Ryan (Mallick Brothers #2)(12)

Figuring Anita would hate me less if I didn't leave a sink full of dishes on top of the confetti, I grabbed a bunch and headed to the counter myself.

From there, I hit the liquor store and then the food store and made my way home.

I was barely halfway out of the elevator when I knew something was wrong.



       
         
       
        

First, the noise.

There was crashing and cursing and yelling and the whacking sounds that my history told me was the unmistakable sound of fist hitting flesh.

My stomach twisted painfully as my eyes went to my door.

Second, there was the fact that her door was wide open.

Everything fell from my hands in a blink as I ran down the rest of the hall and into her doorway.

I froze for the barest of seconds, the message not seeming to transfer from eyes to brain to body fast enough as I watched two men, not Bry and his cohort, but two other men- big, ugly, mean-looking, in her apartment. One was rummaging around the already destroyed living area, overturning drawers, ripping open pillows.

The other, yeah, he was on Dusty.

Meaning he was straddling her waist and those fist hitting bones sounds came from him.

I heard a roaring sound and didn't know it actually came from me until eyes shifted in my direction- the dark, almost black ones from both of her attackers and the one not-swollen-closed green eye of hers.

And I fucking flew at the guy who did it.

He couldn't even get to his feet before I had him by the throat, throwing him so hard that he cracked the plaster in the wall behind him.

Then it was what it was. It was fists and blood and howls and cursing and bones breaking under my knuckles and adrenaline surging through my system and my blood racing so fast that it whooshed in my ears.

I didn't know how long it went on. It felt like seconds, but judging by the raw-meat look to the man's face, it had to have been long minutes. But then arms grabbed me, yanking me back, making my back crack against Dusty's kitchen counter hard enough to wind me.

The guy who grabbed me hauled up his friend and they took off.

I took a slow, deep breath, trying to calm it back down. For the first time in maybe my life, I went into a fight something other than cold and detached and calm. For me, it was like any other aspect of my job. I did it rationally. I finally understood what happened with Eli when he lost it, when he went hot, when he was an unstoppable force of rage.

It was right then, ears no longer whooshing, that I heard the low, sad, pained whimpers coming from my side and I looked over to see that Dusty had rolled and curled up in the fetal position, rocking gently. One of her hands held her face, the other her stomach.

Fuck.

Mother fuck.

I rushed over toward her, getting down on my knees by her side and reaching out to touch her hand.

She let out a shriek and jerked away, making my stomach drop in a nauseating way.

"Honey, it's me," I said, making my voice soft even though it felt like my jaw was going to crack from how hard it was clenched. "It's okay. They're gone. You're alright." 

She let out another whimper as she dropped her hand, giving me a full view of the black and swollen-shut eye. The sight brought another wave of rage that I had to fight back. She didn't need me angry. She needed me calm and controlled.

"Everything hurts," she admitted, her good eye losing the battle with tears and they started streaming down her face.

"I know. I know, honey," I said, reaching down for her, glad when she didn't shy away as I pulled her half up onto my lap. When she didn't scream at the way I twisted her slightly, I figured her ribs were fine, that the pain to her center was likely just muscular, not bone. "Who were they?" I found myself asking, brushing some of her soft blonde hair away from her face. "What did they want?"

It was like I shot a gun off in her apartment.

The tears stopped, her eye went huge, and then she flew upward, letting out a loud cry of pain at doing so, but getting up and crawling across the room to under the TV cabinet, scrambling inside.

"Dusty, calm down," I urged, moving down beside her, watching with drawn-together brows as she found a box, pulled it out, and opened it.

"No. No no no no no," she cried, rocking back and forth slightly, going back into the cabinet and feeling around. "God, no."

"Alright," I said, reaching out and taking her hands, pulling them in front of her and holding them in place.

"Let me go."

"Not until you tell me what you're looking for."

"Five hundred 30s," she said in a desperate hiss.

