by Heather Long
Not as much as my parents had nor as much as in my trust, but I’d been secreting funds for four years. Four years to plan my escape. I didn’t realize I’d need it so literally, but surely I had enough to persuade them.
“Fact,” Jasper said when I paused. “You don’t give a shit about that asshole, as long as he never touches you again.”
I shrugged.
“Not particularly, no.”
The fact I could say that without a lot of feeling was a testament to just how much I loathed him. Maybe it was cold. Maybe it made me a monster.
I’d been raised by them after all.
Jasper stared at me, surprise flickering across his face for the first time since I met him, and he dug his cigarettes out of a pocket and lit one up, even as Kestrel flipped a button on the wall that started an extractor.
Then it was my turn to be surprised as he held the cigarette out to me. I had to leave the beer on the table to take it, and for a second, my fingers trembled as they brushed his as I took it. The first drag, like that first full beer, also helped settle me some.
Moving back to his chair, Jasper sat, lit another cigarette and then leaned back as he stared at me. A groan from behind Kestrel pulled Jasper’s attention, but I didn’t look, instead I just sucked on the cigarette and tried not to look at the blood on my arm. The cramps from my twisting and tortured uterus were a lot harder to ignore.
The beer settled my nerves but not that.
Dressed in gray sweatpants and nothing else, Rome walked into the kitchen yawning and scowling.
“Sleeping beauty didn’t even notice she’d left her room, and he hadn’t locked the door,” Vaughn explained, and I swore he shot me a near apologetic look when he mentioned locking the door.
Rome shrugged, his whole back a ripple of golden muscle. The long lines of the tattoo decorating his spine pulled my attention before he slanted a look at me and grunted. He went to the fridge for a beer, and Jasper scowled. I twisted a little as the light of the fridge hit Rome on the chest.
The flock of birds tattoo was missing. Not just…
“Where the hell is Rome?” Jasper demanded. “Why did he leave you watching her?”
The man who was not Rome smirked as he pulled out a beer. “You’re welcome that I came over to do a favor. I didn’t have to show up you know.”
Jasper’s expression had turned thunderous, and Kestrel let out an aggrieved sigh. “Where is he, Liam?”
“I didn’t ask,” Liam said as he grinned at me. Though it was more a grimace with a lot of teeth showing. “You don’t look so fragile and scared to me.”
Maybe it made me a cliché, but I just blew smoke at him and the guy with Rome’s face laughed. Twins. Identical. But they had different tattoos. There were also a few scars along Liam’s abdomen and on his back. Rolling his head from side to side, he cracked the vertebrae and took a long slug of beer before he said, “I don’t know where he had to go. Just said he had something he was working on. Man, you know how he gets when he has a project. He said the squirrel didn’t do much and I just needed to be on hand until you got back. I was fucking tired, so I slept.”
As much as I tried not to look at him, it was hard to miss the bruises on his knuckles as he closed in on the table. Kestrel was right behind me. He’d shifted his weight, and the heat from him seemed to press against my neck. The only other place I could look was cracked linoleum, otherwise I was staring at Jasper, Vaughn, or Liam.
The room seemed to shrink with all of them in it.
Jasper snubbed his cigarette out, then nudged the ashtray toward me.
“Vaughn…”
“No,” the colorfully painted man with all his tattoos and thick brawn said with a shake of his head. “I am not going to look for him. If Liam doesn’t know where he is, I’m not wasting hours hunting all over town. I have appointments booked all afternoon. I’m eating, then I’m out of here.”
“Don’t look at me,” Kestrel said. “I’ve got Sparrow duty.”
“Sparrow?” Liam snorted. “She’s not a sparrow.” He studied me. “You’re quiet, but you’re tough. Or you wouldn’t be sitting there bleeding without an ounce of complaint.”
I frowned at him as Jasper jerked to his feet. “What the fuck do you mean she’s bleeding?”
Kestrel yanked my chair around, and Vaughn shoved Liam to the side. Why the hell had he told them that?
