by Hazel Parker
Head laceration. Concussion. Bruised ribs. Broken nose. Severe bruising.
“Let’s go.”
Together, we ran down the stairs to his room. I pushed it open without pausing and gasped at the man on the bed before me.
The man lying in the hospital bed was nothing like the man that had left my bed this morning. I tried not to stare at his nose, but my eyes kept coming back to it. One moment they were obediently on his swollen eyes, and the next they were rested on the bloody mess that had been a perfectly ordinary nose only hours before; so ordinary in fact, that I could not recall what it had looked like. His left eye was too swollen. I knew he couldn’t see anything out of it and probably wouldn’t for a while, but his right eye wasn’t as bad. He could see through a slit of the swollen flesh. His eyelashes poked through like clumped spikes from the thin strip of skin that wasn’t discolored. His face was still covered in congealed blood in some places.
My bottom lip trembled and I struggled to hold myself back. His brother should be by his side. When he tried to say my name, his cracked lips failed at the first syllable. I hurried to sit by his bedside. I reached forward to hold his hands. “I’m here,” I said, my voice cracking. “I’m here,” I said pushing back his limp, dirty blond hair.
I forgot about Ethan, who was beside me. I forgot about what I read on his chart. All I could think about was him possibly leaving me, and that idea didn’t leave space to thing about anything else.
Were we ever strangers? I couldn’t remember. I’m not sure we ever really were. That day I first saw him there was something even then, though I didn’t know what.
“Who did this to you, bro?” Ethan said, wringing his hands. “Who the hell did this to you?”
“Skulls,” he whispered.
“What?!” Ethan screamed. “Why the fuck were you in Skull territory?”
“You,” he groaned before losing consciousness again.
“Evan,” I whispered kissing his hand. “Oh, Evan. Please don’t leave me. You’ll be alright. Everything will be alright.”
Ethan turned slowly, too slowly to be normal. When he spoke, his voice trailed, his words unwilling to take flight. “I’ll be right back.” His eyes held a sadness, the blue furiously glossy. “The brothers are on their way.”
Chapter Eight
Kaylen
I bit my tongue trying to hold the tears that threatened to leave my eyes. But that’s when I couldn’t hold them back. First, one small crystal bead escaped from my right eye. I could feel the warmth, sliding down my cheek, and rolling off my chin. Then another. And another. Until my eyes flooded with them, coming like rainfall. Sniffing every ten seconds, they fell and fell, and I let them.
The doctor entered and I jumped to my feet.
Doctor Harris. I’d seen him before, though we’d never actually worked together. I tended to stay on the long-term care patient wing or pediatrics.
“Doctor Harris.” It was then that I realized I was still at work. I was still supposed to be working.
Ethan walked in behind him, followed by several men I recognized from the club.
“Oh. Nurse. Good afternoon. Are you family?”
“Oh no sir. This is –”
“Her boyfriend,” Ethan cut in. “I’m the brother.”
Ethan’s proclamation knocked me off my feet and back into the chair beside Evan’s bed. I looked at him, the question plain on my face and he smiled—not the smug smirk he used to hide behind his feelings or pretend he had everything under control. A real smile.
His girlfriend.
Either way you look at it, it was only two words, and yet those two words held everything. Two words that were an apology, an acceptance, and forgiveness all in one. He understood and nothing needed to be explained further.
I clasped Evan’s hand in my own and looked confidently and expectantly at Doctor Harris.
“Oh. Okay.” He said looking between us. “I’m Doctor Harris, I’ll be supervising Mr. Hunt’s treatment.”
I know what he’s going to say. I’d already looked in the chart, but I wanted to hear from his mouth that everything would be fine.
