by Kylie Scott
Someone yelled out from behind them. An angry torrent of words he couldn’t make out. Something hit his back, stinging like shit. A stone. They’d thrown a fucking stone at him. A crowd of people were gathering back down the street, watching with open hatred.
“Back off.” Finn’s eyes were furious, his mouth tight. “Right now.”
“Get that bastard out of our town!” someone yelled.
A chorus of idiots joined in, with “yeah” and “fuck yeah” and other genius statements. Another stone flew past his head. One hit Finn in the arm and he swore a blue streak. Things were definitely screwed in paradise if they were taking potshots at the sheriff. Nick had expected to be met with extreme dislike, maybe even a bullet, but people gathering to stone him came as a bit of a surprise.
“Take him inside, now,” Finn directed the other man.
They hustled him into the house. A good thing—his head didn’t hurt so bad out of the sun. Roslyn was stretched out on a double bed in what had probably once been a bedroom, though most of the contents were gone now in favor of medical equipment. Her beautiful face was too pale. Her red hair looked shockingly stark in contrast. Sean was helping Lila strip her out of her bloody shirt, carefully cutting through the bulk of the bandaging. The medic cut through the strap of Ros’s bra and peeled the bloodstained material down a little, away from the wound, exposing the top curve of her breast.
“Don’t look,” he growled and Finn and Sean kept their eyes averted. Just as fucking well. He was losing what little remained of his mind seeing her lying there so still. “How is she?”
Lila, the medic, pointed to chair beside the bed. “Sit here.”
Sean pulled a pair of shattered reading glasses from the pocket of Ros’s bloody shirt.
Nick could only stare. “She’s going to be mad. She’s always losing her glasses.”
“What do you need, Lila?” Sean asked, hovering by the woman’s elbow. He couldn’t remember the captain ever hanging onto a woman’s skirts before, but there was a first time for everything.
“I just need to clean the wound first, so I can see what’s going on,” she said, her hands constantly moving.
Nick fell into the chair beside Roslyn and Finn fiddled with the cuffs, producing another pair so that he was connected to the sturdy iron bed frame. Then Finn stood at the end of the mattress, pistol in hand. The sheriff’s eyes never left him. Fuck them. Whatever. So long as they helped her. He slumped tiredly in his chair. The place smelled of cleaning fluids, antibacterial stuff. Roslyn obviously wasn’t the first patient they’d ever seen.
“Finn?” Lila sighed at the cuffs on Nick’s wrists. “Isn’t this overkill?”
“They stay on,” said the sheriff. “Work around them.”
The medic grumbled but didn’t raise the subject again. Nick leaned over, resting his elbow on the frame to make it easier on the medic. Lila wrapped a band around his upper arm, preparing to take his blood. Next, she swabbed Roslyn’s forearm, then got busy filling a syringe with something.
“What are you giving her?” he asked.
“Morphine for the pain,” said Lila, a little frown of concentration on her face. Her teeth were sunk into her bottom lip. “Something to make sure she doesn’t wake up while I’m digging the bullet out of her.”
The way the woman said it gave him pause. “You’ve got experience in this sort of thing, right?”
Lila didn’t meet his eyes. “A little.”
“What? What do you mean?” Fear flashed through him and he jolted upright in his seat.
“Easy,” Sean warned.
“What’s going on here?” Nick edged forward and Finn raised his gun, pointing it at his chest.
Lila took a deep breath. “I’m a dental nurse. But I’m the best chance you have for her.”
A wave of dizziness came over him. He almost had to hang his head between his knees. “A dental nurse? Y-you’re a fucking dental nurse?”
“I will do the best I can for her.”
Nick hissed out a breath. “Shit. She doesn’t need her teeth cleaned.”
“Lila’s the only chance you’ve got, Nick.” Sean gave him a look not entirely without compassion. “Just sit back and let her work. This isn’t the first bullet wound she’s seen.”
“Oh fuck.” Seriously, he thought he might hyperventilate. Lila stuck the needle into Ros’s arm and he nearly decorated the floor with his puke. He couldn’t stand it. “Please don’t kill her. Please.”