“I’m fine,” I snapped when Kestrel put his hand on my leg. Sure enough. I’d bled through the tissue and it was soaking my leg. Shit.
“You’re bleeding, that’s not fine.” Jasper glared at me. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“Because I don’t generally discuss my period with others much less my kidnappers. I’m not injured. I just don’t have any products, and I had to make do with toilet paper.”
I jerked my leg out of Kestrel’s grasp. Mostly because the warmth of his hand on my thigh seemed to have left an electric imprint and burned all the way through my clothing to my skin.
Vaughn had frozen and so did Liam. Jasper stared at me as if I’d sprouted a second head, while Kestrel raised his hands in mock surrender. Yeah, typical guys.
“I just need a bathroom for a few minutes or a trip to a drugstore.”
Somehow, I doubted I’d be going to a drugstore. And if I went to the bathroom in my room, I wouldn’t be getting out again. This had been my one escape attempt. So…maybe what I needed to do was make friends?
Ugh. I could do this.
I had to pitch myself all the time at fundraisers.
Maybe that could work…
“Doc was here,” I said slowly. “We could just ask him.”
Vaughn shoved off the counter and was already through the door before Jasper said, “Don’t…”
“Too late,” Kestrel murmured. “And she’s right—Doc probably has supplies. He’s always got stuff for the girls over at the center.”
The center?
Jasper ran a hand over his bearded face and then focused on me. “Are you sure it’s just that? It’s not…something else wrong? Something that asshole did?”
I stared at him, then shrugged as I shifted in the seat. Now that Liam had pointed it out, I couldn’t escape the feeling of where I’d leaked. Really, it was bad enough he’d mentioned it, now I was intimately aware of it. As for the jerk in question, he still stared at me. The scrutiny didn’t help at all, so I just took another long drink of the beer. I kind of hoped the more I had the better it would taste.
Sadly, no.
The silence stretched, and Jasper swore again then slammed back the rest of his beer. Then it was just the four of us with the thump of music vibrating the walls for company. I didn’t sigh when Doc appeared, but I almost sagged. The last thing I needed was to incite Jasper, because the tension thrumming through him snapped him straight like someone had yanked a cord.
The scuff of Kestrel’s shoe behind me was the only warning before his hand brushed my back where he braced it against the chair. He wasn’t gripping me, he gripped the chair.
“Hey, little bit,” Doc greeted me, ignoring the obvious tension in the other men present. Well, in Jasper and Kestrel. Liam looked more intrigued than he did tense, and Vaughn’s expression was hard to read. “Vaughn said you’re having a bit of an issue.”
There was no mistaking the assessment in his eyes as he looked me over or the way his mouth tightened when he got to my leg and then back up to my arm.
“I got my period,” I explained. “And I didn’t have any supplies. I used some toilet paper, but apparently, it’s heavy this month.”
He nodded. “That’s normal for you?”
“For fuck’s sake, man,” Jasper snarled. “Really?”
Doc ignored him and focused on me. “Would you like to go somewhere more private?”
“Doc,” Kestrel warned, and I didn’t even have to look to know Jasper had stiffened further.
“It’s fine,” I said, not interested in getting Doc killed. “Pri
soners don’t get rights. This happens some months. I just lost track of time.”
“Have you tried birth control to modify it?”
A faint smile pulled at my lips, because Liam actually looked a little ill and Vaughn shook his head in slow disbelief. I kind of wished I could see Kestrel and Jasper’s faces right now, but I kept my attention on Doc. “Not specifically, no.” I used birth control for the base purpose. Besides, I’d tried the pill, it wasn’t as effective as I’d have liked.
Doc narrowed his eyes. “There’s other options.”
Fuck it. “I have an IUD. Sometimes the flow is just heavy. It is what it is. I really need pads or tampons if you have them. Or if you don’t, could someone just get them for me?”
“IUDs usually help with the flow.” He let it go, thank fuck. The IUD was still new, and I’d rather not have that discussion. “I have some. Since I’m here, let’s get you cleaned up then I can look at that wrist and ankle.”
