Fighting for Phoebe

by Jennifer Ann

  “She’s not going down for your shit!” I bark.

  Ellen’s visibly shaking when she catches my scowl. “You think you’re going to stop it from happening, big guy?”

  An engine roars in the driveway, sending a wave of nausea coursing through me. A beat later, Phoebe comes flying out of her room with a weary expression, confirming my fear.

  Decker’s here.

  That piece of shit was probably just waiting around the corner for us to return so he could finish what he started.

  Doors slam. Ellen giggles in a way so menacing that I’m rattled to my core. “As much as I’d love to continue this sad little conversation, it sounds like you have company.” Then she stands on her tip-toes to plant a kiss on my cheek. “Good luck, handsome. You’re going to need it.”

  I flex my fists as she slips from the apartment, resisting the urge to beat her ass to the floor. Phoebe stands frozen across the room, staring back at me.

  “What do we do?” she asks.

  “Nothing,” I answer firmly.

  “Phoebe!” Decker calls from down below. “Bring your friend out here! The three of us need to have ourselves a nice little chat!”

  I move over to the window and Phoebe follows. The asshole and three guys I vaguely recognize from the other night stand waiting by his truck in the back alley. Decker catches my gaze and spins the baseball bat in his hands through the air, grinning. The metal barrel catches in the sunlight.

  This time he’s not leaving until we’re both dead.

  Wrapping my fingers around Phoebe’s arm, I grimace. “Whatever happens, stay in here and keep the door locked.”

  “You’re actually going out there?” she croaks, grabbing my shirt in her fist. “Do you have a death wish?”

  “I won’t let him or anyone hurt you again.”

  “Then we’ll call the police! You’re not going out there alone!” Her lips begin to tremble. “They won’t fight fair, Jace! Every last one of those butt munchers owns a gun!”

  “This asshole won’t stop until someone is dead.” Staring into her big brown eyes, imagining how it would feel to watch Decker break her body and watch as she took her last breath, something in my chest cracks. “I won’t let it be you.”

  Sweeping her into my arms, I slant my mouth over hers for a kiss that’s long and hard, using urgent strokes of my tongue to accentuate the point. I feel her quivering as she threads her fingers through my hair, firmly grabbing my head like she doesn’t intend on letting go. My hands greedily memorize every soft curve and hard plane of her body before tangling in the loose curls of her long hair. If this is the last time I get to touch her, I plan to make it count.

  “Don’t do this,” she pleads with tears rolling down her face, refusing to release my shirt when I draw away. “This is my fault. I won’t let him hurt you because of something I’ve done.”

  “Doesn’t matter.” I brush my lips over hers one last time. “I’d do anything for you.”

  Then I pry her fingers from my shirt and start for the door, pulling it firmly closed behind me.

  14

  Phoebe

  With the sound of the door clicking shut behind Jace, I release a desperate cry and run back to the window. Decker’s ugly mug lights with satisfaction as Jace slowly approaches with a murderous glare. The other three jerks circle around him like wild dogs at a fight. Grinding my teeth together, I try to calm my erratic breaths enough to hear what they’re saying, but it’s distorted through the glass and I’m only able to catch the low rumble of their voices as they volley back and forth.

  Decker tosses the bat to the ground and holds both hands out at his sides, beckoning Jace in a “come at me” gesture. It comes as no surprise when Decker throws the first punch, catching Jace’s beautiful jaw. I cry out and wrap my arms around my stomach as Jace reels back from the blow.

  I don’t hear Jace’s response as he rights himself in front of Decker and lifts his arm to swing back. But Aron and Clint grab onto his arms, holding him in place. Decker comes at him again, this time catching Jace in the stomach.

  Jace finally breaks free, staggering a little before he’s able to hit Decker with a solid punch to the face, sending him down to the ground. I cheer quietly to myself.

  Aron and Clint immediately gang up on him, and a shit storm of scuffling and swinging fists ensues. Jace successfully knocks Clint on his ass, but Aron strikes out with Decker’s bat, hitting Jace’s side.

  “Fuck this!” I cry, running for the door.

