadn't locked it.
The shower started. Water on tile. Steam curling under the door.
He sat on the bed with his stitches pulling and her water glass on the windowsill and the number in his head and the sound of her shower through the wall.
The lock hadn't caught. The door was closed but not locked.
He didn't follow.
The argument wasn't over.