Chapter 55
“Show me your hands or I shoot!”
Angie really wanted to show him her hands.
But she couldn’t move them out from under her without agony shooting up her side.
What had she been thinking?
Had she really imagined that it would be easy to escape Jared’s property? If she’d taken a moment to just think, she’d have realized that she needed an exit plan.
A strategy.
But she’d been acting on emotion not rational thought. She’d just wanted to get out and away from them.
She’d thought they wanted her.
Stupid, foolish Angie.
Nobody wants you. Nobody will ever love you.
You’re not lovable. You’re someone to be used.
A part of her knew she wasn’t exactly being fair. That they still wanted to protect her. Which was more than a lot of people had done.
But she could go back to Keira and have protection.
What she needed was to be desired, to be craved, to be wanted for who she was.
Who was yelling at her?
Was it the guy who’d murdered Rex?
No. Wait. That was dumb. If this guy was Beltran he’d have just shot her, right? There wouldn’t have been any warnings.
But that didn’t change the fact that this guy was about to shoot her because she couldn’t move her arms.
“I . . . I can’t,” she managed to get out.
Her side burned. It felt like she’d torn it open as she’d fallen off the fence. There must have been something sharp on the ground.
“Patrick!” a sharp voice said.
Relief filled her.
Because even though he didn’t want her like she did him, she knew that Jared would keep her safe.
“Boss? Careful, there’s been a breach. Found this one lying on the ground after throwing herself at the fence.”
“It’s all right, Patrick,” North told him. “She’s not a threat. We’ll take care of her. Although you need to keep her presence quiet. For security reasons.”
“Um, sure. If you’re certain. Do you want my help transporting her?”
“No, we have this,” Jared replied. “Thanks, man.”
“All good.”
And then she felt someone crouch next to her.
“Oh, baby girl,” Jared murmured. “What happened?”
“I assume she fell while trying to scale the fence,” North said.
“I guessed that,” Jared said. “But what hurts? Can you tell me?”
“I . . . I . . .” She couldn’t talk for some reason. The air just wouldn’t come.
“What do you want to do?” North asked as Jared started to gently run his hands over her.
“Get the doctor to meet us at the house,” Jared ordered. “Hopefully she doesn’t need the hospital. It would be risky to transport her.”
Because of Beltran?
“I’m going to roll you carefully, baby girl,” Jared told her.
Wait! No!
A cry of pain erupted from her.
“Fuck. Fuck!” Jared said. “North?”
“I’ve got the doctor enroute,” North said, crouching on her other side. “Where is the pain?”
“Mostly on . . . my right . . . side,” she managed to get out.
North lifted her shirt on the right side. “She’s bleeding.”
He suddenly stripped off his shirt and wadded it up before pressing it to the side of her stomach.
“I think we’re going to have to go to the hospital,” North said.
“Make it happen,” Jared told him.
Oh. Goody.
Angie woke up groggily, staring around.
Where was she?
In her room at Jared’s house? At Zander’s compound? Maybe in her small house that she’d had for such a short time?
No. This place smelled funny. And there was a strange beeping.
“Baby girl? Hey, it’s all right. You’re okay.”
She blinked as she stared up into Jared’s blurry face. What was going on?
“Where . . . where am I?”
“In the hospital,” North replied, coming up on her other side.
Her vision was starting to improve.
“Wh-why?” she croaked.
She really needed a drink of water. Suddenly, Jared held a straw to her mouth.
He was so good at figuring out what she needed. She wasn’t sure if that was because he was a Daddy Dom or not.
But she drunk some water and tried to figure out what had happened.
Why would she be in the hospital? And why did she feel so awful?
Well, she guessed they both went hand-in-hand, didn’t they?
“What happened?”
“You don’t remember?” North asked. “The doctor never said that you had a head injury.”
Head injury?
“You fell, baby girl,” Jared said, taking hold of her hand. “You’re cold. North, she needs some more blankets.”
“On it,” North said.
“They should keep the hospital warmer,” Jared said with a frown. “It’s unacceptable that you are cold.”
“I will speak to the administration,” North said as he returned with armfuls of blankets. They proceeded to absolutely cover her in blankets until she couldn’t breathe.
“Um, I . . . it’s too much . . . too much . . .” she said, her voice edged with panic.
She knew it was silly to panic over blankets, but she couldn’t seem to push them off. One of her hands wasn’t working properly.
Well, it worked, but each time she tried to lift her arm, pain slashed down her side.
“Shit, she’s panicking,” Jared said, pulling some blankets off.