  As I’m dashing down the steps, I watch in horror as Ricky, Decker’s most loyal buddy from grade school, whacks Jace across his lower back with a hunk of wood.

  “No!” I cry, launching myself at Ricky as Jace falls forward. I land on top of Ricky and reach for the mullet behind his head, yanking with as much strength as I can muster. He yowls in pain as I successfully pull out a small handful of curly blond hair.

  “Someone get this crazy bitch off me!”

  As I’m lifted off the ground by one of the other guys, Decker regains his footing and tenderly dabs at his obviously broken nose. Scowling, he strikes out with his boot, catching Jace in the jaw as he’s still trying to catch his breath while on his hands and knees. Jace reels onto his back with a mouth full of blood.

  “You sick fuck!” I roar, trying to pull my arms away from whoever’s pinning them behind my back. “This has nothing to do with him! Leave him alone!”

  “This is on you, Phoebe!” Decker says, meeting my glare. Then he raises his boot in the air once again, bringing it down on Jace’s chest with a sickening crunch.

  The scream that rips from my chest doesn’t sound human. Wild with anger, I dip my chin down and thrust my head back with all my energy, knocking the back of my skull into someone’s face. I’m finally set free and start for Decker, tackling him with every ounce of energy I can muster.

  “I’ll kill you, asshole!” I scream, clawing at his face.

  All at once it feels as if a bowling ball is dropped on the back of my head, sending a blinding pain through my skull.

  Decker’s sneering expression is replaced with total darkness.

  Sirens blare.

  Someone says my name over and over.

  Voices shout.

  I’m lifted into the air.

  I float in and out of nothingness.

  Then I hear a deep voice say, “Phoebs, I know you can hear me.”

  In response to the disembodied voice, I moan. Pain radiates along the base of my skull like the strike of a gong. The muffled wail of a siren grates on every one of my nerves, making me grit my teeth.

  “Hey, Phoebs, Deadpool is here to see you! Oh my god, it’s really him! He’s even wearing the red spandex suit! You’re missing it!”

  “Fucker,” I mutter, trying to lift my finger but discovering my arms are strapped down to something.

  Peeking through one eye, I find Kory smirking down on me. In a goddamned ambulance of all places.

  With a chuckle, he blows out a long breath and rubs at the back of his neck. “You scared the shit out of me, Phoebs. I had a bad feeling when I heard all those sirens tearing through town. By the time I made it to your place, they were already putting you in here…I thought you were dead.”

  Through a foggy haze, I remember Decker kicking Jace. “Where is he?” I cry, trying to bust through the restraints holding me down.

  “Whoa, take it easy,” a man says at my side, gently pushing my shoulder against the gurney. “You’re safe now.”

  I look to my other side and find Bubba Kappen wearing an EMT uniform. Our six foot seven classmate was always one of the good guys, never missing the honor roll and dominating in every sport. It’s no surprise that someone like him would be eager to serve the community.

  “Oh hey, Bubba,” I greet him with a small flicker of my fingers. “Thought you made it out of this shithole.”

  “I volunteer over in Kato,” he says with a sly smirk. “There’s a pretty big lump on the back of
your head. Are you hurt anywhere else?”

  A wave of panic swells in my chest when memories of what just happened come back to me in bursts. Decker was determined as hell to kill Jace. What if he succeeded?

  I try sitting again, groaning when a sharp pain blasts through my head. “Where the hell is my boyfriend? Where’s Jace?”

  “Don’t make me sedate you,” Bubba warns, pushing on my shoulder once more.

  “They took him in a separate ambulance,” Kory answers. “Decker and his boys messed him up pretty badly. You were both unconscious when the Warren County Sheriff arrived.”

  I wince, wondering what else they did to Jace after I was knocked out. “Wait. Why did Warren County show up?”

  “One of your neighbors called them directly. Must’ve seen Decker was involved.” Kory grins, though it’s a really sad attempt. “Guess not everyone in this town is a crook who supports Sheriff Mortensen’s bullshit. They caught Aron trying to flee the scene. I doubt it’ll be long before they arrest Decker and the others.”