Great, we weren’t doing the physical exam in the kitchen, and I needed to change. I guessed I was going back to my cell after all. When I stood, Kestrel moved the chair, and Vaughn scowled. The pants were sticky. Yeah, I was a mess.
Whatever.
I didn’t ask to be here.
Snagging a bag from the floor, Doc looped the strap over his shoulder and headed out of the kitchen. I was right behind him, violently aware of four sets of eyes drilling into my back. The weird thing in all of that, I’d offered to pay the ransom and they hadn’t even mentioned it.
They were so confusing.
A step next to me had me jerking slightly, and I glanced up to find Jasper moving next to me. Doc didn’t slow until he got to the door I’d snuck out of earlier. The room had lights on, the bed was disheveled, and the comforter on the floor.
With a sigh, I walked into my room behind Doc while Jasper crowded up next to me.
Yay, it was just the three of us.
Chapter 12
Jasper
Doc cut a look in my direction as I closed the door to her room. A quick scan of it showed nothing out of place. After putting her clothes away, we’d removed the bags. She didn’t need to be tripping over them, particularly when her ankle still gave her issues. I’d pulled all the books I’d saved over the years, the ones I would reread in here. We needed to get a television, but we didn’t have anything wired to run something to it.
We would be correcting that this weekend. She needed something more to do in here. Her boredom wasn’t lost on any of us, even if she hadn’t displayed the slightest interest in talking. Vaughn had tried, but then, Vaughn was just thrilled to have her here. Freddie wanted in here, but I’d have to cut his balls off, so better he wasn’t trapped in a room with a bed and her.
Arms folded, I leaned against the door as Doc set his bag on her bed after snapping the comforter up. Too much military was still in that man. I trusted Doc with her health. I didn’t trust him with much else. Not after I’d found him giving her a bath. She’d been naked, vulnerable, and alone with him. Doc might be the closest thing we had to a friend outside of the Vandals, but no way in hell would I trust him with her after pulling shit like that.
He pulled out a couple of Ziploc bags filled with pads. Fuck me, he did actually keep them on him. Scrubbing a hand over my face, I waited for Emersyn to take them and get a change of clothes out before she disappeared into the bathroom. Once we were alone, I opened the door. “You can go now.”
“I haven’t checked her ankle or her wrist.” Doc met my gaze without flinching. The blankness in his stare was a warning. I’d pulled a gun on him, and it broke one of his few rules. The fact he even showed up here had nothing to do with us and everything to do with the woman in that bathroom.
“Doc, she’s not your concern.”
“That’s the problem with you, Hawk. You think you get to dictate what your people think and what they do.” The barest hint of a smirk touched his lips. “You also think I give a shit about what you decide.”
“Doc, you and Raptor go back…”
“We all go back,” Doc reminded me.
“Yeah, we do. Don’t put me in this position.” Because if he kept up this campaign of disrespect, I was going to have to put him in his place. We had enough people who didn’t know Raptor or the history. They would just see Doc, the guy who wasn’t one of us, getting away with not following the rules.
That shit didn’t fly.
It couldn’t.
“You’re the only one putting yourself in that position,” Doc said. Fuck his cool under pressure. “You brought her to me. That makes her my patient and my concern. You’ve been playing this bullshit game of keep away, but Kestrel kept me in the loop.”
The fuck?
“Yeah, he takes her health a little more seriously than your jealousy.”
The door to the bathroom opened, and Doc turned, his expression gentling almost immediately. “Better?”
“Yeah,” she said, folding her arms. The pants she’d had on earlier were in the sink. I frowned, but she rubbed her good hand against her upper arm. “Thank you. I don’t suppose you have extras of the heavier pads?”
“I do,” Doc said. “But I can also get you your own supplies.” He turned back to his bag and pulled out two more sealed baggies. “Do you not want to use the tampons?”
Why the fuck were we having this conversation?
“It’s a little awkward to insert it at the moment and not a good idea on the heavier days.”
But she didn’t miss a beat. Goddamn. It was almost impossible to not like her, even when she got all irritating and standoffish. She was tough as hell.
