Chapter 13 #2
I glanced at the clock on the stove and saw it was nearly twelve-thirty in the morning. This meant Pistol had been in the shower going on twenty minutes. I decided enough time had lapsed that I could check on him.
Reaper lifted her head and looked up at me as I approached, pressing my ear against the door. All I heard was water. When I glanced back down at the pup, I swear her eyes told me I was being too timid.
“Fine,” I whispered at her before I cleared my throat and knocked. “Everything okay in there?”
“Not made of glass,” he yelled back.
Meeting Reaper’s eyes once more, I shrugged. She huffed and dropped her head back onto her paws, like she didn’t find me the least bit helpful.
I tried again.
“I’ve got pain meds in the kitchen when you’re ready.”
This didn’t earn me a reply; but as I began to walk away, I heard the shower cut off, and I considered that a win. I raised my eyebrows at Reaper, as if to say, ‘See? Not useless, after all,’ then returned to the kitchen.
It was another ten minutes before I heard Pistol’s bare feet and Reaper’s clipped nails against the hard floors coming my direction.
I reached for the bottle of pain meds and opened it, shaking two capsules into my palm.
I was twisting the lid back on when I sensed him behind me, and I was quick to turn around.
The gasp I sucked in at the sight of him couldn’t be helped.
On any other day, under very different circumstances, the sight of him in hardly more than a pair of gray sweatpants, his curly blond locks dark and heavy in their damp state, would have made my breath catch for a variety of reasons.
But at present, the sight of him without a shirt on felt like a gut punch.
It was impossible to ignore the beauty of the chest piece that spanned across his pecs—two pistols, barrels pointed at each shoulder, laying in a bed of smoke and roses—the piece done entirely in black and gray.
But it was the blue and purple that stole the show.
He was covered in bruises, a particularly gnarly one on his left side.
Two ibuprofens wasn’t going to be nearly enough.
I blinked then turned for the bottle, shaking two more capsules into my palm. I then held all four out in offering. He grabbed them, tossed them into his mouth, then reached for the glass of water. He downed the whole thing, put the glass back on the counter, then turned to leave.
“Wait, where do you think you’re going?” I asked, hurrying around him to block his path.
“Bed.”
I gaped at him. “Have you looked in the mirror? You can’t go to bed like this. Your eye is going to be swollen shut in the morning if we don’t ice it. And that bruise could use a chill, too,” I urged, pointing toward his ribs. Next, I motioned toward the table and demanded, “Sit down.”
He stared at me blankly, and I thought maybe he’d ignore me. But after a long pause, he rotated on his heel and dragged his feet to the table.
I nodded to myself, allowing a second for me to bask in my victory, and then I started prepping a couple ice bundles. When I had two wads made, I joined him, handing over one of the packed tea towels.
“For your side,” I instructed, pulling a chair closer. I sat, propped my elbow on the table, then gently pressed the second ice bundle against his eye. He hissed and jerked away, but I cupped my hand around his opposite cheek and tried again. “Not so tough now, are you?” I teased.
He grunted, but he didn’t fight me, and that felt like another win.
“You don’t have to do this.”
I looked him in his decent eye and shrugged.
He was right. I could have listed a number of reasons why he hadn’t earned my compassion, but I wasn’t cold hearted.
“Didn’t have to protect me back there, either.”
This time, rather than a hint of humbleness, I sensed his pride was back and aimed directly at me. I narrowed my eyes at him in annoyance.
“Yeah, well, no one else was doing anything to help. Couldn’t make that make sense.”
“We were in their house. Outnumbered and outgunned. One wrong move, and all of us might not have made it out of there.”
While I hadn’t seen any guns, I understood that was his point. Nighthawk’s intent was obviously to keep the peace—however marginal it was.
“Even more reason for me to step in. Someone had to before you got a broken jaw.”
“Didn’t have to be you.”
“Okay,” I scoffed, now full-on irritated. “I’ll remember that the next time you’re getting your ass kicked.”
He shook his head slightly, his calm, steady gaze never wavering from mine.
“No. I mean, you didn’t have to put yourself in harm’s way for me. He could have thrown a fist at you.”
“Oh,” I breathed, instantly deflated.
I replayed the last sixty seconds, studying his face all the while. As I realized it wasn’t his pride speaking but something else, I dropped my hand away from his face and lifted the ice so I could look at him. Really look at him.
