Ch.21: The Missing Finger

The door opens again.

I brace myself. Aris is back from dragging his mistress to her recovery room. He is going to be angry.

But he isn't angry.

He is calm. Quiet. Clinical.

He walks into the room carrying a small, stainless steel case. It looks like a lunchbox, but I know what’s inside. It’s a transport container.

He sets it on the tray table.

He snaps on a pair of fresh latex gloves.

"The graft is failing," he says simply. He doesn't look at me. He is organizing his instruments on a sterile drape. "The adrenaline shock caused massive vasoconstriction. The tissue is hypoxic."

He picks up a scalpel. Not the small one he used for the eye. A larger one. A #10 blade.

"I need to stimulate angiogenesis," he explains, his voice devoid of emotion. "I need stem cells. Fresh, mesenchymal stem cells to inject directly into the graft bed."

He turns to me.

"Blood isn't enough anymore, Elena. I've taken too much. Your hematocrit is critical. If I take more, your heart will stop, and the tissue will die anyway."

He walks to the side of the bed. He picks up my left hand.

My hand is limp. The paralysis from the high dose he gave me earlier is still in full effect. I can't make a fist. I can't even twitch.

He examines my fingers. Long, slender, pianist's fingers. He used to love them. He used to kiss the knuckles.

"Bone marrow is the best source," he muses. "But a hip aspiration takes too long. And the infection risk in this... environment... is too high."

He strokes my ring finger.

He slides my wedding ring off.

It’s a vintage platinum band with a three-carat diamond. He designed it himself.

He sets the ring on the bedside table. It lands with a soft *clink* next to the empty vial of Rocuronium.

"There is another source," he says. "Rich in progenitor cells. The phalangeal marrow."

He looks at me. His eyes are dead.

"I'm going to take a sample."

He isn't going to use a needle. He’s holding a bone saw. A small, oscillating Stryker saw.

He’s going to amputate.

"Don't worry," he says, turning on the saw. The high-pitched whine fills the room. "The nerve block from the wrist is still active."

It isn't.

The block was for the restraints. It wore off hours ago.

He grabs my ring finger. He isolates it from the others.

He lowers the saw.

The blade bites into the skin.

Pain explodes.

It isn't a sharp pain. It is a grinding, vibrating, shattering agony that travels up my arm and explodes in my brain like a white-hot star.

I try to scream.

My mouth opens. A sound comes out. A ragged, guttural gargle.

Aris pauses. He looks at my face.

"Reflex," he mutters.

He pushes harder.

The saw hits the bone. The vibration rattles my teeth. I feel the marrow cooking inside the phalanx.

My body convulses against the straps. Not a seizure this time. Just pure, unadulterated torture.

The bone snaps.

He cuts through the tendon.

The finger comes free.

He drops the saw. It clatters onto the tray.

He picks up the severed finger. He holds it up to the light, inspecting the cut end.

"Viable," he says.

He drops it into the steel container. He snaps the lid shut.

He doesn't bandage my hand. He just wraps a tourniquet around my wrist to stop the arterial spray.

"I'll suture it later," he says. "Time is tissue."

He grabs the case. He turns to leave.

He stops at the door. He looks back at the bedside table.

My wedding ring is sitting there. A circle of platinum and diamond, sparkling under the harsh fluorescent light.

He looks at his hand. He isn't wearing his ring. He took it off for the surgery.

"I suppose you don't need that anymore," he says.

He reaches for it.

Then he stops.

He hears Isabella screaming upstairs. A high, thin wail of pain.

"Coming, darling," he calls out.

He leaves the ring.

He runs out the door, the steel case tucked under his arm like a football.

I lie in the dark.

My hand is on fire. The stump where my finger used to be is throbbing with a pulse that feels like a hammer blow.

I look at the table.

The ring is there.

It’s heavy. It’s sharp. The diamond is cut in a marquise shape. Pointed. Hard enough to cut glass.

Hard enough to cut wire.

I stare at it through the tears blurring my vision.

He took the finger. But he left the ring on the bedside table.