by Heather Long
Too fucking bad.
“Jasper will just get mad,” she said, and that defeated tone pissed me off.
“Who gives a fuck? He’s a big boy. He can take it. You need Doc, I’ll call him.” With that, I stood and pulled out my phone.
She moved toward the bathroom again and shrugged out of my jacket and then my hoodie. I kind of liked her wearing them. “I don’t want to cause more problems.” With that, she closed the door and shut me out.
Cause. More. Problems.
What the actual fuck?
I texted Doc.
Me: You ever get out of her what happened?
I stared at the closed door. The sound of water turning on in the shower told me what she decided to do.
The second message I sent to Hawk.
Me: Cleanup?
Hawk: Done. Two for the station. One for the show.
One of them was still alive.
Good. I had questions.
Me: I’ll make room on the stage.
Hawk: Call Doc in.
I frowned and read that twice.
Me: You know he doesn’t like patching up ragdolls.
If we weren’t planning on them living, Doc wasn’t prolonging their suffering. He had lines, and he wouldn’t cross them. Not even for us.
Hawk: Rome caught a knife. Be back in thirty.
Fuck.
I glanced at the bathroom again, then switched to Doc’s messages. He hadn’t answered me, but he had read it.
Me: Rome needs stitches. Clubhouse in twenty-five.
Three dots appeared on the screen.
Doc: How bad?
Me: He’s still walking.
Which was true. If it was going to be thirty before they got back here, then he wasn’t in danger of bleeding out. Was that what had Emersyn all tied up in knots? She said those guys didn’t lay a finger on her. I could get that answer out of our survivor. I hadn’t taken my next turn with our other guest. Maybe it was time he answered some questions.
Not that Hawk had bothered to ask him anything. We didn’t need to know the why to know what he’d done. At this point, we’d just taken our pound of flesh for her over and over. Every single injury she’d suffered had been inflicted on him.
Repeatedly.
I tapped the phone against my chin, and it buzzed again.
Doc: What’s wrong with Little Bit?
I debated answering that, particularly after he didn’t answer me earlier. But fuck it. She needed to talk to someone, and she trusted Doc.
Me: She got caught between Rome and some 19 Diamonds. Wrong time. Wrong place.
Then, because I wasn’t a dick, I clarified.
Me: She doesn’t appear to be hurt.
Doc: On my way.
The shower cut off, and I moved over and knocked on the door once. “Sparrow, I’m going down. You can join in the kitchen or the playroom, but stay inside the clubhouse, yeah?”
“I might just stay up here.”
I clenched my fist. “If that’s what you need. Food will be down there though, and Doc is on his way. If you don’t come down, I’ll send him up.”
She sighed. “I don’t want Jasper to shoot him.”
“I’ll take care of Jasper, Sparrow. Trust me.” I winced on the last two words, but she rewarded them by opening the door and letting a wall of steam out. Her skin was reddened all along her arms and shoulders like she’d stood in the scalding water, and there was only a towel wrapped around her.
At least the mottling of bruises she’d had from the beginning had all but faded. But this was new.
“I want to trust you,” she whispered. “I did before. But I thought you were just this really nice guy that treated me well, and I thought…you could be fun to escape with.”
“Well, I’m not a nice guy.” Facts were facts. “But you can trust me. I will treat you well.”
“And if I ask you to let me go?”
“If I could Sparrow, I would.” Then I touched her chin gently when she looked away. I wanted her eyes on me. “I mean it. Get dressed. Come eat. Talk to Doc.”
“I’ll think about it.”
Unwilling to push her further, I forced myself to leave the room. I was halfway down the hall when I spotted Freddie. Perfect.
“I didn’t do it,” Freddie said, holding his hands up. “It wasn’t me.”
“Uh huh. Then why are you declaring your innocence?”
“’Cause you’re wearing the you’re fucked face.”