  I suck in a sharp breath. While Jace stands a fair chance of successfully claiming self-defense with the neighboring county involved, they’ll eventually uncover his identity and he’ll be sent back to California. He’s screwed.

  “Unstrap me from this thing,” I say, glaring back at Bubba when I try to sit again. “I need to see Jace. Now.”

  “Settle your ass down,” Kory tells me in a scolding tone. “We’re obviously heading to the hospital. You’ll see him when you get there.”

  Relaxing under Bubba’s firm hand, I close my eyes, trying to push through a sudden rush of tears. I will never be able to live with myself if Jace doesn’t make it through this.

  “I need you to stay awake, Phoebe,” Bubba says.

  “I’m resting my eyes,” I reply in a snarky tone.

  Kory’s thick hand wraps around mine and squeezes. “From what I can tell, he’s a fighter, Phoebs. He’ll make it through this.”

  “He’s not just a fighter, he’s a Marine,” I reply, opening my eyes. “He came here to tell me he thinks Logan was killed.”

  “What?” Kory and Bubba ask in unison.

  “When?” Kory adds, becoming noticeably pale.

  “Jace was in Afghanistan when Logan disappeared. He thinks someone screwed up and the government washed their hands of it. Jace approached their chief, wanting the truth. There was a gun pulled…cops showed up…and now Jace is on the run.” Tears thicken my throat. “Before they caught him, he wanted to tell Logan’s family what he thinks happened over there.”

  “Ho…ly…shit,” Kory mutters, slumping in his seat.

  “Sounds like something out of a military novel if you ask me,” Bubba comments.

  “Well no one asked you,” I snap, irritated that he’s right.

  Kory rakes both hands through his hair. “It would explain some things he said to me the other night before you left the bar together.” My friend’s eyes jump between me and Bubba. “Sounds like he’s running from some serious shit.”

  Tears slip down my cheeks as guilt for everything I’ve done—every lie I’ve been a part of that led to this point, every shitty decision I’ve made and agreed to execute—weighs me down like an anchor. What if there isn’t time to explain myself to Jace? What if I don’t have a chance to tell him I’m sorry?

  As I’m lost in my thoughts, the ambulance slows and takes a somewhat wide turn. “We’re there,” Bubba tells us, rising to his feet when we stop.

  I struggle against the straps holding me down. “You can’t stop me from going to see him! I have rights! You can’t keep me tied up like I’m being committed to a looney bin!”

  “Phoebe, they need to—” Bubba starts.

  “Forget it,” Kory cuts in. “Once she has her mind made up, there’s no talking her out of it. After she’s had a chance to see Romeo, I’ll take her to see the doctor myself. Trust me when I say I’m not about to let her walk out of here. Just help her out of this thing so she doesn’t fall on her face.”

  “Fine,” Bubba grumbles. “We’ll get you to a wheelchair and Kory can take you to see your boyfriend. You have to promise me you’ll take it easy, or you’ll end up strapped down again. Okay?”

  Nodding, I give Kory a sad, appreciative smile as Bubba attends to the doors. A moment later, Bubba and another man lift me off the ambulance to where two of Warren County’s deputy sheriffs stand waiting at the hospital’s entrance. My stomach drops.

  “Phoebe Carson?” the taller of the two asks. “We’d like to ask you a few questions.”

  By the time I’m rolled to the ER, my last bit of patience has dissolved and my head is pounding. The deputies were nice enough, treating me appropriately as a victim, but I became irritated when they asked too many questions about Jace and started getting too close to the truth. I pretended we had just met at the bar and didn’t know anything about him other than his first name and the fact that he was good in bed. And I got a little irate when they said they hadn’t found Decker yet. That’s when Kory finally intervened and told them that I had to go inside for tests.

  “Excuse us,” Kory calls out as we approach the nurse’s station.

  “Where’s the insanely attractive, big guy with tattoos they just brought in from the fight?” I demand, making eye contact with a portly older woman behind the counter.

  “Are you family?” she asks, shooting both me and Kory a doubtful glance.

  “Yeah, I’m his sister.”

