Eat Crow (Cheap Thrills Series Book 6)

by Mary B. Moore

  “How the hell did the woman get the jump on you and beat the shit out of you with a broken arm?”

  “If she’s still at the hospital, you’ll see.”

  His tone was ominous, and his words ended up being the bringers of psycho juju.

  “I’ll cut your balls off with my tongue,” the woman responsible, who was still being treated, screeched. “I’ll wear your guts for a belt. Let me outta here.”

  Holding the new ice pack to his face, Alejandro murmured, “Now do you see?”

  I kind of did but I was curious, so I walked down the hallway to where she was and looked around the corner. The woman looked to be of average height and average weight, but she was thrashing around so hard that she was close to tipping the bed over. A bed that she was cuffed to.

  “I can’t believe she bit through the restraints,” one of the doctors said as he moved to join me in the doorway. “We used the standard ones on her, and when we came in, she’d managed to bite through one of them and was trying to get the other one undone with her free hand.”

  Using DB’s words of wisdom, I repeated, “Meth’ll do that to you.”

  Pointing at a file in a holder on the wall outside of her room, he whispered, “Her blood work came back, and she’s on more than that. It’s a miracle she’s still alive with the amount of things she’s popping.”

  “Can you give her something to get rid of it?”

  “There was a distribution problem with our main supplier, and we’re low on the medications we get from them—including Naloxone. The directors have told us we’re only to use it on overdose cases,” he relayed, chewing nervously on his lower lip. “It also doesn’t work on what she’s got most of in her system, because it’s mainly for drugs with opioids in them.”

  “What about sedating her?”

  “Let me go discuss it with another doctor to make sure what I give her doesn’t mess her up,” he sighed. “Whatever we use will have to be admitted intramuscularly, though, because she tore out her IV a while ago, and I doubt we’re going to be able to get a new one into her. I’ve got two medications in mind that, if admitted at the same time, will sedate her slightly faster than if I just gave her one of them.” Nodding, I leaned back so he could get her file from the wall. “It won’t be immediate, but at least it’ll do something.”

  Then, hurrying down the hall, he disappeared, leaving me to watch the woman who was now panting and glaring at me.

  I swear, if her head started spinning, I wouldn’t be surprised. She looked as possessed as she’d been acting.

  “You’re ripping your wrists up,” I advised her, keeping my distance but taking a step closer to her. “And the doctors want to fix your broken arm. Doesn’t that hurt?”

  From the way it depressed in the middle, it had to be agony. Hell, I’d broken my ankle when I was fourteen, and I still remembered the pain.

  “I need to feed my cat.”

  Blinking, I tried to process what she’d just said. “You need to feed your cat?”

  With no expression on her face, just her eyes boring into me, she replied, “My pussy.”

  “I see. Is your cat at home?”

  “Yes.”

  Rubbing the back of my neck, I nodded. “I could go and feed it for you, but you need to stay calm and let them fix you up.”

  “My pussy needs to be cuddled.”

  I couldn’t stop the visible shudder that went through me at the possibility she was talking about her pussy. At this stage, it probably had fangs and attacked whatever came near it.

  Injecting as much sympathy and understanding into my voice as possible, I said, “We can arrange for that. All we ask is that you allow the doctors to treat you for your injuries and remain calm.”

  Looking down at her body for emphasis, she had the audacity to raise an eyebrow at me. “I am calm. I’m not screaming or shouting. I’m merely requesting that you care for my cat.”

  “You’ve been very agitated since you arrived, but if you stay like this, we can arrange to get your cat the care you want it to have.”

  Clenching her teeth tightly together, she hissed, “Because of my cat.”

  “I’ll call in and get someone to feed it and cuddle it.” I held my hands up in front of me. “I’m sorry that you’re going through so much.”

  There, that was nice, and hopefully she’d appreciate the sympathy.

  Big mistake. Instead of relaxing like I’d assumed, she glared at me. “You arrested my boyfriend.”

  “Because you reported that he was hitting you and smashing up your home.”