30s meant thirty-milligrams of Percocet.

A single pill at that dose would go for twenty on the street.

Five hundred of those meant that she had just lost ten thousand dollars worth of drugs.

Ten thousand.

Jesus Christ.

"You understand what I'm saying, right?" she asked, swallowing hard, tone desperate.

"I know exactly what you're saying," I agreed, nodding.

"Bry might be a friend of mine, but he can't just... let me lose ten thousand dollars of his."

That was the damn truth.

When it came to drug dealers, old friend or not, business was fucking business.

And she just lost a huge stash of drugs the day before New Years Eve when everyone would be scrambling to feel good all night.

"Who were those guys, Dusty?" I asked, wanting to take care of her but knowing there would be nothing that could ease her mind until we figured some shit out.

"I have no idea. I've never seen them before. I thought it was Bry showing up early so I went to pull the door open and it crashed in and..." she trailed off, shrugging a shoulder.

"Alright, honey, listen," I said, ducking my head a little to catch her troubled gaze. "I know this is a huge fucking deal and it needs to be handled, but right now, I need you to let me clean you up and look you over. Figure the hospital is out of the question," I added, though I would have preferred a CAT scan to make sure she didn't have a concussion and an x-ray for her ribs, but I wasn't going to push. She'd been through enough trauma for one night.

"Maybe you should patch yourself up first," she said, reaching out tentatively and putting her fingers on the side of my hand.

Looking down, I saw my knuckles busted open. But, likely because my body was used to trauma, the bleeding had already long stopped and I would be scabbed over before the end of the night. "This is nothing," I said, shaking my head, moving to slowly stand, pulling her up with me gently "Can you take a deep breath?"

"I'm assuming you mean am I physically capable," she mused with a small self-deprecating smile, moving her one hand to her belly and expanding it with air. "Yeah."

"Alright. How stocked is your medicine cabinet?" I asked, glancing down the hall to the open door to her bathroom.



       
         
       
        

"Bandaids and triple antibiotics?" she half-asked, half-declared, looking unsure.

"Alright, I will grab some stuff from my place. You alright to stay here?"

"Can I come?" she shocked me by asking, making me turn fully to look at her, my brows drawn together.

"To my apartment?" I clarified, watching her.

"I kinda just don't... want to be in here right now," she admitted, looking around like she didn't recognize it anymore. Given the utter disaster it was in, I imagined it was more anxiety-inducing for her to stay than leave. "If that's okay," she added, looking down at her feet.

"Honey, you can stay with me as long as you need," I offered, reaching down to take her hand, only somewhat surprised when she not only let me, but squeezed tight. "Come on," I added when she hesitated, looking around. "I'll find Rocky once we get you patched up," I said, knowing that was what was holding her back.

"Thanks," she said, voice quiet as I led her across the hall and unlocked my door. "Are those your bags?" she added, nodding down the hall.

"Nothing important. I'll get it when I get the cat. Come on," I urged, pulling her inside and closing the door.

"Has anyone ever told you that your apartment sort of screams 'bachelor'?"

I smiled at that. "My brother's woman, constantly." I led her toward the hall only to have her yank back, stopping and looking at the canvas she had given me that I had found a spot for in the hallway.

"You hung it already."

"Of course I did. Come on, stop stalling. We need to get your face treated."

With that, I led her into my bathroom and went straight for the linen closet, dragging out the big plastic container full of every medical supply you could get in a store (and a few you couldn't) and put it down on the counter.

When I looked back at her, she was staring at herself in the mirror, her lower lip quivering at the mess her face had been turned into. "It will all go down, Dusty," I offered. "The eye and the cheek and the lip. They look so bad because they're swollen. The bruises will fade. The cuts, well, you might have a scar or two, but even those will fade eventually. Trust me," I added when she just kept staring.

"You fight like someone who does it often," she said, catching my gaze in the mirror.