“She will.”
Cody didn’t need to look up. He knew who was there. Slade had come by every few hours to check in on things. Cody had some mixed feelings about it. On the one hand, he was mad about the boss’s treatment of Donna. On the other, it had been him, not Cody, who had saved her.
“She will,” Slade repeated. “Donna isn’t one to just give up.”
Cody silently agreed. Even so, she looked so pale lying there against the sheets, her face slack with the deep sleep of the healing. Everything about her had a gray cast, her lips, her cheeks. Her eyelids were so pale that he could see the lines of her veins running through them. Even her hair, usually so bright and vivacious, hung limp and dark around her face. Her hand wasn’t quite warm against his. A large bag of blood was hanging up, flowing down a tube and into her.
“Thanks,” Cody said finally, “for being there.”
Slade shrugged. “It was the least I could do. I owed her that much.”
“Will you tell me what happened?” Cody suddenly asked. So far, he hadn’t asked. What had happened didn’t matter, not until he knew that Donna was going to be okay.
Slade slumped around the side of the hospital room and plopped himself into the remaining chair. He wasn’t wearing his jacket. Cody couldn’t remember the last time he had seen the boss without his president’s patch firmly on display. His tattooed hands were stretched over his denim-clad knees.
“You called me and I put a few things together. I figured that it was Kyle you caught selling. I got mad about it, so I went over to have a talk with Donna.” Slade pulled a pack of gum out of his pocket and popped a piece into his mouth. The scent of mint filled the too-clean air.
Cody snorted. Slade offered Cody the pack, but he shook his head. He didn’t want gum. “What exactly where you going to say?”
Slade shrugged. “Hadn’t quite worked that one out. I was good and angry and wasn’t thinking everything through right then. I just needed to do something.”
Cody knew that feeling well enough. He’d felt it a couple times these past few weeks, and plenty of times before that now that he was thinking about it. “Sure. I get that. What happened?”
Slade lifted one brow at Cody’s sharp tone, but nothing else. “I was coming up the road, and I saw her there. Hard to miss all that red hair, right?” When Cody didn’t answer, Slade continued. “I saw her standing there, had a bag in one hand and nothing else. It didn’t seem right. There was a guy with his arm around her. It didn’t seem right to me. I couldn’t put my hand on it. I mean, Donna’s hot enough to get hit on, but this wasn’t that.”
“What was it?”
“It was intimidation. A bunch of these teenagers gathered around while this one dude hulked over her.”
“What dude?”
“Tall kid, skinny but not scrawny. Loves his peroxide too much. He’s the one that stabbed her.”
Cody jerked his head in Slade’s direction. “Why didn’t you get him?”
Slade snorted. “How? I didn’t have a gun on me. Even if I did, she was taking up a lot more space than the guy was and I don’t have a great shot while riding on a bike. And when they scattered, they moved quick, left her behind. I could have gone after them, but there Donna was… bleeding on the ground.”
Cody felt a sick feeling in his belly. He could picture it. Easy enough since he’d seen the puddle of blood she’d left behind after they’d taken her away. He couldn’t blame Slade’s choice. “I shouldn’t have left her.”
“You were going after Kyle,” Slade said. “Where is the little brat?”
“I don’t know. Not yet. I tried looking for him. I found Donna’s car, but not him.”
Slade made a sound of frustration. “I’ll go look for him.”
“Why?” Cody dropped Donna’s hand and stood up as Slade swung to his feet. “Why are you doing this? You came into my shop and railed on me about helping people who weren’t part of the club. You made a big deal about it, but here you are.”
Slade eyed Cody. “You questioning me?”
Cody moved until he was standing toe to toe with Slade. He wasn’t sure why he was so angry at the man. Slade had been his friend for many years. Not as close as Twitch or Hulk, but still a friend. Anger welled up inside him like a bomb just waiting to explode. “Yeah, I guess I just did.”
“Why don’t you ask me what’s really bugging you.”
The words were spilling out of Cody’s mouth before he realized what they were going to be. “Do you still love her? Do you love my Donna?”
A long silence spilled between the two men. This was too much; it had been too much since the moment that redhead had stepped into his life. He’d never been jealous before, and he didn’t want to be jealous now. Maybe he wouldn’t be if it had been him there to rescue her.
Slade took a deep breath and blew it out slowly. Cody smelled the mint of the gum that the other man was chewing. “Only in the way that you always love the first one. I already told you that I screwed up where she was concerned. I want to make amends.”
Cody swallowed his anger. It wasn’t real. It was lack of sleep and stress. “You think finding Kyle will do that?”
“Don’t you?”
Cody dragged a hand down his face. His head was swirling with emotions that he didn’t want and that he couldn’t name. “Yeah, I do. All right.”
“The club voted. If you want out… you can go. All you gotta do is bleed a little.”