  Then, she did something truly unexpected. She threw her head back and burst out laughing. “He didn’t do that. I did that.”

  “You put the holes in your walls?” I clarified.

  “Of course.”

  “So, what happened to your arm?”

  Smiling smugly at me, she sang, “I broke it hitting him on the head.”

  Oh, for fuck’s sake!

  Dropping my head back to look up at the ceiling, I counted to five before looking back down at her. “Why did you call it in?”

  Shrugging her shoulder as much as she could, she said seriously, “Foreplay.”

  And this, folks, is the shit we look forward to every day.

  Just then, the doctor came back with a tray in his hand that had two syringes in it and stopped when he saw how calm she was.

  “I’d still give it to her if I was you,” I muttered out of the corner of my mouth. “I’d also request a psych eval after her arm’s fixed up.”

  When the doctor glared at me as I advised him, I said solemnly, “Trust me, you’ll thank me for it.”

  “What about my pussy?” she snapped.

  This time, the doctor shuddered with me.

  “I’ll arrange for it to be looked after,” I promised.

  “Don’t you get no humane or animal society on it. They won’t give it back. Petunia needs one-on-one TLC, and those assholes just cage the poor animals up and kill them when no one wants them.”

  Rubbing my face with both hands, I repeated to myself that I needed her to remain calm. “I’ll get on it.”

  With the way she was talking, it was going to be an angry beast with one eye sewed shut, its ears cut off, bald in patches, and have a personality like the Antichrist, I just knew it. That’s the only reason she wouldn’t want it to go to an animal rescue place.

  “Now, Doc, give me whatever’s in that syringe, fix my damn arm, and order that psych eval like the nice Po-Po asked.” There was a pause, and then she added, “And I’m truly sorry for getting blood on your sheets. I’ve got a special pussy, you see, and being in here is keeping me from her.”

  Glancing over at the doctor, who was still standing there in shock, I nudged him toward her. “Good luck.”

  I was almost back at Alejandro’s room when she shrieked, “I said, give me the damn drugs in the goddamn syringe, fix my fucking arm, and get me a motherfucking psych eval like he said, you stupid piece of shit.”

  Walking in and seeing that Alejandro had a doctor with him, I waited while he was examined and kept an ear on the woman down the hallway while I talked to DB about what’d happened and the cat.

  It’s a given that in life you’ll encounter people or situations where you’re left asking yourself, “Self, what in the ever-loving hell did we just get into?” Or you’ll muse about how surreal and bizarre it was. I could honestly say that this might be number one on my list of those situations and people.

  After getting the all-clear from the doctor and finding out he was just badly bruised, I helped Alejandro off the bed and walked slowly beside him down the hallway to the exit.

  We’d only taken a couple of steps when the woman yelled, “God damn, that’s some good shit. Isn’t that good shit, Doc? I need to get the name of this, ‘cuz hoo-wee!” And then she started singing Christmas songs.

  Looking at me out of the corner of his eye, Alejandro murmured, “I’ve never in my whole entire life
met anyone as insane as she is, and that says something.”

  “Wanna hear something that’ll make your day feel better?” When he nodded, I chuckled, “She’s got a cat that needs looking after, so to keep her calm, I agreed I’d get someone to go and do just that. I called DB, and he’s sending Carter and Naomi to do it.”

  A bark of laughter burst out of him again, making his legs crumple slightly, and I had to catch him carefully. “Fuck me, you gotta stop doing that. The next one’s gonna have my rib ricocheting through my body until it comes out of my ass.”

  Yeah, the boy had been given some painkillers by the doctor, so he wasn’t thinking all that clearly, which was why he’d pretty much yelled that in a room filled with people waiting to be seen.

  An old guy in a wheelchair with an oxygen thing in his nose nodded. “I feel you on that, man. Last night I had this frozen meal that left my ass bleeding. It feels like I shit out a rib.”

  I was torn between being disgusted and my heart hurting because he reminded me of Bexley’s grandpa, Lawrence. He’d say something like that to make people laugh.