Tougher than I gave her credit for. Liam wasn’t wrong about her not being a sparrow.
A sparrowhawk?
Much more likely.
Doc lowered his voice. “Well, then I’ll make sure I get you both. Do you have a preferred brand?”
Were they really fucking talking about pads and tampons? I scrubbed a hand over my face. Of all the fucking conversations. She held onto her words, dribbling them out like they were precious gold. But this? This she talked about.
“No,” she answered him, and her gaze cut to me. Those whiskey brown eyes held an almost malicious amusement, and one corner of her mouth curved faintly before it flattened again. She was enjoying this torment. “Beggars can’t be choosers after all, and I doubt prisoners are allowed that much choice either.”
“You’re right,” I said, agreeing with her, and some of the amusement faded. “Good thing you’re neither. Tell the doc what you want. You might as well be comfortable.”
“Comfort on a period isn’t really possible.”
I shrugged. “Then I’ll bring you a bottle of whiskey. I’m sure after a few shots, you’ll be comfortable enough to sleep.”
“Well, don’t go out of your way or anything.”
The bite in her voice made me smile, and that just seemed to piss her off more. “You don’t have to worry about that. I take care of my own.”
Doc snorted softly. “Tell you what, you two lovebirds can go back to swiping at each other in a minute. Let me see that wrist, and I want to check your ribs while I’m here.”
The heat of her glare abandoned me for Doc. Maybe she’d stop thinking he was gonna rescue her or some shit.
“How’s the ankle? You seemed to be walking on it fine.”
“It aches,” she said with a shrug and moved to perch on the bed. “It’s hard to rehab it stuck in this room.”
“I’m going to check your ankle first, that means I’m going to handle your leg and manipulate your foot.” He waited for her nod before he did as he described. Next, he moved to her wrist. Same thing. He told her everything he was going to do before he did it. The splint he’d used was kind of scuzzy looking as he removed it. That irked. If it was in that bad a shape, he should have told us we needed to change it.
“Have you been able to clean the skin here?”
“Didn’t take it off,” she answered
, almost mechanically.
“Flex your hand for me.”
At his order, she opened and closed her fist. If I hadn’t been watching for it, I would have missed the twitch near her eye.
“Painful?” Doc asked.
She shrugged. “I’ve had worse.” Still the flat tone.
“I’m going to put a fresh splint on this, but let’s wash the skin. Then we can check it again in a week or two. I may want to do another set of X-rays in case it’s setting incorrectly.”
The flinch was barely perceptible but there, and it happened when he wasn’t touching her.
“Let me check your ribs first,” Doc said as if she hadn’t reacted to the news her wrist might not be healing the way it should.
“If she needs X-rays to make sure it’s setting correctly, then we should do those now,” I said. Logistically, taking her out of the clubhouse was a bad idea. Her face was on the news, and so was the meat-sack down in the cooler. Though the fact we’d taken all of their things made it look like they’d run off together.
I hated it, but it worked for now.
Doc glanced at me. “We’d have to take her to the clinic.” The reproach in his dark eyes held a warning for me. While he hadn’t commented on her identity, he knew who she was. It was hard to miss. Even without the news showing her face.
“Tonight, after it closes.” If she needed the care, we’d get it for her. We had just taken that haul, once we delivered the stash and picked up the fees, we could cover any extras she might need.
After a moment, Doc gave me a curt nod. “Okay, little bit,” he murmured to Emersyn. That nickname needed to go. He wasn’t going to be spending enough time with her to develop that affection. “I need to check your ribs, so I’m going to start at the bottom and work my way up. Just tell me if you experience even mild discomfort.”
“A little difficult for that right now, Doc,” she told him with the first glimmer of a smile. “I’m nothing but discomfort.”
“Fair enough.”
For the next five minutes, Doc moved his hands up and down her ribs. More than once, his thumbs were awfully close to her breasts, but he kept from actually touching them. That was good, it meant I didn’t have to break his hands. Doctor or not, Doc was pushing it here. She only let out one hissed breath toward the end, and Doc nodded as he backed up.