Right. “Get cleaned up. Then go wait for Emersyn to come out of her room. Hang out with her, get her something to eat. Keep the rats away.” I paused and looked him over. He smelled like two-day old hot dogs, and there was vomit on his shoe. “Definitely clean up first.”
“I thought I wasn’t allowed near the pretty little princess?”
“Freddie, you try to touch her with any part of your anatomy, just be prepared to lose it.” I smiled, and he snapped his mouth shut. I didn’t make threats. “Keep her happy. She’s had a shock. Doc is on his way. Rome got stabbed and needs stitches. Don’t tell her that part.”
“Got it.”
“And Freddie…”
“I got it—I won’t touch her. Just entertain her and keep the rats away. Then make sure I leave her alone with Doc, which means then Hawk kills me. You guys…I swear. You’re the worst brothers ever.”
He was bemoaning his fate as he trudged down the hall to his door, which was at the very far end.
“Go to work, Freddie. Get a new job, Freddie. Don’t fuck the waitress at the kiddie circus, Freddie. Babysit the hot dancer with the pretty pussy, Freddie. But don’t forget, don’t touch. Assholes. All of you.”
“Wait,” I said as I reached the stairs, and he paused at his door. “You fucked Daniella down at Circus Pizza?” She was what, in her forties? And a mom?
Freddie shrugged. “She’s hot. Good ass. Really likes it in the ass too.” He saluted me and then vanished into his room.
Fucking Freddie.
Jesus.
There were rats waiting out in the garage when I got out there. They had a van open, and Jasper was already climbing out of it. He yanked one of the 19 Diamonds out, staggering. The guy was bleeding from his forehead, and one of his eyes was swollen shut. Shoving the walking corpse at one of the rats, Jasper jerked his head toward the fridge.
“Park him.”
The guys didn’t ask questions. They just moved. They weren’t gentle about it either. Rome came out next. He was still on his feet, and he had his hoodie packed around the knife, holding it steady where it rested in his side.
“You good?” I asked.
The guy laughed. “Hawk’s just worried ’cause he punched me before he realized I took a knife.”
“I’ll fucking punch you again if you don’t get your ass in gear. Office. Emersyn doesn’t need to see this shit.”
“I didn’t let her see it there,” Rome told him bluntly. “Won’t let her see it here. Where is she?”
“Showering. Why is she so upset?”
Rome stilled as Jasper pivoted midstep, turning away from heading to the clubhouse and facing Rome with me.
“They didn’t touch her.” Fierceness entered his eyes, and he glared at me. “I got there before they touched her.”
“So she said. So you said. Why is she shutting down again?” Because she was. It was like after she first woke up here, for real. She’d retreated into herself.
“Maybe because some 19 Diamond fucks acted like they were gonna mess with her?” Rome shrugged, then grimaced. “I don’t know. She was with me. She trusted me to protect her, and I did. Hell, she even…” He paused.
“She even what?” Liam asked. When the hell had he gotten here? Rome’s twin aggravated Jasper on a good day.
Surprisingly, Jasper ignored him as he focused on Rome. “Answer him.”
Rome leaned back against the van. “Do you mind if I go park my ass in the office before you interrogate me?”
“I do,
” I said, mostly because I had places to be. But I wanted this answer. “What happened?”
He sighed. “She backed me up. She kicked that asshole in the head. The one in the fridge. Kept him down. Got the other one with a rock. The one who went over the wall.”
The dead guy.
“She killed someone?” Liam asked the question pinging around inside of me and Jasper swore, but I shook my head and just turned my attention to Hawk.
“Take care of your brother,” I told Liam.
After the twins headed for the office on the far side of the warehouse where we had a clinic set up that would work for minor injuries, I faced off with Hawk. “She’s killed someone. You happy now?”
“Fuck off, Kellan.” He pinched the bridge of his nose, then raked a hand through his hair. “No, I’m not fucking happy. I’d be less happy if she hadn’t defended him and had gotten hurt. Rome getting stabbed is bad enough.”
“We can’t keep her here.”
“She’s been fine the last few weeks.”
