Chapter 11
Chapter
Eleven
ZOE
Idress in a shimmery topaz blouse and taupe skirt, asking myself what I’m doing. I’m crushing on C so hard right now, when I know I should be running away. Fast and far.
A man like Connor McCann has expectations, and they’ll only get worse the deeper I get.
I have plans for my life that are nonnegotiable.
Not that he negotiates. I touch my ass gingerly.
It’s sore in a way that causes my pussy to throb, but my body is an instrument.
Expecting to spank me for displeasing him is just one more way that our lifestyles probably aren’t well suited.
I shouldn’t be wearing thousand-dollar outfits he’s bought for me. I can’t let myself get caught up in his world, no matter how much I love the way he makes me feel.
When I emerge from the bedroom, he’s pacing with a frown on his face and his phone to his ear.
“It’s his choice. I’ve gotta go.” He ends the call. The phone rings immediately, and he shoves it into his pocket, scowling.
“What was that about?”
He shakes his head.
The phone vibrates in his pocket. He looks like he’s barely keeping his emotions under wraps.
“Are you all right?”
The phone rings again, and he grits his teeth. He pulls it out and swipes the screen. I can hear a woman’s hysterical voice. C listens, saying nothing. The voice continues for several moments, begging him for something.
When there is finally a pause on the other end, he says, “I told you I’ll send someone.”
A fresh round of crying pleas begins.
“I have to go,” he says and ends the call. He shoves the phone into his pocket.
I go to the suite’s kitchen and take a lime from a basket of fruit. I slice it and make him a Jack and Coke. The ice swirls against the sides of the glass when I stir it. I cross the room and hold the glass out.
“Thanks,” he murmurs.
He turns to the window as he takes a drink. I slide my arms around him from behind and rest my cheek against his shoulder.
“Heavy is the head that wears the crown,” I whisper, then fall silent again.
After a few moments, he sighs and holds the glass over his shoulder.
I take a couple of small sips.
“My guy who was wounded in the van robbery? His wife is losing it. He’s taking pain pills and is unsteady on his feet. He took a tumble getting out the shower. Twisted his ankle. She wants him to go to an emergency room. He says no. She wants me to order him to go.”
“Did you talk to him?”
“No, she doesn’t want him to know she called me.
So I’m supposed to pretend to be calling to check on him about the gunshot wound.
He’ll know that’s bullshit. Plus, I don’t lie to my guys.
We have to be able to trust them, and that means they have to be able to trust us too.
I might hold things back that are none of their business, but I’m not going to outright bullshit them. ”
“Is he a pretty reasonable guy? If he needed to go to the hospital, would he?”
He’s silent.
“No, then?” I ask softly.
“He wouldn’t go for the gunshot wound. Hospitals have to report that to the cops. But for a regular twisted ankle he could go if he thinks he needs it. He obviously doesn’t.”
“Is his wife the hysterical type usually?”
“I don’t know her. Only met her when I went to see him after he was shot. She was calmer over that.”
I’m silent a moment, thinking back. My dad was a tough man. My mom had to convince him to go the hospital when he had left arm pain. It turned out to be a heart attack. He lived because of her.
“What if we went to see them?” I say.
He turns. “We?” he asks, looking at me.
“My people are theater people. Hysteria doesn’t freak me out.”
“We’d have to drive back,” he says with a question in the inflection.
I shrug. “I don’t mind.”
He doesn’t hesitate. “Yeah, let’s go.”
CONNOR
I do not want to deal with the noise from Little Joe’s hysterical wife. I’m tense as I knock on the door to their apartment. I can hear a baby crying.
His wife, Manda, has dirty blonde hair that’s greasy and falling from a clip. She looks wrecked compared to the other times I’ve seen her.
“Mr. McCann,” she says, shocked. “Oh, my God, thank you.” Then she bursts into tears.
Zoe pushes into the apartment. “Hi, Manda. I’m Zoe, a friend of C’s.” Zoe wraps an arm around the girl’s shoulders. “Let’s go get some water.”
“Cecile’s cryin’,” she mumbles.
