by Blair Grey
Experimentally, I pinched the flesh together. I was still bleeding, and I knew I was going to need it bandaged for sure. What I couldn’t decide was whether I needed stitches.
Probably, I finally decided, sighing. God, if Ray found out what had really happened with this thing, he was going to give me hell. He would already be pissy enough at the fact that I hadn’t brought the twins out with me, and no amount of lying and saying that I was still formulating a plan was going to work. Ray was a difficult guy to lie to, not least of which because he had spies all over the city. He might already know that I had gone to the Unknowns’ hideout tonight. Lying would only make it worse.
It wasn’t like the extra muscle would have helped me at all in that situation, but Ray wouldn’t have seen it that way. I wouldn’t have changed plans, though, and there hadn’t been enough space there for someone else to intercede. I doubted one of the twins would have realized what the man was about to do, either. If I hadn’t realized, they wouldn’t have.
I frowned down at the cut one more time and then turned my feet in the direction of the local hospital. Fuck it—better at least make sure that someone took a look at it. Have them offer a professional opinion on whether it needed stitches or not. The last thing I needed was to bleed out overnight.
When I got to the hospital, it was surprisingly empty. I supposed that made sense when I thought about it; it was still pretty early for things to be kicking off, even if it was a Friday night. I was ushered into a room almost immediately, and I only waited a couple minutes before a nurse came bustling in.
She immediately frowned when she saw the blood on my sleeve. “Got in a fight?” she asked.
I raised an eyebrow at her. “What if I told you a cat did this?”
She rolled her eyes. “Unless by cat, you mean a tiger, you’re a liar,” she said succinctly. “And even if it was a tiger, it’d have to have some serious claws to get you that deep.” She shook her head. “Come on, shirt off.”
“Don’t mind if I do,” I said, leering at her as I pulled my shirt up over my head. But my smirk faltered as the material caught in the partially formed scab. I tore it off, grimacing in pain.
The nurse, Leila according to her nametag, rolled her eyes, but I could see the traces of a smile on her lips. “So do you want to change your story?” she asked as she started stitching me up.
“Trust me; you don’t want to know,” I told her. And she probably didn’t. She looked like the good girl next door. Oh, she was beautiful as all get-out, with that heart-shaped face and those piercing eyes. But I couldn't see much of her body with those scrubs she was wearing, and her hair was drawn up in a tight bun.
But hey, who hasn’t had a nurse fantasy or two in their time?
“So now that you have me shirtless, do you want to…” I trailed off at the look she gave me. I wasn’t usually the kind of guy to be cowed by a woman, especially not a sexy one, but something in her look told me not to finish that sentence. I shrugged the arm she wasn’t fixing up. “Your loss, babe.”
“I doubt it,” she said, but again, I could see that faint smile. Like she didn’t want to feel so pleased that I was flirting with her. Unfortunately, I knew what that probably meant; I’d seen her type before. She probably had a boyfriend.
Rats. I could have used something to make my night a little better. It seemed I was out of luck, though.
6
Leila
Friday
It was only the years of practice that kept my hands steady as I sewed Marcus’s wound shut. Jeez, I didn’t know what it was about him, but the minute I walked into the room, my heart started beating a little faster. It wasn’t like he was the first attractive patient that I’d ever worked on. Nor was he the first one to flirt with me.
But there was something about that careless wave of his brown hair and those laughing blue eyes that had me interested in him. Besides, it wasn’t like his shirt was doing much to hide how muscular he was. He was pretty much sex on a stick. And even though normally, he was the last kind of guy that I would go for, with those tattoos and that cocky attitude of his, I could already feel myself getting turned on by him.
This wasn’t even foreplay.
I resisted the urge to roll my eyes. No doubt it all came back to Rachel’s insistence that I needed to find a man. She had probably just gotten into my head, and now my body was ready to consider any man I met as the potential next person to warm my bed and give me babies.
My mind, of course, knew that there was a lot more to these things than that. I was at work; I had to stay professional. I couldn’t even give him my number or anything like that.
