Kiss Me if You Can

When Josh opened his eyes again, he was in a hospital.

A thick bandage wrapped around one arm, and an IV needle was inserted into the other.

“You’ve got an insane amount of stamina.”

Mark, who had just arrived, clicked his tongue in disbelief.

He launched into a long-winded explanation—detailing Josh’s condition upon arrival, the procedures he underwent, the injections he received—but to Josh, it all blurred into one thing: “I got a lot of shots and treatment.”

Only half-listening, Josh rummaged through the small bag of personal belongings Mark had brought. The first thing he checked was his phone.

A few messages had come in while he was unconscious. One was from Emma.

[Call me when you can. I need to ask you something.]

It didn’t seem urgent.

I’ll deal with it later.

Thinking the same as last time, Josh skimmed through the rest of his messages.

Meanwhile, Mark’s report was finally wrapping up.

“You’re fully vaccinated now—rabies shot, tetanus, all done. Luckily, no broken bones.”@@novelbin@@

Mark sighed as if relieved before adding with a smirk,

“But seriously, what the hell were you thinking, going up against a pack of coyotes? C was completely wrecked watching that. The guy went pale as a ghost when you collapsed. Even Laura was shocked—said she’d never seen him panic like that before.”

Josh felt weird hearing that.

Chase had been that shaken because of him?

Not knowing how to respond, he forced a vague smile and quickly changed the subject.

“So, when can I go back to work?”

“Hey, slow down. What’s the rush?”

Mark raised a hand, gesturing for him to calm the hell down.

“They’ll monitor you for another day. You’ll probably be cleared tomorrow. Take it easy. Get some rest. Maybe call your kid. You probably miss him, right?”

“…Yeah, I do.”

The first thing that flashed in his mind was Pete—but oddly, Chase’s face overlapped with his.

Josh quickly shoved the thought aside.

“So? What the hell happened?”

He had a lot of questions.

Mark exhaled, then began explaining.

“The problem started at the hospital.”

Josh wasn’t surprised.

Mark continued,

“The chocolates we ate were drugged. Thankfully, it wasn’t anything too serious—everyone recovered after a few hours. Henry got hit the worst, though. The guy ate the most, so he hallucinated the longest. Took twice as long to snap out of it.”

Josh barely reacted.

Not surprising. Henry ate everything in sight.

Mark sighed.

“Seth and I just felt off for a while. I told Henry to stop eating free shit without thinking. Thankfully, Isaac didn’t touch them at all. Though, honestly, Henry bringing back two full handfuls of that stuff made testing the contents a lot easier.”