Laughing, she pushes me back until I lie flat. She maneuvers around my head and pulls it into her lap so I look at her upside down. “Want me to pour some peroxide onto your face? Payback for how youhelpedme.”
“No.” I’m not a soft man. Not an easy man. And I’m not a man accustomed to pouting, but that’s what I do when this teasing girl smiles down at me in nothing more than a towel and a halo of light framing her face. “No peroxide. I’m feeling a little tender right now. That Russian beat me to shit.”
“I’ll be gentle.” Bringing two fingers to my brow, she smooths out a long wrinkle that’s been lining my face since before high school graduation. “I promise to be gentle. You were very kind to me the other night. And since I don’t intend to be in debt to anyone with ties to the mafia – seeing as how it wouldn’t be good for my health – I’ll repay my debt, and I won’t even use needles.”
She thinks she knows everything about me. She thinks she’s got it all figured out.
“No stitches?”
“No. I’d have no clue what I’m doing, but I promise I’ll buy a medical textbook when I go to the store next. I’ll shove it under my pillow and get rich with knowledge.” Gently, so very carefully, she brings the wipe to my lip and works to clean me up. “Or I could call my brother. You wanna lay your head in his lap? He kinda looks like me, so it wouldn’t be so weird…”
“Fuck no.” I hiss at the sting in my lip and glare when she grins at my pain. Bringing my arms back to circle her hips, I hold her close. I shouldn’t hold her. I promised I wouldn’t touch. But I can’t help myself. “No, I don’t wanna put my head in your brother’s lap, Jessica. Freak.”
Laughing, she leans in close enough her sweet breath fans my cheek. “I could call Kari. But if you put your head in her lap, my brother will probably get mad. Next time you need real medical care, he might put peroxide into your IV. He’s petty like that.”
“I don’t wanna put my head in her lap, either.”
Just yours.
“I’d probably get mad, too, to be honest.” Like her quiet confession annoys her, she frowns as she works on my face.
“You’d get mad if I put my head in your friend’s lap?”
Her towel covered breasts rest against the top of my head as she hunches in close to work. “Yeah. You’re a criminal. You’re probably gonna be in prison before our next birthday.AndI probably shouldn’t even bother sitting the bar, since I’ll just have to hand my license straight back; what, with the whole harboring a criminal, perversion of justice, keeping pertinent information from the police about a man who died tonight. But I still get this proprietary feeling, ya know? I don’t get it.”
I get it.
“Anyway.” I grunt with pain when she gives a jerky shrug and bumps my lip. “You don’t want my brother. You don’t want Kari. So, you’re stuck with me and my pillow theory. I’ll use some of those Band-Aid stitches if you think we need them.” She leans closer, so close her chin almost touches my brow. “I think it’s okay. The lip is split through, but I don’t think there’s anything you can do with it but let it heal. But I’ll show you once it’s clean. You can decide.”
“So you think your theory really works? You think you’re onto something really smart?”
She cups my jaw with one hand, absentmindedly brushing her thumb over my cheek, and runs the wipe over my lip with the other. “My theory won’t cost you a thing. It doesn’t hurt to try. And then there’s the whole Babysitter’s Club miracle. It was more amazing than that virgin mother story. So, who knows.”
“Iknow.” I wait for her eyes to meet mine. “Your plan issoflawed and full of holes, dog shit leaks through and stains your expensive shoes.”
“Not true,” she snaps. “You’re just jealous you didn’t think of it first. One day, they’ll label it something. Like how Marie Curie got a name for her research in radioactive science, I’ll become somebody for this. The Jess Lenaghan Dream Theory.”
If you say so, pretty girl.
She brings a fresh wipe up to my eye and sighs. I squeeze her hips just to remind us both I’m touching her, that she trusts me to hold her; thatItrust me to hold her.
“Why are you here, Jess?”
Pausing, she studies my swollen eye. “You brought me here. Youliterallycarried me here.”
“But why were you at the club? I told you to stay away. It’s dangerous. Surely, you must believe me now.”
“I do believe you.” With new tears in her eyes, her back arches to escape me when my finger strokes her hip.Hands off.“I went there searching for you. And it was working great. I had my phone up and pretended I was talking to you, I said your name a bunch of times, which worked. People stayed away. I went inside and looked around. I found…” She bites her lip. “I found rooms that people were… well…” She clears her throat. “They were having sex. They were doing things – with ropes, and chains – all sorts of stuff. People were standing outside the room, watching, but I didn’t see anywhere you have to pay to watch.” Searching the bed for the ointment I used on her, she unscrews the cap and takes a little onto her finger. “Someone asked me if I wanted to move to a room of our own. I said no and kept moving into the club. Then I found you.”
Shoot first. Deal with the mess later.
“Who spoke to you, Jess? Who asked you to go to a room?”
She shrugs. Leaning back over my face, she slides a gentle finger along my lip. “I don’t know. I didn’t stick around to chat, I just left. Didn’t see him again. I walked into the main room, and it was kind of exciting, because you were on top. You were winning.” She swallows. “But then you weren’t. And when he hit you that last time, it scared me. So I followed you outside. You know the rest.”
“Why were you there, Jess? Why were you looking for me?”
She runs an angry finger over my swollen lip until my toes curl. “Because I still have a job to do and men to build a case against. Seven years of school, a shit ton of school tuition, six months of cramming for my upcoming exam, and several more months to go. I’ve worked hard to become a lawyer – to become thebestlawyer – which means following youismy job. My boss is trying to take Abel down, and it’s really shitty luck that youare you, because I kinda like you. But you’re on the wrong side of the law.”
I open my mouth to respond, but she cuts me off. “It sucks you’re the bad guy, Kane. I want you to be the good guy. I want freedom for you. But you make it so I have to choose between right and wrong. I was raised to know right is right and the law is the law. There’s no gray area.”
“There’s always a gray area, Blondie.” I push her hand away and turn to sit on my haunches. From lookingdowninto my eyes, to now arching her neck back, Jess watches me take her hand and hunch my shoulders to minimize my size. “There’s always a gray area. You don’t see it yet. Hopefully you’ll never see it. If we’re lucky, you’ll meet a real estate agent soon and marry up and be safe.”
“Marry a real estate agent?” She snaps her hand from mine. “You’re arranging my marriage like I’m worth a goat?”
“You’re worth a hell of a lot more than a goat. And trust me, it makes my dick soft to think of you and that real estate agent together, but I’m trying to save your life, Blondie.”