“Can I get her?” Zoe says, practically pushing Manda into a kitchen chair.
“I’ll get her,” she says in a calming, but firm voice.
She squats down in front of Manda’s knees.
“Don’t let her see you cry though. It’ll scare her.
Take a deep breath. Deep breath. Good. Just like that.
A couple more. I’ll be right back.” Zoe strides past me.
“Where’s Joe?” I ask.
“Bedroom,” Manda says, wiping her eyes and pointing.
I go to the door and knock a couple of times. There’s no answer, so I finally just push the door open. I don’t like strutting into a guy’s bedroom without an invite, but I’ve come to see him and I’m going to. The air’s stale and musty. I flick on a light, and it’s already no good.
Little Joe’s a skinny guy normally, but he looks like he’s lost ten pounds in a few days.
His ribs stick out like he’s been through a famine.
He’s wearing gray boxers, and his head’s on a damp towel.
The pillows and part of the sheets are bunched up against the headboard, like he’s been fighting demons in his sleep.
The bandage around his thigh where the gunshot wound is dry at least, not saturated with blood.
The ankle though is bad. It’s swollen and purple, the foot’s ballooned too.
The skin on one side of the ankle is stretched tight, like white knuckles.
The baby’s crying stops, which is a relief. I don’t get how he’s sleeping through the noise in his place and the pain in his leg that’s now doubly wounded.
“That’s broken,” Zoe says softly.
I glance over to the doorway where she’s standing and nod.
“The bone’s trying to push through the skin. The skin will die if the bone’s not straightened right away. It happened to someone I know. He didn’t have insurance, so he waited too long,” she says.
I lean over and give Little Joe a hard shake.
When he recognizes me, he tries to straighten up, but he can’t manage it. He grabs his leg and groans. His words are slurred and confused. He’s clearly doped up on pain pills. No wonder he fell.
I stalk to the dresser and dig through the drawers until I find a pair of sweats.
“I’ve got this. Tell her if she wants to come, get dressed.
Or if she doesn’t want to bring that baby to the hospital, they can stay here, and we’ll call her from the ER.
And tell her not to worry about the money. C Crue will cover this bill.”
I get Joe dressed and come up with a cover story for the thigh wound. I drag him over my shoulder in a fireman’s carry and take him out to the Rover. The cold air sobers him some. His eyes are a little more focused when I strap him in his seat.
Zoe, to her credit, opens and closes doors, but is otherwise silent. When we’re strapped in to the front seats, I exhale my frustration.
“She didn’t say he was out of his mind on narcs,” I say, shaking my head.
“She was out of her mind with worry and terrified of calling you,” she says.
“I think he didn’t want to go to the hospital because he thought they might see the thigh wound.
She was afraid you’d say he couldn’t go to a hospital period because that’s what he’d said.
But she couldn’t even get him up after he fell.
He crawled to the bedroom, screaming from the pain in his ankle.
It took almost thirty minutes to get him into the bed.
She didn’t know how she would even get him back to the bathroom when he needed to go. ”
“Fuck,” I say, feeling guilty. I’d never imagined that Little Joe wouldn’t at least call to say he needed a hand at his place.
There are plenty of guys I could’ve sent over.
Any of them could’ve gotten him in his damn bed and then sent me a picture of his ankle and asked for orders.
“My people shouldn’t act like they’re on their own. We call it a Crue for a reason.”
“They’ll know now,” Zoe says. “You’ve shown them.”
My gaze slides to her. She’s taken no credit for getting us here. No credit for calming his wife and toddler. No credit for her patience in going on this ride-along to a hospital for a stranger.
I’m sure now that she wasn’t involved on any level in the hit on the van.
She didn’t hesitate an instant in going to the home of the guy who got shot in that robbery.
She didn’t flinch when she held his crying wife or saw what a healthy twenty-four-year-old man had been reduced to from being shot during that robbery. No one’s that good of an actress.
“Z?”
“Yes?” she asks, turning her head.
“Thank you.”
She smiles. “I didn’t do much, Connor.”
“Yeah, you did.”
I know now what I’ve sensed all along. She’s the woman for me.