Was he for real? “She’s losing her mind being stuck here. This isn’t her life. This…” I stuck my hand out. “None of this is her life.”
“Yeah well, the one she had wasn’t doing her any favors.” He rubbed at his jaw.
“Have you even told Raptor yet?”
Jasper not answering was an answer.
“He’s going to kill you.”
“He’ll understand.”
I tilted my head back and looked up at the rafters.
“He will.” There was more confidence in Jasper’s voice. “She’s not safe with her people. Look at how they are even dealing with her disappearance.”
They’d treated it like she and that shitstain had run off together. Half the tabloids made it out to be some romantic escapade, and the rest chided her for being a spoiled rich kid. The cops weren’t looking. A couple of our guys had done some asking around, and there was no report of her being missing.
The show had moved on.
They even had a new headliner.
A door at the far end of the warehouse opened, letting Doc in. Jasper’s aggrieved expression washed away, and he shot the other man a look. “I’m going to deal with the Diamond and find out why the fuck they were up this far. You get Doc in and then out.”
“Sparrow needs to see him.”
Jasper whirled on me. “I thought you said she wasn’t hurt.”
“Physically? No, she isn’t. Mentally and emotionally? Different story. She trusts Doc. Trusts him like she can’t trust us. She needs to see him.”
Fists clenching until his knuckles went white, Jasper glared at me. I didn’t flinch or look away. She needed this. If he could get his head out of his ass for five minutes, he’d see it. Doc had gotten her through some of the worst of those injuries.
“I don’t want him around her.”
“She’s not ours.”
“The fuck she isn’t,” Jasper ground out.
“Hawk, she doesn’t belong here.” How many times did I have to say it before he’d hear me?
“Give me one reason why I don’t just fucking shoot you right now.” Despite his words, there was no heat.
“Because I’m your brother and I’ve never lied to you. I know you want her. But you can’t have her.” None of us could.
“Shut up.” Jasper shoved past me. “Let him talk to her. Give her what she needs. But she stays.”
I sighed.
He didn’t slow down, and the door to the fridge slammed as he disappeared inside.
We were all fucking dead if someone didn’t tell Raptor what was going on. I could do it, but that would mean going around Jasper and I wasn’t ready to take that step yet. Doc slowed when he reached me, and the man’s unflinching attention to detail meant he hadn’t missed any of that.
“Rome’s in the office. Sparrow’s inside. Freddie’s keeping an eye on her, so don’t take too long.”
Doc nodded.
“And, Doc?” I didn’t look at him, and he didn’t turn. “Take care of her.”
“That was always my plan.”
I debated heading into the fridge for my own answers or hunting down Vaughn. I’d told him to walk it off, and apparently, he’d taken the words to heart. Still, I hesitated and glanced back at the clubhouse door.
When the hell had this all gotten so fucked?
Chapter 17
Emersyn
As promised, Kestrel sent Doc to see me that night. Freddie had shown up at my door to harass me into coming down to eat. I went more because I hadn’t had the energy to dissuade him. It wasn’t like I had to talk, he chatted enough for both of us. It was also hard to not laugh at Freddie’s outrageous statements.
Even if he did call me Boo-Boo.
What a name. At least it wasn’t a bird.
Doc called me Little Bit. That wasn’t a bird either.
So I was two for two.
Freddie left when Doc came in and I answered his questions, but mostly, I wanted to go to sleep. So when he asked to check my wrist and ribs, I let him and kept my gaze fixed on the wall when he checked them. There was almost no ache at all.
“Little Bit, do you want to talk about it?”
“No,” I told him. “I really don’t. Goodnight, Doc.”
I’d left him downstairs and returned to my room on my own, aware of his gaze following me. The next few days, I didn’t want to leave my room. That one little taste of freedom, and not only did I not take it and run, I’d helped to kill someone.
One part of my brain said self-defense. The rest of it though? I kept replaying the crunch of when I’d struck with the rock. The meaty thunk of it. Then Rome knocking him over. The body had been so still.
