CHAPTER ELEVEN
The rains had cleared from the night before, but it was still overcast again at five-thirty in the evening as he pulled into the parking lot of the Beverly Belle motel. Passing by the lobby entrance to get to the rooms around back, he thought about when LaTisha fainted and how his heart nearly skipped a beat. He knew anybody watching would have thought she actually was his daughter the way he rushed to her aid. Which only begged the question again and again: what was he doing? When he did bother to spend the night with a woman, she was always around his age. But this girl wasn’t even thirty yet. Had nothing in common with him. Had, in fact, been before him in a court of law. What on earth was he doing???
But whatever it was, he couldn’t seem to stop himself from getting in deeper and deeper with this one particular woman. Now he was worried that she was discharged too soon and wouldn’t have anybody to look after her. Why was that his business? He did all he could for her, why didn’t he just leave it the hell alone? He certainly didn’t want a relationship with her. That would be ridiculous. Love hurt too much for him to ever go down that road again, and with somebody not even thirty yet.
But then what was it if not a relationship? If not love? What was it then? Concern? Common curtesy? Decency? He didn’t know. His goal was a simple one yet again: make sure she was doing okay, and then get the hell out.
But that was complicated as soon as he drove around back and saw her motel room number. Because as soon as he drove back there, he also saw a muscular white guy slamming his body against her motel room door that easily gave way, and he was able to run inside.
If her fainting caused JJ’s heart to nearly skip a beat, it skipped several beats when he saw that man gain entrance. And he slammed his car on brakes in the middle of the parking lot, hopped out so fast he nearly fell, and ran to her room as fast as he could run.
Inside that motel room, Tish was running for the bathroom, slamming the door behind her as her front door gave way and Knuckles rammed his big body inside. As soon as he ran in, already limping and in pain from the exertion it took for him to break in, he saw that bathroom door slam shut. He ran in that direction.
But if he thought Tish was running in that bathroom just to get away from him, that notion was quickly dispelled when she was the one to open the bathroom door again. Only she came out with the curtain rod in her hand and was slinging it like a sword. He was trying to grab it from her, but she was hitting him on his bad leg and on his head, in his face, and anywhere away from his outreached hands.
But when he did manage to run up on her and grab hold of that rod, with both of them falling to the floor with a hard thump, fear gripped her even more as she tried with all she had to keep control. But he was way too powerful and easily took that rod from out of her possession. And just as he had raised it to start beating the crap out of her, JJ came running into the room and grabbed that rod from Knuckles as easily as Knuckles had grabbed it from Tish.
Then JJ tossed that rod aside, grabbed the assailant off of Tish by pulling him from the back of his shirt, and began beating him down to the floor again with his fists.
And although Tish was relieved beyond measure that JJ was there, she didn’t hesitate. She ran to the motel room phone and called 911. Then she ran and grabbed that rod again and held it like a baseball player at home plate ready to swing a homerun on his ass should he overwhelm JJ.
But that wasn’t possible, she quicky realized, as JJ was far more muscular than the assailant and healthier too. He beat him down and then subdued him in a headlock easily. It felt wonderful to Tish to have a man’s man in her corner. Somebody who not only was willing to look out for her, which was rare enough, but he also knew how to take care of business. He didn’t need her to stand over them with a rod at the ready. He knew how to roll.
That was why she leaned against the wall. Fear had been her adrenalin when she realized somebody was trying to force open her door. But now it was her enemy and was crashing down on her like a bad hangover.