Lila glanced at him but didn’t answer.
“Who is she?” asked Sean.
“Her name is Roslyn Stewart. She used to be a librarian.” Nick breathed deep, did his best to get his shit together. Ros needed him.
His former captain watched him through narrowed eyes. “I’ve never seen you get intense about a woman before.”
Nick ignored him. What the fuck could he say?
“How did you meet her?” Finn asked, lowering his weapon.
The medic picked up some ages-old-looking instrument of torture. A small pump in the middle, with tubing topped with a needle either side. Nick couldn’t watch. He’d never been scared of needles or blood, but this whole scene terrified the shit out of him. The sight of her blood wrecked him. His hands shook, rattling the cuffs. Best to stare at the pale green walls, the butt-ugly dog picture.
Ros would be alright. She would be. She was tougher than she looked.
He swallowed past the rock in his throat. “Down near Stanthorpe. She was holed up in a private school with some other people.”
“You joined them?” asked Sean. They really had been friends once, sort of. But Nick hadn’t trusted him enough to include him in the plot against Emmet. Of course, if he had, Nick wouldn’t have been thrown out of town and set on his way to meet Roslyn.
Funny how things worked out.
“Join them?” Nick coughed out a laugh. “Not likely. They were pricks. She wasn’t safe with them. I offered them a van full of supplies for her and they took it.”
The two men exchanged looks. Fair enough. It didn’t sound so fucking fantastic now that he came to think about it. But it was the truth. There was no point lying, not now. Maybe if she died they’d put him down, save him the trouble of having to do it himself.
“I figured she needed to see those people for what they were,” he said. “For what they’d do to her, how little she meant to them. One of the bastards was going to hurt her before too long. Now… I don’t know. They messed up not long after, got wiped out. At least she wasn’t there when that happened.”
“What did you do after you picked her up?” asked Finn, fingering the safety on his pistol. He was a good-looking bastard, late twenties, blond and pretty. Roslyn would probably like him. If Roslyn would wake up and be okay, Nick would live with it. He’d give her up. Whatever price he had to pay, so long as she lived.
“I had a cabin set up, took her there. She attacked me.” He grinned at the memory. “Swung a bottle of wine at my head. She can be so fierce. I kept her chained to the bed.”
Something popped in Finn’s jaw. The sheriff looked at him with murder in his eyes. But he’d play by the rules. Finn wouldn’t put a bullet in him here and now. The fucker believed in law and order and all that shit.
“You raped her?” Finn asked.
“Fuck no,” he spat, then calmed his voice. “No, I talked to her. I looked after her. I tried to … I tried to explain to her what life was like now. She’d never been out of the school. Not since the plague first hit. She didn’t know shit. On her own she wouldn’t have lasted five seconds.”
Lila swabbed the crook of his elbow and stabbed him with a needle. It stung. He didn’t really blame her for putting a bit of extra zest into the job, though. The little pump between the two lengths of tubing made a sickly sucking noise as she worked it.
“Take whatever she needs,” he said.
Lila nodded, not arguing.
A dental nurse. Fuck.
“What happened next?�
� asked Finn.
“We were doing okay, but our cabin caught fire and we had to move. Then we ran into Pete and Justin just a few hours out from here. They had plans for causing you guys trouble. But also, they wanted her,” he said. Damn, but he wished he could kill them both all over again. Only slower this time. “I said I’d talk her into it. That it would be better if she was on board than trying to keep an eye on her all the time. Told them she was a sexually liberated girl. Better yet, that she was in love with me, would do anything to please me. I promised them I could talk her around.”
“So you were in a sexual relationship with her? But it wasn’t rape?” Finn stared him down, disgust clear in his eyes.
“No. Never.” Nick shook his head. The silence that ensued was accusation aplenty. Fuck them. Ros knew the truth.
“So, how did she get shot?” asked Finn.
Nick gritted his teeth. “I got her out a window, told her to get in the car and drive until she got here. I figured you’d take her in. So long as she wasn’t with me, right?”
