Whispers in New York - Book Two

~Chapter 46~

Chapter Song

Faded – Alan Walker

_______________✏

Nothing could have prepared him for the scene before him once entering Adriana's room. The doctor had warned him, but it was still very much a shock.
There she lay, as still as a statue alone in the hospital bed. The room was cold, eerily cold as he approached her bedside. Noticing another bed across from her he stopped completely stunned, a sheet was placed over the top of what looked like a body underneath.

"What the fück?"

He didn't even need to explain himself, the Doctor was well aware the secondary bed had caught his eye, it was only natural. This was an extremely unorthodox situation, even for her.

"Why is she covered in blood? Am I standing in a fücking morgue right now?"

"She wouldn't get off him Salvatore. She screamed the hospital down, verbally abused the staff, the ambulance paramedics had already announced him dead. She remained on top of him applying pressure to the wound." Taking a moment the Doctor stopped to take a breath recalling the last few hours.
"She was completely hysterical, demanding we do something but I assure you there was nothing we would do, the damage had already been done some time before."
Walking further into the room she walked around Adriana's bed and stopped at the secondary bed. "She wouldn't let go of his body, even after we sedated her she sobbed uncontrollably before drifting off to sleep. We thought it was best to let the sedation kick in before separating her from him." Placing a hand on the cold off white sheet she looked to Salvatore for answers. "I know this is a lot to ask, but do you mind identifying the body, so we're sure?"

The room remained silent, it was always a difficult question to ask, but someone had to identify their John Doe and Adriana was certainly never in a state to do so.
"Or..." She spoke back up making an alternative suggestion, "would you happen to have the contact details for Luca's family? We could call them and ask for them to come down here as soon as possible."

"Absolutely not." Salvatore was cold towards her, "they shouldn't need to see him like that." This was on him; everything about the family was always on him now with the loss of his father. "I'll do it."
Making his way around Adriana's bed he joined the Doctor around the other side. Taking a deep breath he knew this was it. The moment she lifted that sheet everything would change. Their lives would be different, forever changed. He wasn't sure if he was ready, if he could ever be ready. One thing was for certain, he couldn't put Luca's parents through the heartache, he was responsible for him.

As part of the sheet was removed from the upper body, Salvatore's chest tightened with the sudden onset of intense anxiety. A body lay in front of him, zipped up inside a dark thick body bag. The sound of the oversized plastic zipper being drawn down was by far the worst sound he had ever heard.
He was accustomed to the sounds of guns blazing, the torturous sounds of people screaming. But the zipper of a body bag was something else, something unexplainable.

With the plastic pulled back and the top half of the body in full view Salvatore found himself shaking his head slightly from left to right. Inhaling deeply he felt as though he held onto the breath for a little too long feeling slightly light headed.
He wasn't exactly sure what he expected, but he was hoping his best man and long time best friend was not the one engulfed in the oversized body bag. It could have been a bystander, someone who was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time and Adriana just went into complete shock at the sight of the murder of the stranger.
But that was not the case...