Chapter 68
There was a knock on the bathroom door while he was still showering.
“I found some things. I think they are Hope’s brother-in-law’s. They should fit. He’s about your size. All big and muscly and hot. Just older. And blond.”
“About,” Dom stayed right where he was, the water rushing over him. Hell, he could almost smell that woman the instant the door had opened.
Damn it. He didn’t know if he could do this. Every instinct he had was screaming at him to just grab his woman and carry her off to the nearest bed. And show her what she did to him.
“Thanks.”
“I found the first aid kit. If…just hurry up, damn it. I’ll take care of your arm, and we can figure out what to do next.”
Well, his little shrew was getting cranky. It made him smile. She could get so edgy with him at times. Usually when she was feeling unsettled. “I’m good. Some tape to hold it together will be enough.”
“You were practically comatose when I was driving. Are you sure you’re okay? Tell me the truth, Dominic Vincent. I do not like it when you lie to me.”
Dom pulled the shower curtain back. “Being the nagging wife, sweetheart? If we have that kind of relationship, climb in here and check on my arm yourself. I have other parts you can…examine…if you want.”
“You’d be so lucky, jackass.”
Yes, yes he would. He wasn’t going to tell her that though. He rather thought she knew by now what she did to him. “Best get out of here, Madison. Right now. I am naked and feeling vulnerable, as Lake would say. Scram, before we end up like Powell and Gunnar, and all the rest of them.”
She almost growled. He laughed then. Nothing turned him on faster than pushing the shrew he adored’s buttons.
“Just hurry up, you ass.”
He heard the door close.
That was exactly what he’d wanted. He needed time to think about what was going to happen next.
He wasn’t lost to the situation they were actually in.
Right now, there wasn’t a whole lot of options.
Half the people he would trust with her safety were injured themselves. Or he couldn’t get to them now.
There wasn’t any way in hell he would lead someone back to his own father or Madison’s mother and brother.
But he and Madison couldn’t stay here for long.
Someone would see them, for one thing. And that would mean arrest by the Oklahoma authorities until things got sorted out.
He couldn’t guarantee that the TSP who showed up to pick them up would be the good guys.
Not with Daniel and Gunnar and Heather out, and Marshall stretched thin.
He wasn’t letting those sons-of-bitches get their hands on Madison.
Dom would kill every one of them himself if he had to, in order to keep that woman safe.
No matter what he had to do.
He finished the shower and dressed in the clothes she’d found for him. The sweatpants and sweatshirt would work—he and Heather’s brother-in-law were around the same size. That was all that mattered. They were older clothes and paint-stained, but they would do for tonight.
He pressed a dry washcloth to his arm. It was still bleeding a bit. But he’d gotten damned lucky.
It was just going to be another scar. Well, he had plenty of those.
He found the woman of his dreams in the small kitchen at the back of the house.
She just looked at him. Dom studied her.
He’d never forget one of the first times he’d seen her outside of the TSP. He’d been called out to her mother’s house. A B&E that had turned deadly.
His own father had been there to protect Madison’s mother.
There Madison had been, helping Cherise tend to the wound on his own father.
Dom had never forgotten how those two amazing, beautiful women had been that night.
He’d known Madison for over a year by that point.
He’d made a point of staying away from the prickly little beast. For his own sanity, for one thing.
He’d been hot for her for months by then.
Hell, from the moment he’d first seen her in the lab, and she’d just smirked at him over something long forgotten.
He’d taken one look at her and wanted to just carry her off to his cave. Keep her forever.
Well, he’d done just fine pushing that urge away for years.
He could get through tonight. He’d been afraid of ruining what relationship they did have.
But after what had happened between them, he didn’t know how much longer he could do that.
Or if he even wanted to. This was the only woman he would want for the rest of his life.
Did he really want to keep her at a distance now?
“Sit.” She was good at ordering him around at times.
Dom just let her this time. He knew it was what she needed to feel in control.
Madison was a bit more anxious than she used to be.
Since…before…the choir hall shooting. The Wilson attack had only made it worse again. Just as she was starting to do better.
Damn that bastard. Dom wanted nothing more than to rip Wilson apart with his bare hands. For what he had done to Madison. And little Hope Coleson. And for Heather. The man was one of the few on the planet Dom fully believed didn’t deserve to live after what he’d done.
But that wasn’t Dom’s place to decide.
“This kitchen is small. I don’t know how they got a table in here with so many kids.”
He looked around and saw what she meant. It was neat, in decent repair, but the room was small. “How many lived here together?”
“I think they all did at one point, Hope said. Bonnie and the ten girls. After her parents died, and then her sister, and then what happened with Zoey’s sisters and everything.”
“I bet there were little girls practically coming out of every corner.” Hard to imagine Heather Coleson as a little girl, but he supposed it was believable.
That woman was the kind who made men tremble from fear.
And other things. There was a reason his pal Jarrod had called her Scary Heather a few times or dozen.
“Hope has told me stories. She definitely liked it better here. I think she doesn’t really understand life in a city, even one as small as Finley Creek. Sometimes she says things that make me think she doesn’t feel she fits in.”
“No, I don’t suppose she does yet. She’s still new to Finley Creek. But…she’s ours now. Especially…Mig’s. If she ever figures that part out.”
Madison snickered. “That’s going to be hilarious to watch. She seriously has no clue he’s interested in her. I love how doofy he looks at her sometimes. We need something good around here, now, don’t we? I get so tired—“
“Honey?” Hell, he couldn’t stand it. She was hurting. And that damned near destroyed him. “We’ll get through this shit, too. It’s just…darkness. It’ll only be temporary.”
He knew the words he spoke were a lie, but she was breaking his heart. All he wanted was for the world to be a better place for her. Somehow.
He sat still while she buzzed around him, fixing the graze in his arm with the steri-strips she’d found. “I…am going to sit up for a while. I want you to go rest. Master bedroom. I can defend that one best.”
“I don’t want to live a life where I even have to think about defending a bedroom, Dom. I just don’t.”
And then he just did it. Dom stood up, and pulled her closer. And held her as she cried.