No one answered. Yet again, it was answer enough.
“She wouldn’t leave me. Drove the pickup into Justin, killed him. He was the one that shot her.” Nick stared at Roslyn, lying unmoving on the bed. Nothing else mattered. Everything in his world burned down to just this. This one woman, living or dying. “She should have left.”
No one said anything. Lila picked up what looked like tweezers and carefully probed the hole that the bullet had made. He wished he believed in God. Maybe he should say a prayer, just in case. Sean took over pumping the blood transfer. Nick could feel it, drawing the blood from his veins, giving it to her. Please let it be enough.
“Back at the cabin, she got away from me after a while,” he said. “Stole the key and escaped.”
Sean stared at him, face blank. “What happened?”
“She came back.” He didn’t doubt it now. The last few days he’d been wondering, unsure, but no longer. Ros had made her choice and turned back. She’d chosen him.
“Why?” Sean asked.
“Honestly?” He gave the man a grim, unhappy smile, and told him the absolute truth. “I don’t know.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Roslyn woke slowly. Someone was talking nearby, a woman. A man answered her, his voice low and smooth. Neither voice was familiar. Her brain felt floaty-light and her mouth tasted weird. Above her sat a white ceiling and below a bed with clean cotton sheets. She had a drip in her arm.
“Wha—?” Her tongue didn’t want to work. She swallowed and tried again. “Where am …”
“You’re awake.” A woman appeared above her, blocking out some of the ceiling. She had long black hair and a kind smile. “How do you feel?”
The man wandered closer. He looked like a Viking. A big, blond, frowny-faced Viking. How funny.
Roslyn tried to grin. The most she could manage was a lazy smile. Her face wouldn’t follow directions. “Hey.”
“Let me get you a drink.” The woman grabbed a glass from the bedside table. Roslyn heard water being poured. Beneath her the mattress moved as the woman sat down. “Slowly, alright?”
Water had never tasted so good.
The room was spartan, basic but clean, with a bed and a table, a couple of chairs. A butt-ugly picture of puppies hung on the wall opposite. Who could make puppies ugly? How did someone even do that?
“Roslyn?” The Viking hovered at the end of the bed, handsome face still very serious. “We need to talk to you about Nick.”
“Nick?” She tried to sit up. It took a few goes with the woman assisting her before she made it upright. All of her strength seemed to have been sapped right out of her. “Where is he?”
“It’s alright,” said the man. “You’re safe. He can’t hurt you anymore.”
Viking dude looked so concerned, eyes intense. It made no sense to her. “What?”
The pretty black-haired woman huffed. “Now is not the time for this, Sean. You’re distressing her.”
Ros opened her mouth to intervene, to explain she wasn’t distressed, just clueless, but they were already off and arguing. It felt as though she wasn’t even there.
“We need to know what happened,” said the Viking. “I’ve explained this to you already.”
Lila faced down the big man, hands on hips. “Sean.”
“Lila.”
“I’ve explained this to you already, too. It can wait.”
“No it can’t. It’s important.”
“What’s important is giving her time to recover. You’ve got your priorities wrong, buster.” Lila gave him the evil eye. Clearly Sean was used to this, since he stared back calmly. Neither of them made much sense. But then nothing about this did. Her head felt useless and her body little better. What the hell was going on with the world now?
“Can I have some more water, please?” she asked when she could get a word in.
“Sure. You’ve woken up a couple of times, but always drifted back off to sleep straight away.” Lila held the glass once more to her lips. “Do you remember?”
“No.” Everything in her head was a muddy haze.
“Don’t worry. It’ll come back to you.”
“Where’s Nick?” Ros repeated for like the tenth time. Tingles raced across her skin as she tested her limbs, rolling her feet and scrunching her toes, shrugging her shoulders. Pain rolled through her. “Oh!”
“Be careful,” said Lila. “Don’t you remember? You were shot. Two days ago now.”
Someone had shot her? Seriously? Oh, yeah. She remembered it vaguely, distantly. There’d been a fight.