  Not Alejandro, though. Nope, he went over and started talking to the old guy, asking him which meal it was because he had about fifty in the freezer in his garage and didn’t want a bleeding ass.

  Deciding to give him a moment with the man, I pulled my phone out to see a text from Bexley asking what I was up to.

  Me: In the ER listening to an old guy telling Alejandro about his bleeding ass. You?

  Her reply came back quickly.

  Bex: So many things I want to say to that. Gross. Ew. Why the hell do people like to share so much? Are you okay?

  Me: I’m not the hurt one, and it’s fucking gross.

  Bex: Are you free to meet me at the house later?

  She could ask me to cut a kidney out myself, and I’d do it at this stage.

  Me: Absolutely. What time?

  Bex: Whenever you’re free. I’ll order pizza.

  Me: Make it tacos.

  Bex: Deal.

  When I’d first seen her at the funeral, my grandpa had told me I needed to eat crow and get her back because my misery was making him miserable. My whole family and anyone who knew me could see that the last seven years had been hell without her.

  The thing was, I’d already been planning to do it and was just hoping I’d get the chance. Now that things were easier between us and she was moving back, I felt like I was getting that missing part of me back again, but it didn’t mean I was going to stop eating crow, as Grandpa called it.

  Hell no.

  I was going to surprise her by picking up the tacos and bringing them with me. It didn’t matter what it took, I was going to get Bex back. Her friendship had been the best part of my life back then, and the last week had given me glimpses of what it would’ve been like if I hadn’t fucked up so badly.

  I was a man on a mission.

  I was also a man who’d been spending a ridiculous amount of time trying to analyze his feelings. I’d had a crush on Bex for years, but the feelings I had now were far different from that. Sure, it was still slightly strained between us, but it didn’t feel forced when we were together, and that had to mean something, right?

  Every time I asked myself what it meant or tried to dig deeper into my feelings, my brain would scream, “I’m just a man!” at me. Trust me, I knew I was just a man—a specific part of me that was certain about its feelings for her definitely wasn’t confused. And that just confused me even more.

  Time. We needed time to heal and time for me to sort my head out. Maybe I should have asked for the psych eval?

  I had a key to her house for emergencies, but I still knocked before going inside with the food in a bag dangling from my hand. That big asshole Doyle would try to take me down if I just walked in, but I was holding a taco in my hand to throw in case he still tried after I warned him I was there.

  Bexley might have come around to having me near her, but he sure as shit hadn’t.

  Opening the door cautiously, I glanced around to make sure he wasn’t there, then walked fully inside. I don’t know what Lawrence had taught him about me, but none of it was good.

  What I saw made me come up short. Bexley was on her knees, ass in the air, in a ridiculously short pair of cut-offs, hissing at whatever she was doing.

  “Go in, you big bastard. You fit before, so why are you doing this to me now?” I didn’t say a word and barely heard the soft click of the door shutting by itself. “Why don’t you fit in the hole? You can’t just have miraculously grown in five minutes.”

  Tell that to my dick.

  “Oh, for fuck’s sake,” she snapped, straightening up and pointing at the space in front of her. “I’m going to get you in, just watch.”

  Licking my lips, I croaked, “Maybe try lube?”

  Jumping, she squeaked and turned around with her arms out like she was going to attack me. “You shit head. Do you know the damage I can do to you?”

  Raising an eyebrow, I placed the bag down and reached for the Velcro on the side of my vest with my free hand. I know some guys were religious about wearing theirs as soon as they put their uniform on, but I wasn’t one of them. Wearing it into work and after it depended on the day, and today I’d been in such a hurry to get her that I hadn’t taken it off before I left.

  I still needed to carry it inside with me, though, and this was something she’d wisened onto a couple of days ago, so now there was a wooden bench—one of the ones people sat on to put their shoes on—next to the door that she’d said was for me to put it on. Carefully placing on it, I picked the food up and tried to smile breezily at her.

  Yeah, breezy—I could do that.

