At the touch of a hand on her shoulder, Lyla jolted. “Lady, you wanna tell me what the hell is going on here? We must’ve gotten four different phone calls about a fight in this alley,” one of the officers said.
“He broke into my apartment and attacked us,” she said, gesturing at Brett. “I called it in, but then he ran, and Tate chased him here—so I followed, but…”
“Who is he? Do you know him?”
“You have to call Detective Scarletti,” Lyla whispered. “Tell him you have Lyla Lawson and Tate Monroe here. And tell him…tell him…”
Lyla couldn’t take her eyes off Tate, though. Why wasn’t he moving? She pointed. “What’s wrong with him?”
“He’s out cold,” the cop told her. “Don’t worry. What do you want me to tell Scarletti?”
“Tell him Captain Monroe caught my weird fan…I mean, my stalker. Tell him Tate caught the stalker.”
“That character you just popped in the leg? Seems to me like you were the one who caught him, Miss.”
Lyla shook her head. “No, I just finished him off. Tate’s the one who saved me.”
If it hadn’t been for Tate, Brett would’ve had her trapped all alone in her apartment, and Lyla had the sickening feeling things might’ve ended up a whole lot worse than this.
“Still. Nice job getting him in the leg. Dropped him like a bad habit, didn’t you?”
She blew out a breath. “I was aiming for his chest.”
The officer just chuckled. “Okay, so who is he? You know him, or what?”
“His name is Brett Jones. He lives with his parents in Rye, on Maple Avenue. I bet they’re wondering where he is right about now, too.”
Across the way, Tate had opened his eyes and was batting ineffectively at the EMT’s hands as she tried to strap him onto the stretcher. Without warning, though, he doubled over and fell to the side, coughing and retching up bile.
“Tate?” Lyla scrambled toward him on her hands and knees. “Oh my God, Tate!”
The paramedic barked, “Keep her back!”
“What’s wrong with him?”
The officer who’d been talking with Lyla hooked an arm around her and hauled her backward, sitting her on her ass and holding her in place. “It’s okay. They’ve got him. Let them help.”
The paramedics got Tate settled again and onto the stretcher, and then they were lifting him up and carrying him carefully toward the ambulance parked on the street.
Another set of EMTs were guiding Brett into a second vehicle, surrounded by a knot of grumpy-looking cops. Lyla could still hear her old neighbor complaining, but his words were indistinct.
Nearby, one of the paramedics attending Tate was repeating, “12-alpha-2,” into the radio set clipped to his vest.
“12-alpha-2?” Lyla asked the cop. “What’s that mean?”
“Seizure with an unknown cause. Your boy overdosing, by any chance?”
“Oh my God, no.”
“What about epilepsy?”
“No,” Lyla said. “He’s in the Army. He’s been recovering from a TBI for months. But he takes an anti-convulsant. He showed it to me.”
The officer jogged over to the EMTs to relate what she’d said. Lyla followed, trying to get closer to Tate so she could see for herself if he was okay.
“Where are you taking him?” she asked.
“Mount Sinai is closest.”
But Tate didn’t know a soul at Mount Sinai, and he should have people who loved him taking care of him now. On impulse, Lyla blurted out, “I don’t suppose there’s any chance you could bring him to Weill Cornell, instead?”
They all peered at her in annoyance, so she bluffed, “I think that’s where his insurance is.” But then she felt guilty for lying to the people trying to help him, so she added sheepishly, “Also, his best friend works there.”
Tate met her gaze and blinked up at her, his eyes hazy and confused.
“Don’t worry,” Lyla told him. “Luca will get you all fixed up.”
They rolled him into the back of the ambulance and hopped in after him.
“Can I come with you?” she called, but the EMT didn’t hear her over all the commotion on the sidewalk. His partner climbed behind the wheel and he reached to pull the doors closed.
“Wait!” Lyla said, “Can I—”
The patient compartment slammed shut, and a moment later the vehicle was pulling away with its lights flashing, but sirens eerily quiet.