I could sneak his number from his file, though, my snarky mental voice reminded me. But like I would ever do that. It would be a total breach of his privacy, and besides, he was probably only flirting with me as a way to take his mind off his pain.
And I was sure that he must be in pain. I couldn’t smell any alcohol on his breath, and even though I assumed he’d gotten into some stupid fight at a bar, he seemed altogether too lucid for drink to be numbing him to the gash and the stitches I was carefully putting in.
But other than that grimace when he’d torn his shirt off, there was nothing. He was tough–I had to give him that. This cut definitely hadn’t come from a cat, though.
“I need to write something down on your report,” I finally said. “And something tells me they’re not going to believe me if I say that you required forty stitches after being scratched by an angry feline.”
“What if that’s a euphemism for a woman?” Marcus joked.
I couldn’t help but roll my eyes at that. “Nice try, but even the sharpest of fake nails wouldn’t do this to a guy,” I said. “It looks to me like someone jabbed you in a bar fight.”
“You see a lot of guys come in with cuts like that?” Marcus asked, sounding impressed. For a minute, I thought that I must have gotten the truth, but he shook his head. “Wasn’t a bar and wasn’t a fight,” he said. “I just fell. That’s all.”
“Bullshit,” I said. Normally, I tried not to swear around patients, but he was starting to test my patience.
“Oh yeah?” Marcus said, an unmistakable challenge in his voice. “So what do you think it was then, doc?”
“First of all, I’m not a doctor, I’m a nurse,” I corrected peevishly. “And I’ve seen cuts like this before. I know it’s a knife wound.”
Marcus whistled appreciatively. “You are one smart lady, aren’t you?”
“Flattery isn’t going to get you into my pants.”
Marcus grinned and shrugged. “You can’t blame a man for trying,” he said. “The sexy nurse—that’s everyone’s porno fantasy, right?”
“I wouldn’t know,” I said, my tone clipped. I didn’t know what it was about him, but he was really getting on my nerves. Almost like he knew exactly what to say to push my buttons. Sexy, arrogant, and obnoxious. I wouldn’t want his number even if it wasn’t a breach of privacy to get it off his file.
Although there was nothing wrong with a little romp between the sheets with someone sexy and arrogant. As long as I could keep him from talking too much, maybe it would be worth it. It had been a while since I’d gotten laid.
I shook those thoughts out of my head. Whoever this guy was, he clearly was mixed up in the kind of shit I didn’t want to deal with. “Whatever life you’re living, you really need to slow down,” I couldn’t help saying.
“Oh I do, do I?” Marcus asked, raising an eyebrow at me.
I shrugged as I finished up the stitches and started applying the bandages. “I’m just saying, this shit’s going to catch up to you. There’s no avoiding it. I’ve seen your type before. You’re a dime a dozen around here on Fridays and Saturdays.”
Marcus stared at me for a long minute. “How’d you get into this nursing stuff anyway?” he asked.
“What do you mean?” I asked. “I went to school, just like everyone else. And if you say something about how I should h
ave been a hooker instead, I’m going to put you under and stitch up your balls.”
Marcus laughed and shook his head. “Not what I was going to say at all,” he said. “A beautiful woman with brains is a rare breed.”
“You probably scare them all away,” I muttered. “They don’t want anything to do with a prick like you.”
“I like that you speak your mind,” Marcus said, and I wondered if he was in so much pain that he was starting to get loopy. If I wasn’t mistaken, he had just complimented me twice in a row, and we were rapidly starting to leave the territory of arrogant flirting.
“What I meant,” Marcus continued, flexing his fingers as I finished off the bandage, “is, how did you decide you wanted to be a nurse? Was it what your parents wanted for you or something?”
“No,” I said shortly. If Dad had wanted me to be a nurse, I probably wouldn’t be here right now. I would have done anything else, just to spite him. I shrugged. “I wanted to be a nurse ever since I was a kid,” I told the man. “I wanted to help people.”