  “Sorry, I did knock before I came in, but you were trying to scare something into fitting.”

  Nodding, she replied seriously, “I was in the zone. A bit of the baseboard came off when I touched it to look at the gap. I’ve got the glue Dad recommended, but it won’t fit back in.”

  Holding a finger up, I dropped the bag on the counter in the kitchen and then came back and squatted down beside her to see what she was talking about. It took all of one second to figure out what was wrong.

  Taking the piece of wood out of her hand, I nudged her aside and leaned into the area. “You’ve got it upside down. Because it’s cut at an angle on this side, if you don’t have it the right way around, it won’t fit,” I explained, pointing at one of the edges.

  “Damn my life,” she huffed, moving away and giving me space to work.

  Putting some glue on the back, I slotted it into place and held it for forty-five seconds like the instructions on the back said. “Are you going to redo the floors?”

  “Yeah, they’re getting sanded down in three weeks, and the floor guy said he could do this burning thing that’ll fit in with the rest of the house before they’re varnished again. I want to retain the old vintage style but just freshen it up a bit.”

  Slowly lifting my hand off the piece of wood, I counted to twenty before moving away completely, just in case. “He’ll probably fix that piece and any others properly, but that’ll do for now.” Then, standing up, I looked behind her at the living room. “You planning to commit the perfect murder or something?”

  The whole floor was covered in plastic sheeting, which had been taped down to hold it in place.

  Rubbing the back of her neck, she lifted one shoulder. “The guy said to get the walls done in there before he comes, so I just… wrapped everything up. The bags around the furniture I’m keeping are the type you put mattresses in when you move, so I figured they’d protect them, too.”

  Turning around in a circle, I took in the area behind us where there was a dining room and another living room. Back in the old days, they had a formal living room and a more informal parlor, I guess, but her grandpa had made it into his man cave. The racks with old rifles on them were empty and had been taken down, but the floors hadn’t been covered yet.

  “What about the rest of
the place?”

  Following where I was looking, she threw her arms up in the air. “I don’t know. I want to get the floors done all at once, but Pops had so much shit that I’m running out of places to store it. I can’t even lift half of it and trust me, I’ve tried. It took our dads and your grandpa two days to pull down all the wood paneling and check for damp in the walls, and it’s starting to freak me out. I just don’t know what to do with it all.”

  Reaching out, I hooked my arm around her waist and pulled her into my side. “Did you think to ask the rest of us to help, Bex?”

  I already knew the answer.

  “No,” she sighed, “but I’ll do it. I need to get a storage unit for a little bit so I can get the house fixed up, and then I’ll sort through it while we’re putting it all back. I’ll repurpose a lot of it because I love it, but I’m feeling a bit overwhelmed by it all right now.”

  Squeezing her, I pulled my phone out and shot a text off to both of our dads asking for a hand this weekend. Then, knowing he’d have some space, I text Ren Townsend to see if we could store some of it at his place in town. They’d expanded it recently and had large garages out the back that he was looking at ideas for, so he might be okay with it.

  I quickly got a yes back from all of them, and Ren was even throwing in help from his brothers.

  “Let’s eat before it gets too cold, and then we can get a plan in place for all of this.” I waved my hand at the area around us.

  Just as I turned to go to the kitchen, she caught my hand and tugged at it. The expression she was wearing when I looked over my shoulder made my gut hurt. It was sad, wary, relieved, but just plain lost.

  “Thank you. I know I should be handling this better than I am, but changing Pops’ house and even thinking about throwing out things he touched hurts more than I can put into words, Logan.”

  Squeezing her hand, I smiled sadly. “It’s going to be hard for a while, but you’ve got a lot of people behind you, Bex. You just have to let them know when you need them to hold you up.”

  Blowing out a breath, she stared down at the floor. “My parents are grieving as well, though—Dad lost his father, for Christ’s sake. I need to be less selfish and let them start healing instead of taking on my grief and inability to act like a mature adult. I’ve been doing that for seven fucking years now. When does it end?”