Lyla spun around and met the eyes of the officer who’d been sticking by her side. “I need to go to the hospital,” she told him. “I have to call a cab or something.”
He nodded but gestured her away from the curb. “We’ll get you there in a little while. First, why don’t you walk back to your apartment with me, so we can start processing the scene. Detective Scarletti is on his way in. He said he’ll meet us there.”
Lyla cast a look over her shoulder, where the ambulance was just turning down Amsterdam Avenue, on its way to cut across town to the East Side. She’d need to stop at home before following Tate anyway, to pick up her purse and his wallet.
He’d need ID and his insurance card. He would want his phone, too, so someone could call his parents and let them know he was okay, and, for crying out loud, Lyla probably ought to bring him some shoes, too.
She reached into the pocket of her pajama bottoms and pulled out her own cell, staring at the dark screen blankly. She should call Red. Lyla should warn Luca that Tate was on his way.
“Ms. Lawson?” the cop asked. “Let’s get moving.”
“Okay. It’s…” she murmured, blinking and looking around at the thinning crowd. “…right. My building’s this way.”
FOR THE NEXT few hours, Detective Scarletti and the officer from the alley—who Lyla learned was named Malloy—presided over the investigation unfolding in her apartment like a pair of grumpy choir directors.
Members of the NYPD strung crime scene tape, bagged evidence, and combed over her home with stark efficiency, all under the terse direction of Scarletti and Malloy.
It was daunting, given how tired and overwhelmed Lyla felt. They’d planted her on one of her kitchen stools and instructed her to stay put, but all the while, the need to get to the hospital, and Tate, beat like a pulse under her skin.
Eventually, however, the officers began to pack up their equipment and depart, and the detective came over to stand beside her.
He jammed his hands in the pockets of his rumpled dress pants and rocked on his toes, looking at Lyla quizzically.
“Sorry you had to get dragged out of bed for this,” she told him.
“Eh, no biggie. Comes with the job,” he shrugged. “I sleep like shit most of the time, anyway.”
“There’s a lot of that going around.”
“So I gather.”
They stood there in silence for a few awkward moments, and then Scarletti said, “So…Brett Jones, huh? Former classmate of the victim.”
“Who would’ve thunk it?” Lyla retorted wryly. “I hope this means you’ll stop looking at Tate as a suspect.”
“Well, you know—it might’ve been nice if someone had told me that the mentally-ill neighbor kid hated you. At the beginning of this whole thing.”
“First of all, I had no idea that was the case. And secondly, it honestly never occurred to me. Besides,” Lyla grouched, “You can’t make this my fault. You didn’t think of him, either.”
A small smile flitted around the detective’s lips, making him seem almost friendly. “Touché,” he said. “And for the record, I wasn’t laying blame. I’m just annoyed that your little boyfriend beat me to the punch, that’s all.”
“Tate’s not my boyfriend,” Lyla blurted automatically.
“Does he know that?”
Lyla sighed heavily. “Detective, do you need anything else from me?”
“As a matter of fact, I do. You’ve got a goose egg the size of Queens on your forehead. Has anyone looked at that yet?”
�
�No. Bigger things to worry about, I guess.”
“Not anymore, Ms. Lawson. Let’s get you to the hospital and make sure that asshole didn’t give you a concussion, all right?”
“How convenient,” Lyla said. “I was just heading that way.”
Scarletti’s brows drew together in surprise. He clearly hadn’t expected her to agree with him so easily. “You were?”
“I happen to have a friend being treated there, at the moment. I need to check on him.”
The detective dropped his head back and groaned, “Ah, Christ. I should’ve known. Need I remind you that Sinai is five minutes away, and Cornell is clear across town?”
Like Lyla cared about that. “I can find my own way there,” she said.
“Yeah, right. And I’ll bet my last nickel you won’t mention the fact that you got cracked in the skull to a single soul once you get there. You’re going to head straight for Captain Monroe and sit vigil next to him like your life depends on it.”