“Mr. Hunt has several lacerations on his head, though none were deep enough to be fatal. He does have a concussion though, and will need several days of observation. Thankfully, none of the cartilage from his broken nose has moved or blocked any parts of his nasal passage. It was set and should heal in the normal 2 to 3 weeks. The swelling should start to go down within a week, and the bruising will take a while. He has three bruised ribs. We can prescribe pain medication, but the best thing to do is leave them alone and let them heal on their own. It will hurt to breathe for the next couple of weeks. As a matter of fact, it would be natural for him to feel like his entire body hurt. He has severe bruising on several critical areas of his body, but he will survive. Your brother’s a tough guy,” he said smiling at Ethan. “He walked away from a severe beating with only 10 stiches in his head.”
“Are you sure?” I asked as Doctor Harris turned to walk away.
It was dumb of me to ask. Of course he was sure. He’s a doctor. I should have known better than the rest of the people there that he was sure. Doctor Harris did this every day and yet, I still had to ask. I couldn’t lose him. Evan had to come back to me.
Thankfully, Doctor Harris understood. He smiled reassuringly. “Yes. I’m sure. He will be in and out of consciousness today. Call a nurse whenever he wakes.”
I nodded. I would.
“Oh and Nurse…”
“Shaw,” I said, filling in my last name.
“I’ll let someone know that they’ll need to cover your rounds.”
I smiled. “Thank you.”
The big guy who seemed to be in charge of the group followed the doctor out and suddenly the room was empty of the big men with tattoos—leaving only Ethan and me.
“So, boyfriend?”
“Yeah,” he said, taking his familiar stance against the wall. The man loved leaning.
“Don’t think you should wait until he wakes up to ask him that?”
“Nah. I know my brother.”
“And when did you come to this conclusion?”
“The first time I saw you look at each other.”
“What?” I turned my body to look at him fully.
He continued talking as if he hadn’t said something significant. “If I had been paying attention I would have realized what it was, but I’m dumb.” Then he shrugged. “I never claimed to be the smart twin. There’s a reason why he’s the bookie and I’m just a lowly mechanic.”
“You’re not a lowly mechanic. If your bike is any indication of what you can build with your hands, then you’re amazing.”
“And I didn’t have to waste four years and money to get a fancy piece of paper for you to say that.”
I smirked. Of course Ethan was proud of the fact that he didn’t go to college.
“So, you’re done trying to win. You’re letting him have me?”
“I’m not done anything. It was never a competition. He had you from the very beginning. I just didn’t see it clearly until we were at your apartment, and of course I would never admit that because I’m stubborn,” he said, smiling devilishly. “It’s one of my best qualities.”
I smiled and shook my head.
“You think he’ll agree with you?”
He nodded. “He will. I’ve seen my brother with a lot of women, and he’s never looked at any of them the way he looks at you.”
My insides warmed and I blushed. It took this for me to admit it, but I was falling for Evan. I had been since the moment I saw him standing in the hospital corner, clueless and grieving. I hoped he felt the same.
“I have a feeling when he wakes up, he’ll tell you himself. My brother ain’t no coward,” he said looking at his brother’s condition in the bed. “And he deserves somebody who loves him.”
I kissed Evan’s hand softly and sto
od. Ethan watched me approach and didn’t recoil when I placed my hand softly on his cheek. “So do you, Ethan. You’re a good man and you deserve somebody too.”
He turned his face and kissed the palm of my hand.
I hope that’s true.” He walked to the door. “Take care of my brother. He’ll want you when he wakes up.” Then he left the room.
Ethan
Fragments of that day came back to me in pieces. Driving. Stopping at the first bar I see. Getting kicked out. Knocking over the bike. I tried hard to remember the bike. It was beautiful. Ghostly white. With something drawn on it. Casper, the ghost. That was what was drawn on his bike. Not Casper the friendly ghost, Casper but in a bad ass way.
I trashed Casper’s bike. Casper fucking Karin, the top dog of The Skulls.
Triple fucking shit.
As if they didn’t hate us enough already. Now they really were going to hate us.