Cody nodded. “I hear you. Go find the kid. Let me know what happens.”
Slade snorted. “Just because you’re out doesn’t mean you can boss me around.”
A moment later Slade was gone and Cody was alone with his own thoughts once more. He wished that Donna was awake. She was easy to talk to. Her ability to pick things apart and lay it all down made short work of understanding things.
“I’m pissed off, Donna.” He plopped himself back down in the seat, surrounded by the almost silence of the hospital. Maybe the fact that she was out cold didn’t really matter. He just started talking, and it all came spilling out. “I’m pissed off at me, I’m pissed off at Slade. Hell, I’m even pissed off at Kyle. I shouldn’t have gotten angry at you. So what if you didn’t want people seeing dirty pictures of us. That’s no big deal. I should be mad at Kyle for taking them, for using them.”
He sighed and leaned forward until his forehead was pillowed on the bit of medical mattress between her hip and the edge of the bed.
“I know I’ve said it before, Donna, but I want to be with you, no matter what it takes. I’ll be your secret lover. You can keep me tied up in a basement if it means I get to be with you.”
It was stupid, but he meant it. He’d almost lost her, and that simply wasn’t going to happen again. Whatever it took to be with her, he meant it.
“Cody?”
Her voice was so weak he almost thought he imagined it. It was a crackle of old paper heard from the distance of a breezy night. Cody looked up, and her eyes were opening. Slowly, as if they had been stuck together, the too-pale lids opened just enough that he could see the misty shade of her eyes.
“Hey you,” he said. “Hey.”
“Where am I?”
She tried to sit up, and he put a hand on her shoulder. “You’re at the hospital. You were stabbed.”
Her eyes flicked back and forth, opening a little wider. “The hospital? Stabbed?”
“You don’t remember?”
She lifted one arm, pausing when she saw the tubes coming from it. She made a sound of disgust and let her arm fall back down. The heart rate on the monitor dangling behind the bed gave a blip. “I think so. I… I was getting tacos.” Slowly she cobbled together a story similar to what Slade had told him. Teenagers, a guy with fake pale hair, and the stabbing. When she got to the end of it, she asked, “Where is Kyle?”
“We don’t know. We have your car. It’s parked back at the apartment, but Kyle wasn’t in it, and he hasn’t come home.”
S
he sat up, her hand going to the wrapped wound at her side. “Something’s not right. They were looking for Kyle, I think… Cody, I think he was the one who was supposed to get stabbed.”
“What?”
“The guy, the tall one? He was looking for Kyle. He said he wanted the money… or something. I can’t remember it all clearly, but he didn’t come to the apartment looking for me. Becky was there—Rebecca, that girl that Kyle likes. She… she didn’t like what happened. I could tell.”
“Why?” Cody stood up, running a hand over the arm that wasn’t stuck with a great big needle. Her skin was warmer now than it had been. Maybe pumping her full of blood had been helping, or maybe she was just mad. Chances were it was both. “Why would she care?”
“I don’t know, Cody. I don’t know much, but I think that Kyle’s in trouble.”
She started to swing her legs over the side of the bed. He put his hand on her shoulder and held it as tight as he dared. “What the hell are you doing?”
“I’m going to find a nurse, and I’m going to get myself checked out of here.”
“Are you serious? Woman, you were stabbed.”
“How long have I been here?” she demanded.
Cody hesitated to answer. When she turned her eyes on him, they were cold and serious. “You’ve been out for two days.”
“Good enough.” Her legs were almost steady when she stood up. “I’m not going to just lie here, Cody. Something is wrong and I don’t like it. I’ve got to do something. You can help or you can get out of my way.”
He kissed her. She made a small sound of surprise, but she didn’t pull away. Her lips moved under his. Hands, firm but feminine, clutched at his back. His body sprang to life, and it was all he could do not to push her back against the mattress and remind them both that she was still alive.
“I love it when you get all commanding,” he teased.
Her lips spread into a grin, and she gave him a short playful shove. “Shut up.”
He laughed and hugged her close. “I love you, Donna Mason.”
For a moment, her face went completely and totally blank. Her eyes were flat and emotionless. He found himself wondering if what he’d said was wrong, or if he shouldn’t have said it at all. Then she leaned forward and put her cool cheek to his chest. “I love you too, Cody Bannik. Now help me find my brother.”
He stood there with his arms around her. He wanted to argue with her, to tell her that she needed more rest, that she was injured and he could go out and look for Kyle now that he knew she was going to be okay. Hell, now that he knew she loved him too, he was sure that he could do just about anything.
“Tell me again, tell me about the kids, this blond-haired guy.”
She did. She sat down on the edge of the bed and told him everything she could remember. An idea formed in Cody’s head, but he didn’t want to interrupt until Donna was done talking. “There’s a group of kids, they make a nuisance of themselves sometimes. Breaking windows and tagging buildings, like we saw Kyle doing that night? I’ve never seen a blond guy with them, but if he’s trying to build himself up he might just send them out.”