Well, Scarletti had her there. Lyla crossed her fingers in her lap and countered with, “I promise I will have someone check me out. After I make sure Tate is okay.”
He only shook his head and laughed, though. “No deal. Come on, put on some real pants and grab your stuff. I’ll take you over there, now. And, not a word about the good captain until the ER staff gives you the all-clear. You hear me?”
SCARLETTI LEFT LYLA in the care of a well-meaning clutch of emergency room nurses, and he must’ve warned them about her intentions in advance.
They kept her for a full two hours before Lyla was able to break free of them, and find her way to the room upstairs where Tate had been moved.
He’d been kept overnight for tests and observation. He was still being treated for a migraine and the doctors were consulting with his regular physicians back home in Ohio about the reasons for his seizure.
At least, that’s what Red told her when he found Lyla dozing on a waiting room bench later that morning.
She had not been able to learn a single thing from Tate himself, because once he was allowed visitors, he had stoutly refused to see her.
Learning that, Red had brought Lyla a cup of scorched and bitter coffee, and then had sat and chatted with her for a while.
His face was sympathetic when he told her, “Listen, I think Tate is just embarrassed. He thinks he failed you, but he’s all turned around in his head right now. He’ll come around.”
Her boss was obviously full of it, and not doing a very good job of hiding it. “Now that you’ve delivered the party line,” Lyla said, “what’s really going on?”
“Honest to God. Let Luca and me try to talk some sense into him. You go home and get some rest, and we’ll call you and let you know when to come back.”
“You guys are circling the wagons, aren’t you?” she accused.
“Only temporarily,” Red admitted. “My car’s downstairs. I’ll call down and tell my driver to bring you home, okay?” He looked her over in concern. “You need to eat, and rest.”
And take a long, hot bath, Lyla realized, registering her own appearance for the first time.
“You’ll tell Tate I was here?” she asked.
“He knows. I’m sure he just doesn’t want you to see him hooked up to all the machines and stuff. It’s emasculating.”
Lyla wasn’t so sure. Still, she got dutifully to her feet and followed her boss out of the waiting room.
There was no doubt in her mind that Tate Monroe had saved her life last night. However, Lyla was beginning to suspect he didn’t see it that way.
THIRTY-FIVE
LAYING IN A hospital bed for the second time that year, Tate realized that he was perhaps even worse off than he’d been the last time—at least then, he’d had the hope of recovery on his side.
Now, he had nothing. No prayer of getting his career back, no excuse to speak to his woman ever again, and hang-ups galore.
It was possible that his brain might never be the same again, and his nightmares were back, so there was that.
Red and Luca had both come to see him repeatedly, trying to reassure Tate that all was not lost and that he only needed to call Lyla and tell her how he felt.
It was exactly the kind of advice he ought to have expected from two lovelorn idiots, but given their longstanding friendship, Tate at least expected them to extend just a tiny bit of understanding.
But no—here Red was again, settling into the chair beside Tate’s bed and giving him the same old song and dance.
As long as his buddy was determined to visit, though, Tate figured he may as well get a few questions answered. He couldn’t face Lyla after the way he’d failed her at the most critical moment—but maybe Tate could make sure she didn’t need anything.
“So, how’s, um…how’s Lyla?” he asked. “Is she doing okay?”
Red sat back, folded his hands on his stomach, and rolled his eyes. “You’re really a piece of work, you know that?”
“Not the time, Red. Christ,” Tate slammed his fist on the bed, yanking his fucking IV in the process and wincing at the sting before he could think better of it.
Red’s face went from mocking to concerned in the blink of an eye. “You okay?”
“Fine. Just tell me.” Tate gently rearranged the tubing snaking across his arm then looked across the room, focusing on the quiet television up in the corner.
Let Red think he was watching the sports highlights—then maybe he wouldn’t read too much into Tate’s inquiry.
His buddy sighed, but he gave up the goods. “She was banged up pretty good, but otherwise seems to be doing okay. She’d be better if you let her come see you, though.”