  The woman clicks her tongue with an irritated eye-roll before standing with a clipboard in hand. “Fill out these forms. The doctors are going to need his blood type.”

  “Shit,” I mutter just loud enough for Kory to hear. Oddly enough, my friend takes the clipboard and immediately begins to scribble down information.

  “What are you doing?” I hiss without moving my lips.

  “He showed me his driver’s license,” Kory whispers. “You know how I remember stuff. Maybe they can find his blood type in the system.”

  I slap the clipboard from his hands, glancing over at the annoyed nurse when it clatters to the floor.

  “Oops,” I say, shrugging.

  “What are you doing?” Kory replies, collecting the clipboard off the floor before pulling the wheelchair away from the desk to yell at me in private. “Phoebs, if he needs blood, we have to do whatever we can to help him.”

  “You heard the part about a government conspiracy, right? They’ll come for him, Kory, and I don’t know what will happen! I can’t lose him!”

  “Either way, they’ll find out. The police will want to question him. He can’t hide any longer. I’ll call my uncle in the Cities. Maybe he can recommend a good attorney.”

  I rub at my throbbing temples and sigh. Jesus, I sound like a selfish brat, worried about losing him when he could be sent to prison. He’s too pretty for prison. And I don’t even want to know what could happen to him if they don’t get the right kind of blood.

  “I guess you’re right,” I resign.

  After Kory completes as much of the form as he can, he hands it back to the woman. “We don’t know his blood type or if he has insurance.”

  With another irritated click of her tongue, the woman passes over a baggie containing a flip phone. “The only personal effects on him when they cut off his clothes.”

  With the thought of them having to cut his clothes from his body, I fight against a surge of bile as I take the baggie from her. “Can I see him?”

  “Not until he’s stable,” she says with a small shake of her head.

  “Can you at least tell me…” I stop to swallow down the bile once more, losing the fight against building tears in the process. “I mean is he going to…”

  The woman’s pinched expression finally relaxes as she leans in and reaches for my hand. “They’re doing everything they can, sweetie. Have a seat and I’ll let you know when he’s ready for visitors.”

  “Thank you,” Kory tells her when I can’t form an answer.


  Time drags on as we sit in the waiting room without hearing any updates. My stomach knots around itself when I imagine everything that could go wrong. Decker is jaded enough to have one of his buddies beat him to a bloody pulp and claim he was defending himself against Jace. The police could drag Jace back to California and throw him in prison. Jace could come out of this permanently disabled. Worse yet, he may not come out of this at all.

  I absentmindedly unzip the baggie and open the phone. While I don’t necessarily rule Jace out as a flip-phone kind of guy, I have to wonder if he bought it after leaving California. The phone lights up when I flip it open, showing only two different numbers having been called and nothing stored under contacts. I scroll to the number called the most and hold my finger over the green button.

  “Are you sure you want to do that?” Kory asks over my shoulder. “You still can’t know much about this guy.”

  “I know enough,” I reply, pressing SEND.

  I hold my breath as the phone rings and rings without an answer.

  Just as I’m getting ready to close the phone, I hear a deep voice ask in a frantic tone, “Ace? Where the fuck are you now?”

  “Who is this?” I ask in turn.

  There’s a long enough pause that I worry the guy has hung up.

  “Jace has been hurt,” I say, hoping he’s still there. “He’s in the hospital. I don’t even know…he’s in bad shape.”

  “Is this Phoebe?” he asks in a soft tone.

  A tentative smile pulls at my lips. “Jace told you about me…whoever you are?”

  “Yeah he told me everything yesterday. We served in the Corp together. How’d he get hurt?”

  “It’s a long story,” I say with guilt weighing my shoulders down. “He was jumped…we had to give the hospital his information. They said they need his blood type. I know there’s a warrant out on him in California. They’ll be coming for him. My friend thinks we should find him an attorney.”

  “I’m on it,” the nameless man answers. “Tell me where you are and I’ll be there as soon as I can. I’m in New York so it may not be until tomorrow, but I’ll contact JAG and find the best civil military attorney money can buy. We’ll get him out of this shit-storm one way or another.”