How did they get Evan, though? I thought about what Kaylen said. They were worried about me. He must have been out there looking for me. My brother was there looking for me. That’s the only reason he was even there. My brother was in here because of me.
My hands pulled at my hair, the pain in my follicles rooting me to this moment, to the ground.
What can I do? What am I going to do?
Every possible option ran through my head. Revenge. That’s all I could think of what not right now. Right now, I had to make sure my brother was going to wake up tomorrow.
“What happened?” Gus roared, rounding the corner.
“He was jumped.”
“The hell? Ev? I would have guessed you, not him. What happened?”
The boys stared at me all looking for an answer. Jerry, Warren, Gus, and Luke were waiting here, more were waiting at the club. I couldn’t lie. I wouldn’t lie. A man takes responsibility for his mistakes.
“It was my fault.”
“What? I don’t understand.” Warren said taking a step back.
There was nothing I could say to explain it anyway.
“Some shit came up. I got drunk and trashed a bike… Turned out to be Casper’s.”
“You couldn’t have gotten drunk at the club?” Jerry asked.
Gus cut in. “The Casper?” Gus’ face turned red. “Casper fucking Karin? That Casper?” I couldn’t help but feel like I was letting him down.
I wanted to hang my head in shame, but that’s not how I was raised. A man accepts his shame head on. “Yeah. That one. He must have thought Evan was me, and knowing them, they probably didn’t wait to ask any questions or make sure they had the right guy, not that they’d care. So they made him pay for my crime.”
“How bad is it trashed?”
“I don’t know. I was drunk off my ass, I barely remember doing it.” I couldn’t help feeling like I sounded like a child. “I knocked it completely over so I imagine it’s scratched, got broken mirrors and dents.”
That was putting it lightly. That bike was heavy. It hit the ground hard, and I knew it was more than broken glass and dents. The left side of that bike was probably shredded.
“Jesus!” Warren yelled, rubbing his temples.
Where I’m from, motorcycles were like jewelry. You chose them by hand, not from a sell lot. You did your research and decided what’s best for you. Unlike most clubs, Los Banditos was a club that accepted all bike types. We weren’t all Harleys or just crotch rockets. Yeah, the old guys gave us hell about our small bikes, complaining that all we wanted to do was look fancy, but in the end they respected our choice. Bikes were personal. We built them up, bought accessories, changed out the inside, chose specific paint jobs, loved them, and made them perfect. Bikes were more than machines. They were an extension of the self.
My bike represented me. It looked how I wanted it to looked, matched my jacket and my helmet. Fucking with anyone’s bike was the equivalent to fucking with their kid. It was worse than that. I might as well have cut off his arm or spit in his face. He had every right to be angry. Bikes are sacred.
“How bad is Evan?”
That was the most important part.
“I don’t know. We just found him.”
“We?” Jerry said.
I turned around to look into the glass pane of the door. Kaylen was bent over the bed crying. I could tell from the wet spot pooled on the sheet. Her face was a mask of concern, watching Evan’s face for something, anything, and I felt like someone punched me in the chest. I know that face. I’ve seen it before. It was the way my mother looked at my dad when he was in the hospital. The way Lila looked at Harrison. The way Kaylen was looking at Evan was like he was the sole center of her galaxy and if he died, she would spiral out of orbit.
She’s in love with him.
I don’t know why it was came like some grand realization. I should have seen it before.
Why didn’t I see it coming?
She couldn’t take her eyes off him. She could see him without seeing us. She saw him as someone separate—as Evan, not the other twin. He deserved a woman like her and I was just a nuisance, standing in the way.
“Yeah, we. Kaylen is in there right now.”
“Does she work here? She’s in scrubs.” Luke asked naively. He hadn’t been able to make it to the hospital when Harrison was first hit.
“Yeah. She does.”
“Look, I don’t want no drama shit, Ethan. I swear, your brother is barely holding on and I can barely handle this and the IRS on our ass. I don’t have time for some argument over a broad.”