Okay, that was better. Immediately, she could breathe easier.
“Fuck, sorry, baby. Didn’t mean to scare you.”
“My arm . . . it hurts to move it,” she said, feeling breathless.
“Then you shouldn’t move it,” North told her.
Right. Of course she shouldn’t. As usual, North was right.
“You have several stitches in your side,” North told her.
“There was obviously something sharp that you scraped your side on. There is also bruising on your side, your upper arm, shoulder and hip. We had to bring you to the hospital because of the blood loss and the risk of infection. The doctor didn’t give you a blood transfusion, but you are on fluids to rehydrate you.
Thankfully, whatever scraped your side didn’t penetrate too deeply or hit anything vital. ”
North spoke matter-of-factly. But there was something tense about the way that he held himself.
Was he mad at her?
Why had she been trying to climb the wall?
It started coming back to her as she took a moment to think. The conversation she’d overheard.
The way she’d reacted.
Fuck.
Why had she run like that? She should have stayed. Should have talked to them. But she’d been worried that she wouldn’t like what they said.
And that they wouldn’t let her leave, no matter what her wishes were. That she’d learn the truth.
That they didn’t want her.
“Why did you try to leave, baby girl?” Jared asked. “Did something happen? And if it did, why didn’t you talk to us about it?”
“Obviously, it’s something we did,” North said. “So what was it?”
“I . . . I . . .” Shit.
“Tell us the truth,” Jared told her sternly. That softness in his voice was gone.
The Lord of the Manor was back.
He really wasn’t going to like what she had to say.
“I overheard you both in Jared’s office,” she blurted out.
God, she was so tired.
She wasn’t sure she had the energy or stamina for this.
“What did you overhear?” North asked.
“That you know who killed Rex and delivered his head to the house,” she said. “That you think that I might be at risk because I’m living here as well. And that the only reason you wanted me to stay was to keep me safe from this Beltran!”
There was silence and she stared from one to the other, then both of them glanced down at her.
Holy. Moly.
It would take a stronger woman than her not to be affected by twin glares.
“So you were eavesdropping,” Jared said in a cold voice that made her heart race.
“And you overheard half of a conversation and filled in the blanks,” North added.
“Well, I heard enough!”
“Enough that you thought you needed to run?” Jared whispered.
“That you could leave without a word? What if we were only keeping you at the house to keep you safe from Beltran? Don’t you think it was extra foolish to leave the house alone?
Without telling anyone what you were doing or where you were going? ”
“I didn’t think you would let me leave,” she said in a quiet voice.
“Of course we wouldn’t have!” Jared told her sharply. “Because it’s dangerous out there. Someone is cutting off the heads of people close to me and you thought it would be smart to go out without a guard. Were you wanting him to get to you?”
“Heads?” she asked. “There’s only one head, right?”
Jared stared down at her for a long moment. “We got word soon after we got to the hospital that another box appeared at the front gate.”
“Oh my God.” She was going to vomit.
“Thankfully, the head was fresh,” North said.
“How is that good?” she asked.
North raised an eyebrow at her. As though it was obvious.
“Well, it means that he was killed fairly recently. Which means that Beltran was busy and not looking for you. Or his hitman. I don’t think he’d do his dirty work himself.
I’m trying to figure out whose MO it is to cut off heads and send them in boxes. ”
“I don’t feel so good.” The memory of Rex’s head filled her mind.
She wasn’t sure she could deal with knowing who had lost their life this time.
“Here, baby girl,” Jared held the straw to her mouth again, raising the back of the bed so she was sitting up slightly.
Pain shot through her and she had to take some deep breaths before taking a couple of sips of water.
“Fuck, sorry, baby girl. Are you better now?”
“I, um, well, the need to vomit is gone. Who was it?”
“It was Antony,” North said. “Curious choice when he was already flagged for death.”
“But Beltran didn’t know that,” Jared replied as he arranged some pillows behind her.
She hid her wince of pain.
God, she hated to think how she’d feel without all of these drugs being pumped into her.
“No, I suppose not. But why him? Why not one of the guards at the house? The killer obviously knows where you live.”
“My guess is it was because Antony was on his own somewhere, same as Rex,” Jared said. “Less risk of getting caught for the same impact. Maybe they saw him coming and going from the house the other day. We need to tighten security everywhere in the family. Especially around the women and children.”
“Already on it.” North peered down at her. “And what about our woman? What are we going to do to ensure she doesn’t run from us again?”
Our woman?