“Well, that’s very noble of you,” Marcus said, but he looked thoughtful. Then, he grinned cheekily. “I guess that’s why you’re trying to give me life advice on how to stay out of trouble, isn’t it?” he asked. “Do I have to pay for that, like if you were my shrink?”
I rolled my eyes again. “No, the advice comes free.” I knew I should be leaving now that he was all bandaged up. I was sure there were other patients to attend to. And it wasn’t like I was enjoying this or anything. But for some reason, I wasn’t ready to leave just yet. I folded my arms across my chest. “You seem like a smart guy,” I finally said. “I’d hate to see you show up in the morgue because you did something stupid.”
“That’s sweet of you to care, darling,” Marcus said, getting to his feet. He eyed the remains of his shirt and then quickly tore both sleeves off before pulling the now-muscle tank over his head. Somehow, even though I knew the shirt was never intended to be worn that way, I couldn’t help thinking that he definitely pulled it off.
At least until you got to the noticeable white bandages covering most of his right forearm.
“It’s not that I care about you,” I said, but even as I said it, it felt like a lie. I paused. “Okay, I care about everyone who comes through those doors,” I finally told him. “You’re not special.”
“Wouldn’t have imagined it,” Marcus said, winking at me. “I should get out of your hair, though, so you can go help all those other not-special people coming in here. But I’m sure I’ll see you again.”
I shook my head. “I hope not,” I told him.
Marcus laughed. “Wow, I’m sorry my visit was that terrible for you,” he said, putting a hand over his heart as though he was wounded.
I felt a blush spread across my face. “I didn’t mean it that way,” I protested, even though I wasn’t sure why I cared what he thought. “I just meant, if I see you again, in this setting, it’s because some… cat has attacked you again. I’d rather not see you in here again.”
Marcus gave me a mocking salute. “I’ll try my best to stay out of trouble, like a good Boy Scout,” he said.
I couldn’t help the laugh that bubbled up. “Oh, get out of here,” I said. “And here, a prescription for painkillers. You don’t really deserve them since I’m sure this was all your fault, but what the hell.”
Marcus grinned at me, holding up the carefully written form up in the air and then deliberately tearing it in two, dropping the pieces in the wastebasket as he sauntered toward the door. “Don’t need any of that, sweetheart, but thanks for thinking of me,” he said, followed by another mock-serious quip, “I’ll get along just fine, thinking about all my mistakes I made this evening.”
I giggled again, and a smile, a real smile, broke out across his face like he was pleased with himself for making me laugh like that. Then, he turned and walked out the front door.
I finished filling out his paperwork so that I could file it. I was tempted, again, to look at his phone number. To copy it down, to stick it in my pocket. I didn’t have to call him. It would just be worth it to know that I could if I wanted to.
But I held myself back. Rachel, or even some of the other nurses that worked there at the hospital, probably would have done it. But that didn’t make it right. It wouldn’t have been professional, even if he had hinted at wanting to see me again.
I forced myself to file his paperwork away and then focus on the next round of incoming patients. There was plenty for me to do that night, and the last thing I needed was to have my head in the clouds over some sexy biker dude with a knife wound.
Even if he did have killer eyes and an interesting personality.
7
Marcus
Monday
Even though it was absolutely blistering hot outside on Monday, I wore long sleeves to the clubhouse for our weekly Red Eyes meeting. The last thing I needed was for anyone to see the bandages and ask what had happened. I didn’t need even more drama related to the Unknowns.
Besides, the cut wasn’t that bad. Or rather, it was bad, but I’d definitely had worse. I had sort of lied to that pretty nurse, Leila, when I had said that I wouldn’t need painkillers. But I’d seen something in her eyes when I’d torn up the prescription, and I’d known that I had played it right. She thought I was tough, and she thought that was sexy.
Really, I just had better ways of getting my hands on quality drugs. The perks of being part of the most powerful MC in New Mexico. We didn’t do a lot of dealings in drugs—Ray had never been interested in that sort of thing—but I knew where to go when I needed something.