Even with his left eye now almost swollen shut, I could see he was still looking at me like he did back at the clubhouse. It wasn’t gratitude or surprise. It wasn’t lust or curiosity. It was more subtle than that. It was almost like wonder—like, for the first time in days, he was seeing me.
Not as an unforeseen problem or an inconvenience.
Not as a consequence or a burden.
Instead, he was looking at me.
Just me—the woman who offered herself as his human shield.
My heart did something like a double tap, caught off guard by the moment.
“I—I knew he wouldn’t hit me,” I admitted, pressing the ice against his face again. “Not even on accident.”
“How?”
“He can be a dick, but my brother has never laid a hand on me.”
Pistol furrowed his brow, and I saw it as he connected the dots in his mind. “Carmy. You called him Carmy.”
“Yup. He’s Hotshot to his brothers, but not to me.”
He hummed in acknowledgement.
“What’s the story there?”
“Nothing too original. Had a falling out a few years back.”
Pistol quirked an eyebrow.
“You want my ass to stay in this chair with this ice on my face, you’re gonna have to do better than that.”
I laughed, surprised by the sound as much as his ability to get it out of me.
Are we having our first cordial conversation?
Hesitating for a second, I debated over how much I wanted to share. Our history wasn’t my favorite topic. Neither was it ever particularly easy to talk about.
“Okay—uhm, growing up, he was my best friend. I was his, too. We’re three years apart, but that never mattered. In so many ways, we were all each other had after our parents died. That kind of trauma transcends all the bullshit.”
“Except it didn’t. Y’all had a fallin’ out.”
I smiled in spite of how much the truth stung, impressed he managed to state it so plainly.
“Funny thing is? We barely talk to each other anymore—but he’s always there, keeping tabs on me.
Sometimes I like to think it’s because he still loves me.
Most of the time, it feels more like he wants to be an overbearing ass controlling what I can and cannot do.
I’ve never been able to figure out how the end of us could have anything to do with him becoming a King.
But as soon as he got his final patch, that was it. ”
Pistol didn’t respond right away but continued staring at me, like he was trying to figure something out. Finally, he asked, “What happened to your parents?”
“Car accident. Lost them both at once. I was eight.”
“Fuck,” he muttered with a deep scowl.
The pull of his brow irritated the cut above his eye, and I saw it as it began to well up again.
“You’re bleeding. One sec—I’ll be right back.”
Before he could stop me, I set aside the ice and hurried for the bathroom. I found my box of Band-Aids, then pulled out the appropriate size. Grabbing the antiseptic ointment for good measure, I was quick to return to the table.
I don’t know if I was more relieved or surprised when he didn’t put up a fuss about the bandage. He even let me rub a bit of ointment on his nose and lip. Neither of us spoke as I worked, and I found I missed our conversation.
As I tightened the tea towel around the remaining ice before pressing it against his face, I tried my hand at kickstarting it again.
“What about your parents? They still around?”
“Never knew the old man,” he was quick to tell me. “Lost mom more than a decade ago. Cancer.”
“Shit. I’m sorry.”
“Me, too,” he murmured.
We fell into another silence, and neither of us were quick to dig ourselves out of it.
Then, out of nowhere, he pointed his chin behind me and asked, “What’s that?”
I glanced over my shoulder and saw his plate of food I left to rot hours ago.
“It was your dinner.”
“Still could be.”
It wasn’t until he said it that I thought about how long it must have been since his last meal. Of course he was hungry.
“You don’t want that,” I told him as I pulled a face. “It’s been sitting there for a while.”
“It’s been a while since I ate. It’ll do.”
“Viv got us a few things. Let me make you something else. Bacon grilled cheese, maybe?”
He lifted his brow in interest. “Say less. I’ll take two.”
That got him another smile.
“Only if you promise to keep this ice on your face.”
Without further prompting, he lifted his free hand and placed it over mine. I gently freed my fingers, reached for his plate of spoiled dinner, and went to the kitchen for a do-over.
Lyla made three bacon grilled cheese sandwiches.
Two for him, one for her.
The smell of the fatty meat, buttered-fried bread and melted cheese intensified his hunger which—until he began to relax—had been an afterthought, overshadowed by conflict and aggravatingly immense pain.
While Lyla cooked, Pistol found himself watching her contemplatively.
It seemed at every turn she wasn’t at all what he was expecting.
Or, perhaps more accurately, she was more than he cared to notice before.
She was a smoke show, but anyone with eyes knew that.
She was a wildly good time in bed—as he hoped she would be.
But the rest?
The meager fight she put up to marry him.
The weight she assigned to their vows.