Chapter 276

Liam stepped into the living room and immediately rummaged through the jacket hanging on the coat rack. After finishing a grueling operation, he desperately needed the comfort of a cigarette. But all he found was a lighter that was nearly out of gas—and, to top it off, he’d run out of cigarettes entirely.

Scowling, Liam glanced around. The taste would be awful, but there had to be a half-smoked butt somewhere. He dug through the pile of cigarette butts stacked over empty beer cans and sardine tins until he found one that still looked usable.

His hands trembled as he flicked the lighter. When the flame caught, he sucked hard enough that his cheeks hollowed, terrified it might die out, then exhaled a slow plume of smoke as drowsiness washed over him.

“Fucking disgusting,” a man’s voice muttered suddenly in a foreign language, followed by the thudding sound of someone kicking the wall. The blows were so violent that the entire house seemed to shake.

Irritated beyond reason, Liam snapped toward the sound.

“What the hell are you doing, kicking my wall?”

“The whole place reeks of smoke! If you’re going to smoke, go outside!”

“You’ve got to be kidding me. Can’t even smoke in my own house?”

“You’re treating patients here. That makes it a hospital, not a house.”

“If you don’t like my way of practicing medicine, you can leave. I can stop taking patients anytime.”

Liam exhaled a long stream of smoke, grumbling under his breath. Across from him, an Asian man with sharply defined brow ridges narrowed his eyes and glared. The look said clearly, Do you have a death wish?

The man’s gaze was so feral it felt like facing down a tiger, yet Liam wasn’t the least bit afraid. He might be unlicensed now, but he was still the only surgeon on Kamti Island.

That morning, the man had shown up carrying a patient who was nearly dead. He’d found Liam by asking around the fishermen who’d gone out before dawn—the only doctor on the island. Most patients went to hospitals on the Baggers City mainland, but the uninsured fishermen of Kamti Island came to him instead.

Once, Liam had been a successful surgeon. Then came the insurance fraud, the drug abuse, and the loss of his license. It hadn’t stopped there—he’d kept treating patients illegally, botched a procedure, and fled the country in fear of arrest, drifting from state to state until he ended up here.

And this morning, two men soaked in seawater and blood had appeared before him: one barely alive, the other barking at him to keep the man breathing.

The fierce man had tossed a dripping bag at his feet and ordered him to treat the patient. Inside were stacks of waterlogged bills.

It had been too long since Liam had seen that kind of money. The lure of the cash outweighed his unease about treating a gunshot victim possibly tied to something criminal.

“The operation’s done. So whether I smoke or light up weed, mind your own business.”

He stubbed the burnt filter on the table, filling the air with acrid stench, and reached for another butt from the pile. Watching him in disgust, the Asian man spoke.

“If you’re thinking of taking the money and trying something stupid, don’t. Try anything, and you won’t like how it ends. Call the cops, and you’ll be in diapers for the rest of your life.”

The tone was filthy, the phrasing crude. Liam drew on the cigarette again and blew out another cloud of smoke, eyeing the man sideways. He had to be an Asian gangster, probably one trying to expand operations into Baggers City who’d somehow drifted all the way to Kamti.

“Anyway, the surgery’s over. Why would I call the cops?”

The man folded his arms and interrogated him.

“Did it go well?”

“The operation itself went fine. He was shot in the left flank and side—barely made it. A few minutes later and he’d be dead.”

“Think he’ll live?”

Liam shook his head.

“It’s bad. Honestly, it’s a miracle he’s still alive. A normal person would’ve died already, but this guy’s strange. ...He’s still hanging on.”

“Damn it. I can’t have him die.”

The man raked his fingers through his hair in frustration. It wasn’t worry on his face—more like the irritation of a debt collector who needed his debtor alive long enough to pay up.

“The gunshot’s not fresh,” he said. “How the hell was he still alive when I found him?”

Liam jammed the spent butt into the ash heap and muttered, “I thought you treated him.”

The man tilted his head, raising a brow.

“Me? Not at all. Probably did it himself.”

“Really? Must’ve hurt like hell. He cauterized a few blood vessels himself, stuffed the wound with gauze to stop the bleeding. No sign of infection, somehow. If he’d gone to a hospital, he might’ve made it. Instead, whoever patched him up just stitched the wound shut in a hurry. The guy’s not entirely ignorant of medicine, but... tell him this: his technique was crap. If he ever wakes up, that is.”

“Is there any way to save him?”

Liam shook his head again.

“As you can see, this isn’t a hospital. I don’t have any blood packs. I’ve hooked him up to some plasma expanders, but they won’t be enough for a recovery.”

“...Blood.”

The man’s face hardened as he stared at the floor. Liam hesitated—he hated the idea of direct transfusions—but in this emergency, there was no other option. Reluctantly, he asked,

“What’s your blood type?”

“Me? Type B.”

“That’s unfortunate. The patient’s AB positive. Most of Kamti Island’s population’s white—finding a match here will be tough. AB’s rare among them.”

The man pressed a hand to his side and stared toward the closed door. The frown on his face looked almost artistic. He let out a sigh deep enough to sink the floor and walked straight into the room without asking.

Liam picked up the black bag that had been left in the living room. It was heavy—inside were twenty-three bundles of hundred-dollar bills. Two hundred thirty thousand in total. The payment for treating a suspicious gunshot wound and keeping quiet about both the patient and the details.

A fortune big enough to buy a high-end car outright had landed in his lap. He wondered if he could squeeze even more out of the man and hurried after him.

“Actually, a transfusion might be possible. I’m type O. There’s a chance he won’t wake up, but if we risk some side effects—”

“Impossible.”

“What?”

“We can’t take ordinary blood.”

“Huh? ...What, you mean you’re sticking to some kind of no-transfusion principle? What are you, Jehovah’s Witnesses?”

“What?”

The man frowned, then smirked and turned his head away.

“Think whatever you want.”

But Liam wasn’t exactly imaginative. He had no idea why these people couldn’t take “ordinary blood.” After finally getting to use his skills again, it felt like a waste to lose the patient anyway. He sighed, staring down at the man who was barely clinging to life.

On the cot lay a man in his early thirties, unconscious. His skin was ghost-pale, his body crisscrossed with scars. There was no guessing what kind of life had carved him up like that.

But luck wasn’t on his side today. Severe blood loss had sent him into hypoxia; he was surviving only because of the oxygen mask. Without a transfusion, he wouldn’t make it.

Damn it. I’m going to end up having to get rid of a corpse.

Liam felt a chill of dread. This was exactly why he avoided gunshot victims. If the man died, he might have to flee Kamti Island and live as a fugitive again.

He turned to leave the room, meaning to find another butt, when the Asian man gripped his shoulder hard enough to make the muscles ache and spun him around.

“What the—what is it now?”

Liam rubbed his shoulder, glaring, but the man ignored the protest.

“To transfuse him—you said O or AB would work, right?”

“Yeah. ...Wait, where are you going?”

The man, now tightening the laces on his worn sneakers, headed for the door.

“Where else? To get a blood pack.”

He checked something in the chest pocket of his shirt, answered absently, and stepped outside. For an instant, Liam caught the gleam of a pistol grip inside that pocket.

Staring at the closed door, Liam felt goosebumps crawl up his arms and murmured to himself,

“Where the hell is he going to get a blood pack?”