“Yo, where the hell were you on Friday night?” Braxton asked, dropping into a seat next to me. “I thought we were all going to go get drinks together.”
“Slipped my mind,” I lied. It obviously hadn’t, but I’d needed to go home and get changed after getting bandaged up at the hospital, and then while I was in the shower, I’d started thinking about that nurse again. So I’d banged one out, just a quickie and not overly satisfying, but it was enough. And by then my arm was really starting to kill me, so I’d downed a couple painkillers, decided I was going nowhere that night, and curled up on the couch.
“Slipped your mind,” Braxton said, and he didn’t sound entirely convinced.
I shrugged. “Fine, I didn’t feel like it, okay?”
“Did you have a girl over?” Grant asked from Braxton’s far side, leaning forward so that he could leer at me.
“Bingo,” I said. It wasn’t the truth either, but hey, I’d met Leila that night, and I’d whacked off thinking about her, so that was close enough in my mind.
Fortunately, I didn’t have to face further inquiry. Ray strode into the room, and everyone fell silent, just like usual. “Hope everyone’s doing well,” he said, nodding around at us. “The club is doing really well at the moment in case anyone was wondering. It seems that even with the Unknowns trying to move in on our territory, and even with their continued threats, we seem to be back on track.”
“Does that mean you’re paying Willy back?” Braxton joked. Will was absent from this meeting, as he had been from a number of others lately due to his class schedule. If I didn’t know better, I’d say that he had planned his schedule that way on purpose, and I was surprised that Ray allowed it. But then again, Ray owed Will a favor for bailing out the club.
Besides, Ray was probably more than happy that his daughter’s husband was trying to stay clean and keep his nose out of trouble. And he would be even more happy that the man had decided to go back to school so that he could try to provide a good life for Belle and their eventual family.
Still, it was strange not having Will there at all of our club meetings. He had always been my best friend in the MC, and with him gone, I was left fielding Braxton’s snarkiness on my own.
Or maybe not fully on my own. Ray rolled his eyes. “I don’t think that’s any of your business,” he said. He cleared his throat. “Now, along
with things going well, there’s the matter of the new sheriff.”
“Did you manage to get him on our side?” Cameron asked.
“Not just yet,” Ray said. “But I have finally set up a meeting with him. Today.” He turned toward me. “Marcus, I want you there with me.”
“Of course,” I said immediately. It wasn’t going to come to blows with the sheriff, obviously. Ray wouldn’t even really want me to intimidate the man, except for maybe as a silent presence at his back. My role was more to be a second set of eyes on the situation. To see the things that Ray might have missed.
I appreciated the honor of being chosen to go with him. Besides, I was pretty curious about this new sheriff, anyway. Was he really going to be able to clean up Las Cruces like he seemed to think he could?
I had my doubts when we walked into the man’s office that afternoon. Sheriff Bill Michaels just didn’t look like the kind of guy who would really pose much threat to Red Eyes, not all duffed up in that fancy suit of his. I could tell he wasn’t entirely accustomed to this office, but at the same time, he looked like a pompous ass. Like he was taking to his new position quite well.
Ray and I shook hands with him, and I was careful to hide my sneer. “Sheriff Michaels, I appreciate you taking the time out of your busy schedule to meet with the two of us,” Ray said, his diplomat’s voice in full play. “My buddy Marcus and I are business owners here in Las Cruces, and we just really wanted to meet with you.”
The sheriff stared at the two of us for a long moment and then scoffed. “Bullshit,” he said succinctly. “I know exactly who you are, Ray Thompson. And I know who you are as well, Marcus Pine.” He narrowed his eyes at both of us. “Quite frankly, I have no interest in talking to the two of you.”
Ray widened his eyes innocently. “I’m sure your schedule must be very busy since you’re so new to the office,” he said. It was a veiled insult to how new Bill was at politics in general. I wondered if the other man picked up on that or not.