Chapter 23
Chapter Twenty-Three
Dragon
The Uber driver drops me off at the hospital, and I rush into the ER.
“Diana Steel?” I say to the receptionist on duty.
“Are you family?”
“I’m a…friend. She asked me to meet her here.”
The volunteer nods and types on her computer. “Looks like she’s about ready to be released. She should be out in a moment.”
“Is she all right?”
“She’ll be able to tell you everything, sir.”
I roll my eyes. “Fine.”
What is Diana going to do when I tell her I need ten grand to wire to Malcolm Osborne?
Damn.
All this time…
Griffin might have been right under our nose.
And now she’s with some cult.
I’ve got to rescue her. Her and her daughter.
Then I’ll make sure Malcolm Osborne spends the rest of his life behind bars.
A few moments later, a nurse brings Diana out in a wheelchair. On her left ankle is a boot.
I rush to her. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I got pretty lucky.” She winces slightly. “My pain is quite a bit relieved, and the X-ray and MRI only showed a little bit of inflammation. No actual fracture or sprain.”
“She should be able to walk,” the nurse says. “But I wouldn’t suggest doing any hiking or marathons. For the rest of the day, she should rest with the foot elevated. Tomorrow she can bear weight as necessary as long as it’s not too painful.”
I nod as I’m overwhelmed with a sense of duty and protectiveness.
I want to take care of Diana. Me. Dragon Locke, who has no more than a few bucks to his name. Whose own parents thought the worst of him when he was a mere child.
Who’s done some very bad things.
I’m living in Diana’s penthouse, driving her car, staying in a luxury hotel that she’s paying for.
But I want to take care of her .
God help me.
“Can you walk now?” I ask.
“Like I said, she should stay off her feet for the rest of the day,” the nurse answers for her. “She’s got a prescription dose of ibuprofen.”
“All right.”
I silently thank God that they didn’t give her any narcotics for pain. I’ve been sober since I fell off the wagon in London, but being around pills is never a good idea.
“I’m fine,” Diana says. “It hurt like hell when it happened, but it’s not bad now. After a day or two, I’ll be fine.”
I won’t take the time to remind her that I need to be home by tomorrow evening to begin my job teaching percussion at Antonio Carbone’s music store.
Oh, and I also need ten grand.
“I’ll wheel her out to your vehicle.” The nurse scratches her head. “Or you can bring it up. That will make it easier for everyone.”
“I came in a rideshare,” I say. “I’ll have to call another.”
“Oh.” The nurse scratches her head again. “I can’t release her to a rideshare.”
“You’re releasing her to me.” I sigh.
“Really, it’s okay,” Diana says. “I took our one vehicle to the place where I fell. Dragon had no other way to get here.”
“Dragon?” she asks.
“That’s my name,” I say, my tone a little harsher than I mean it to be. “I’m going to call a rideshare. I would’ve had him wait, but I didn’t know she was ready.”
I pull up my phone and order a rideshare on the app.
“There’s somebody only three minutes away. You don’t have to wait out here with us,” I say. “We’ll be fine.”
“I need to wait until she’s safely in a car,” the nurse says.
“Really, it’s okay,” Diana says again.
“Those are hospital rules, I’m afraid.” She smiles. “I don’t mind.”
But I do. I don’t say the words. I’d like to talk to Diana. Find out why the hell she was at my mother’s trailer. Find out what they talked about, if anything. I won’t be able to do that in the car if another person is driving us. This is my only chance to talk to her privately, at least for the next half hour or so.
“Are you sure you’re okay?” I ask her.
She lets out a light laugh and nods. “Yes. I’m going to be fine. I promise. But your mother’s going to have to get those stairs fixed now.”
I simply nod. From the looks of my mother’s place, she doesn’t have any money to get the stairs fixed. She’s certainly not getting a dime out of me. Not that I have a dime to give her.
The rideshare arrives, and I help Diana out of the chair and into the back seat. I take the front seat and tell the driver to take us to my mother’s trailer.
“You got it.”
The ride takes about fifteen minutes. Once we’re there, I see Diana’s car.
Still in one piece, thank God.
“Thanks for the ride,” I tell the driver. I help Diana out of the car and close the door behind her.
She looks at me. “Do you want to knock on the door and say hi to your mother?”
I let out a humorless chuckle. “Not even a little bit.”
Diana unlocks the car with the key fob, and I help her into the passenger seat. “Are you sure you’re not in any pain?”
“Only a little now.” She shifts around in her seat. “If I don’t put much weight on it, I can do okay. They were going to send me home with crutches, but I didn’t want them. I’ll be fine.”
“Are you sure?”
She nods and smiles.
I get in the driver’s seat.
I’m ecstatic that she isn’t hurt too badly. This is all my mother’s fault, of course. Everything in my life is that damned woman’s fault. Hers…and my own.
And now I need money.
What is the best way to tell the woman you love that you need ten grand?
We could go back to the hotel. I could help her get onto the bed, make her comfortable.
But hell.
Sometimes it’s best to bite the bullet and get it done.
“Diana,” I say as I start the engine.
“Yeah?”
“I got a lead on Griffin. A good lead. But I need some help.”
She nods. “Of course. What can I do?”
“You don’t know me very well yet, but from what you do know about me, you probably know that what I’m about to ask for is very difficult for me. And I wouldn’t ask for it if my”—I decide not to rip the niece Band-Aid off quite yet—“ family’s life weren’t at stake.”
She smiles. “How much do you need, Dragon?”
“You automatically think I’m going to ask for money?”
She laughs lightly. “I know you’re a proud man. In my opinion, you’re a good man, no matter what you think of yourself.” She grabs her phone, opens her banking app. “I have money. You need money. I want to help you find your sister. It’s as simple as that. So I’ll ask again. How much do you need?”
“A lot.”
“How much?”
“Ten grand.” Jesse gave me five, but I’ve already spent some of that.
Diana doesn’t even blink. Ten grand is probably like ten cents to her. “When do you need it?”
“Right now.”
Her eyes widen as I pull out of my mother’s small driveway.
“Right now?”
“Yeah. I need to send it through a cash app to the guy who used to have my sister.”
She drops her jaw. “So she’s really gone? Really with the cult?”
“More like a secret society, according to Alayna. She’s got a lead on where to find them, but in the meantime, I have to send money to the guy who had her.”
“Dragon, I want to help you, but what good is it going to do to send money to the guy who had her if he doesn’t have her anymore?”
“Because,” I say, “he still has her daughter.”