I couldn’t keep myself from growling. I didn’t like him calling Kaylen any names.
“Don’t say that,” I growled under my breath. “There will be no fighting. She’s his. Shit’s cleared up. Ain’t no problem.”
“Good,” he said with a nod before walking away.
Tonight there’d be a meeting. This I knew for certain. I’d call it my damn self. The Skulls were going to get what they had coming. Nobody touched my brother except me, and to hurt him this way when he’d done nothing wrong was the highest offense. Mark my words. They messed with the wrong fucking twin.
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The Billionaire’s True Love
Chapter 1
Today was one of those days that just felt lucky. And it was a day when Kelly Wilson needed luck. She was currently settled at a Harrah’s blackjack table. Eagerly, she watched the dealer as he began to reach for the cards. She’d already placed her bet. This was going to be her moment.
It seems Kelly had known about gambling her entire life. And of course, she had heard the good and the bad. Her native Georgia did not allow casinos, so she would travel to South Carolina and take her pick of casinos seated at the base of the mountains. Part of her wished that her home state would embrace casinos and the revenue they brought. Part of her enjoyed having an excuse to get away whenever she was home from college.
Kelly found gambling to be extremely glamorous. She watched all the movies growing up. Gorgeous, sexy women, gangsters, and the glamourous lifestyle—what wasn’t to love? The women were always decked out in jewels and expensive clothes. She idolized it and wanted to be that. Reality, of course, is much different.
Like she had never seen any gangsters or glamourous gorgeous women here in Cherokee. Once she was good enough, she would get to Vegas, experience the real deal. Hopefully hit it big.
The University of Tennessee in Knoxville had really stood out to her as a high school senior. Not only was it only a three-hour drive from her home in Atlanta, the Indian casinos in Cherokee were only a couple of hours away by bus. So she applied and got accepted.
Kelly’s obsession with the gangster lifestyle continued. The fantasies of money and men swirled happily in her mind from her very first trip. She had told herself on that trip that she was on her way to being a big-time gambler. She thought back on that day a lot lately.
&n
bsp; The first time that she had made the trip was right after her twenty-first birthday, and her heart had leapt at the sights and sounds of the casino. Granted, it was smaller than she had seen on television, but still incredible. The rush that Kelly felt as she put her first coin into the penny slot, the thrill at watching the screen spin and the images pop up, it was all unforgettable. She did not care that her winnings were minuscule; she was having fun and that was what mattered.
Actually, she had not won much at all that first trip. In fact, she had lost a lot—a thousand dollars, to be exact. She had left feeling disheartened, but it was okay. No one was perfect their first time, right?
Today it was going to be different. Actually, she had said that every other time, but this time she felt it. It would be different.
Or maybe it was just that she needed this trip to be different. This time, she really needed to win some money.
At the table in front of her, the dealer flipped over the cards. Instantly, Kelly’s eyes widened in horror. She did not need to listen to what he said, or pay any further attention. She knew from what she had seen in the cards what had happened: she had just lost everything.
It was all the blackjack table’s fault. Her preferred method was slot machines. They were simple. You could just sit back, feed coins in, have a conversation with a friend, maybe have a drink, and watch your money add up. But today, after just a few coins, she had realized that this was not her day on the slot machines. She had decided to try her luck on table games. Those were more glamorous anyway.
The only game that she was familiar with was blackjack. Craps looked too hard, and it made her nervous. But anyone could count to twenty-one. Yes, blackjack was a good start.
An electric jolt seemed to rush through her body as she watched her chips disappear. Her hands started to tremble and she felt sick. This could not be real. This could not be happening. She was a college student. She did not have any income. The only money that she had was supposed to be for her tuition. Her mother—an Atlanta hairdresser—had saved up everything so that Kelly could go to school. She had turned it over to Kelly, believing that she would be responsible. And now, she had just lost every penny of that twenty-five thousand dollars.