“Not gonna happen, bro.”
“Because you…failed her somehow?” Red arched an imperious auburn brow at him, and Tate gritted his teeth.
“Exactly. It’s better this way.”
“But you caught the guy.”
They’d been over this before. “Again with that shit? Having a seizure and blacking out on the fucker does not count as catching him. When I think of what Jones could have done to Lyla if she hadn’t gotten ahold of my gun…or if the cops couldn’t find her…”
“That didn’t happen, though,” Red said reasonably. “You sacrificed your own well-being to neutralize her stalker, giving Lyla a chance to defend herself and the police plenty of time to get there and keep her safe. Tate, you seem to be giving yourself demerits for what-ifs that never even took place.”
Tate knew it was going to be impossible to reason with his old friend. When Red got it into his head that he was right, he was as obstinate as they came—logic be damned. And frankly, Tate was in no shape at the moment to put up much of a fight.
“Look, I told you how it had to be, and nothing you say is going to change my mind.”
Tate didn’t even know how Lyla felt about him anymore. For a while there, he’d wondered if maybe she cared about him as much as he did her, but Brett’s attack had changed everything.
For all Tate knew, Lyla had only viewed him as a convenient fuck buddy, anyway—and now that the danger to her was past, she was more than happy to move on.
Red leaned in to catch his eye, and said, “You know you’re my brother, Tate.”
“But?”
“But you’re being an unreasonable ass about this. Just talk to the woman. How is that so hard?”
“Says the man who didn’t collapse at the worst possible moment, putting the person he was supposed to protect in grave danger.”
“It all worked out,” Red insisted.
“If you say so.” Tate crossed his arms over his chest, then immediately uncrossed them when he realized it probably made him look like a sullen kindergartener.
“Tate, Brett Jones is on psychiatric lockdown, and he’s staying there indefinitely. NYPD is charging him with all kinds of crap. Seems he’s been flushing his meds and stealing his parents’ car, and mommy and daddy had no fucking idea.”
“He’ll beat it,”
Tate said grimly. “You’ll see. They’ll transfer him to a hospital, and before long he’ll be allowed out to visit his parents, and next thing you know, it will be like nothing ever happened.”
Red frowned at him. “When did you become such an unrelenting pessimist?”
“When I went to war, dickhead, and instead of it making sense, it turned out to be a big cesspool of what the fuck.”
Red shook his head, and Tate wanted to beat the look of pity right off his handsome face. They weren’t a couple of hotheaded college kids anymore, however. Red had a billion-dollar business to run and a woman at home that he was scheduled to marry in a matter of weeks.
So, Tate kept his hands to himself and concentrated on not saying something foul to the man who was supposed to be his best friend.
Red was as unrelenting as ever and tried another track. He commented, “If Jones ever does get out, Lyla will need you again.”
“Wrong. She will need an actual bodyguard who is trained and qualified to do the job without fucking it up,” Tate corrected.
“She won’t want that.”
“Then make her want it.”
“You, of all people, ought to recognize the futility of that.”
“Red, if you are half the friend you claim to be, you will find the deadliest motherfucker on the planet to guard that woman, and you will make her agree to it. Do you understand me?” Tate growled. “That is not negotiable.”
Red blew out a long breath and shook his head.
“Promise me, MacLellan. If you do nothing else, at least give me that.”
“Fine, dumbass. But this conversation isn’t over.”
“Oh yes, it is.”
NEXT UP WAS Luca, who strolled into Tate’s room in his starched white lab coat that afternoon, carrying a clipboard and sporting a suave grin.
“So,” he drawled, “Red tells me you are still being a stubborn little idiota. Am I going to have to keep you in here, eating terrible food for another week, just to get you to be reasonable?”
Tate glared at him. “For your information, Red has already played the bad cop, today. Aren’t you supposed to be the nice one, now?”
The Hero Was Handsome (Triple Threat Book 3) Page 31