She blinked up at him. “You lost me.”
“I think someone is trying to build a gang in the White Tiger territory. I think Kyle got mixed up with it.”
“But how?”
Cody shrugged. “Usually it’s blackmail, or getting others hooked on drugs so that they have to be a part of the group. It’s… well, it’s not like a MC.”
“So, what do we do?”
“We go find them. And we handle this.”
She reached behind her and hit the nurse call button. “Okay.”
“Donna, are you sure about this?” he asked, already pulling the phone out of his pocket. “I’m not sure that you understand what I’m saying here.”
“Well, I don’t think you’re about to call the cops.” She gave his phone a look. “Am I right?”
“Well… yes.”
“You’re going to call your buddies. You are going to tell them what’s up and what you know, and then, as motorcycle clubs are prone to do, what follows after that won’t be altogether lawful.”
“And you’re okay with that?”
She leveled her gaze at him. “It’s my brother, Cody.”
Chapter Twenty
Donna
There was a gun holster over her shoulder, perched under the black leather jacket that Cody had lent her. It had been a very long time since she had shot a weapon, but it wasn’t a skill that the body just forgot. She had her arms wrapped around his middle as the bike shifted gears beneath them both. Logically she knew she ought to be back in bed and resting. The doctor had made it very clear that she had lost a great deal of blood and that it had only been luck that kept the knife from hitting anything vital. He had also made it clear that Donna should not be up and around; he’d made her sign a whole slew of forms.
The doctor had probably been right. Her entire side hurt. Twisting sucked. Breathing was something she’d rather not be doing, but none of that mattered. All that mattered was finding her brother and putting an end to whatever hold this group had over him. Whatever it was, she was going to fix it.
The doctor had taken so long that the better part of a day had been wasted. It was going on ten thirty, and the night had long since set on Carson. A bright moon was shining down, turning the road into a line of smoky silver. Her heart was pounding in her chest.
Cody said he had a clue about where the kids were going to be tonight. He wanted to go there, scare them a little. Nothing bad. It seemed like a good idea to Donna. For all they were doing stupid things, they were still kids.
“Do we have to be nice to Blondie?” she had asked. “Because I don’t much like him anymore.”
Cody had promised her that they wouldn’t be that nice to the man who had stabbed her. Good. She didn’t feel like being magnanimous. She felt like kicking butt. That man had stabbed her; he had made her feel weak and useless, and she wasn’t a fan of either of those feelings. She didn’t like that she had lost two days of her life and now she was going out into the night to break the law.
It took her a moment to realize where he was taking her: the long road down toward the overpass, where Kyle had been caught tagging property, where Cody and she had shared their first kiss. The lights were bright enough to block out the moon and illuminate the group that was hanging out beneath the slabs of formed concrete. She couldn’t make out faces, but she knew that this was the same group that had accosted her a few nights before. Would Kyle be there?
With expert movements, Cody brought his bike around and parked it to one side of the pass, tucked up against the pile of earth pockmarked with grass.
“You all right?” he asked as the engine shuddered to a halt.
“Yeah,” she said, looking around at the empty lot behind them. “I didn’t know it was going to be just us though.”
He bent down and kissed her on the brow. “We’ve got this.”
She looked up into his eyes and found strength there. It radiated around her until she felt like she could drown in it. She wrapped her arms around him, feeling the outline of the guns that he was packing. “Yeah,” she said. “We do.”
“What’s this, what’s this?” an all too familiar voice called out. Donna didn’t need to look over Cody’s shoulder to know that the tall man was sauntering over to them. She could hear his strange rhythmic steps. “We’ve got company.”
Donna clutched his shoulder. Memories of blood dripping off her shirt and onto the ground came flooding back to her with enough force to take the strength from her legs. Cody’s arm tightened around her back, mindful of her wound.
“We’ve got this,” he repeated. His voice was firm and certain.
She swallowed hard, shoving the memories to the back of her mind, unwilling to look anymore into them. This mattered more. She cleared her throat and stepped away from Cody, hoping the certainty she felt showed in her eyes. His hand reached u
p to touch her face, touching it gently. She kissed his palm and stepped around the barricade of his body.
“Where is my brother?” Donna was happy to discover that her voice was smooth. It was boardroom confident and carried across the empty lot and echoed beneath the overpass.
“It’s the mouthy bitch,” the blond man said with some surprise. “Wow, didn’t expect you to be up so quickly.”
There was a familiar titter of laughter from the group of teens behind him. Donna was dimly aware of the way they were whispering to one another. They looked so young. Donna felt a mix of pity and contempt.
“Shut your mouth,” Cody said, leveling a gun at the other man, “and answer the lady’s question.”
BARE SKIN: A Dark Bad Boy Romance Page 50