“Ri-i-i-ght. When I drove the car into the wall.” She was dressed in a plain white tank top with soft gray flannel pajama pants on her bottom half. A square white bandage sat taped onto her skin below her left collarbone. It all came back slowly, sinking into her foggy head and falling into place. There was a crinkly little Band-Aid on her left ear, too. Shot twice—right. “We were with Justin and Pete.”
They both watched her, waiting.
Justin and Pete and that horrible little house she’d basically destroyed—now there was an unpleasant memory. Even buffered by the drugs, it turned her stomach. “They were … nasty bastards. I killed one of them. I’ve never killed anyone before. There was a lot of blood.”
She searched herself for a hint of remorse and came up short.
The lack of guilt made her feel guilty, but she’d live with it.
Sean scowled. “I should have killed all three of them when I had the chance.”
Huh?
Whatever. “Where’s Nick?”
“You’re safe. They locked him up,” said Lila. “How’s your pain? Do you need something more? Give me a number between one and ten.”
It hurt, but it was more of a dull ache than anything. It had just caught her by surprise at first. Plus, something more would probably throttle her last coherent brain cell. Her inability to think in a straight line bugged her worse than the pain. “I’m okay. Someone took out the bullet?”
“I did,” said Lila. “We gave you a blood transfusion and you stabilized. Fortunately the bullet came out pretty easily and there’s no sign of infection.”
“Wow. It’s lucky that you’re a doctor.”
The woman grimaced. “Actually, I’m a dental nurse.”
“You are?” Roslyn nodded slowly. “Well, good job. Hang on. Did you say Nick was locked up?”
“Yes,” confirmed Sean. “He’s in a holding cell at the police station.”
“What!” she screeched, wide awake now.
The Viking’s eyebrows headed high.
Lila frowned. “You don’t want him locked up?”
“No, of course not,” said Ros. “Why? Why would you do that?”
“Because he’s dangerous,” said Sean.
She scrunched up her nose at him in disbelief.
Sean in turn scrunched up his forehead, looking less sure of himself by the minute. “Because he hurt you?�
�
“Nick didn’t hurt me. Justin shot me. Pete and him wanted to rape me. Nick risked his life to get me out of there.” She shuffled up, wincing all the while. Fuck, it was uncomfortable. Getting shot was distinctly unpleasant. She would never do that again. Plus her chest hurt. She took a peek down the front of her tank top. A dark, nasty bruise crossed her chest where the seatbelt had been. “What a mess.”
“Roslyn, you can’t get up,” said Lila.
“Yes, I can.” It hurt. It would never be her idea of a good time. But she could definitely do it.
Lila jumped up and helped her with a hand beneath her good arm. “Hang on. Take it slowly. The pain meds are going to make you groggy.”
“Damn.” The room spun and she wobbled a step forward on weak legs. She clung onto the other woman. “I need to go to the bathroom. Then I need to go to Nick.”
“Roslyn, you got shot two days ago,” said Lila, her brown eyes full of concern. “What you need to do is rest.”
“I’m fine.” Her knees trembled, defying her words. Stupid knees. “Bathroom?”
“Wait.” The woman fussed. “Let me get this sling on you. We need to keep the weight off your shoulder.”
Lila helped her into the loopy length of padded material. It kept her left hand up high, taking the weight off that limb as promised. The woman frowned but helped her to the bedroom door. They were in a small wooden house, an old cottage by the look of it. Across the hallway sat a bathroom. God, it felt good to empty her bladder. It was awkward to rise again, but well worth the effort.
She worked one-handed while Lila hovered with her back turned. Roslyn splashed some water on her face and finger-combed her hair. Nothing would save that bird’s nest. It’d grow back eventually. Nick could take her as she came. An eager need to see him built inside her as she started moving about, gathering her meager reserves of energy. She felt stronger already, less shaky. Sort of.
“Are my boots around?” she asked.
“You’re serious about this?”
“Very.”
Lila nodded and opened the door. “Sean, can you carry her to the police station, please?”
“I should be able to walk,” she said. Though, on second thought: “Is it far?”