And those eyes had been open.
Lifeless.
I couldn’t close mine without seeing them.
The first night, I pretended to be asleep when Kestrel came in. He slept on the floor in front of the door. The next night it was Jasper. He actually tried to talk to me, but after a few monosyllabic answers, he left it alone. The third night it was Kestrel again, instead of Rome or Vaughn, but I didn’t say anything and neither did he.
I hadn’t seen Vaughn since the night we came back. Weirdly, I hadn’t seen Rome either. On day four, Jasper woke me early, or I guessed it was early.
“Get dressed,” he said. “Doc’s here, and he’s taking the splint off today.”
A part of me wanted to be excited, but the rest of me just wasn’t. What did it matter? I was still going to be stuck in this building.
I’d still killed someone.
Self-defense.
Didn’t matter. Someone was dead. I’d struck him like I’d been struck over the years.
I helped kill someone.
If I ever met the angel and devil on my shoulders, I’d punch them both in the mouth.
Jasper opened the drawers on the dresser and pulled out a couple of items and passed them to me. One was a leotard. The other was capri dance pants.
I stared at them for a moment.
You know, it wasn’t worth the effort.
He turned away as I went into the bathroom and began stripping my bed. I paused in the doorway and watched. In all the time I’d been here, Jasper had done some odd things, but this was weird, even for him.
“Get changed,” he said without looking at me.
I closed the door and stared at myself in the mirror. I barely recognized myself anymore. More, I hated what I saw when I looked at the dark hair that needed to be washed, the wan face that hadn’t seen enough sunlight—not that I ever did, but I didn’t recall ever being quite this pale.
I stripped off the nightshirt I’d been wearing, which probably belonged to one of the guys, and the panties and dropped them on the side. I had become an expert at wrapping a plastic bag that taped closed over my brace before I got in the shower.
Icy water on, I stepped right under the spray and stayed there until my teeth chattered, then I flipped it over to hot and wa
shed my hair. The chill knocked some of the cobwebs away, and I finished the shower as efficiently as I could.
Hair toweled and combed, I dressed in the leotard and squeezed into the dance pants. It was weird. They were form-fitting, but they were looser than normal.
The loss of muscle tone had my gut dropping all over again. Maybe that was why my face looked so hollowed out in the mirror.
Jasper was not only not in my bedroom when I came out, but the door between my room and the room next door was wide open. I still hadn’t figured out who slept in here, but it couldn’t be Rome. Even if Liam had slept in here that day. As far as I could tell, Rome was never in here, or maybe he just hadn’t been back. The guys had said something about a cleanup.
I should ask.
I made it all the way downstairs before I found people.
“There she is,” Vaughn greeted me. Surprise fluttered through me. I hadn’t seen him in days, and I hadn’t even realized I missed him. “You look a little lost, Dove.”
“Where have you been?” The words escaped before I could haul them back inside and barricade them behind a door locked with common sense. He wasn’t my friend. None of them were my friends. Granted, they were better than my family…
That uncharitable thought ignited guilt in the pit of my stomach, and I drew back a step. Why had I come down here again?
Tugging the knit cap he often wore off his head, Vaughn stepped farther out of the kitchen and into the hall. The conversation in the other room was just a din of masculine voices. It sounded almost like an argument, but I withdrew another step.
“Hey,” Vaughn said, and the soft, melodious nature of his voice beckoned to me. “What’s wrong?”
“Are you really asking me that question?” I quirked a brow. Because seriously? “Did you forget why I’m here?”
“No,” he answered, his tone cautious, but his eyes… Fuck, they just stared right inside me like he could see all the way to my soul. Nothing about Vaughn said gentle, trustworthy, or safe.
So why the fuck did he make me feel that way?
From his colorful tattoos to his bulging muscles to his blunt expressions and huge hands, he was the picture of a gang member. He was one of my kidnappers. He was…
He was someone I wished was my friend.