1
Leigha
I woke up draped across Dylan’s chest, his hand stroking my hair. I felt surprisingly good, considering the bruises on my face and the stitches in my wrist. Turning my head, I came eye to eye with Dylan’s phone. He wasn’t just awake; apparently he’d already been busy getting things done.
“How are you feeling?” he asked, meeting my eyes.
“Okay.” I shifted to sit up and leaned into the pillows beside him, laying half on my side so I could see his face. He looked concerned, sweet, and determined. The determined part gave me a shiver. I couldn’t tell if it was aimed at me or someone else. Maybe both.
“I’ll order up breakfast in a little while. Does your wrist hurt?”
“It’s not too bad.” It wasn’t. It throbbed, but not as much as I would have expected considering I had seven stitches.
Dylan reached towards his bedside table and handed me two brown pills and a glass of water.
“Ibuprofen,” he said. “Take them now before you start to move around too much.”
I did, staring at the light yellow stretchy bandage the doctor had wrapped around the dressing he’d put on my arm. It would look terrible with my dress for the wedding. The bruises on my face would be even worse. At the thought of Christie’s wedding, my stomach sank. The last thing I wanted to deal with was my sister’s wedding.
“What?” Dylan asked, catching my expression.
“The wedding. I feel better, but I don’t feel up to going to Christie’s wedding. And I really don’t want to face questions about this.” I raised my bandaged wrist in the air.
“If you want to blow it off, I’m all for it.”
“I can’t,” I said, wishing I could. But my mom would be both furious and disappointed. I could handle the furious part, but I didn’t want to disappoint her.
“I know,” Dylan said. “Don’t worry about the arm. Lola is sending over elbow length gloves. They’ll be a little too formal, but better than anyone seeing your wrist. And I had Melissa schedule someone to come up to do your hair and makeup this afternoon. They’ll cover the bruises so no one will know anything happened.”
“Did you do all that while I was sleeping?”
“You were out cold. Never even flinched when the phone rang.”
“Oh.” I could be a deep sleeper, but not usually that deep. Must have been a stress hangover from the night before. “Have you talked to Axel? Did he stop the video?”
“It’s fine.”
“And?”
“And, it’s under control,” he said, that determined look taking precedence in his eyes. I guess it was directed at me after all.
“I need to know more than that. What did he do?”
“Do you trust me?” Dylan asked. I remembered him asking that last night at the hospital. I’d said I did. Now that I was awake, the question seemed to have more depth. At the time I’d been overwhelmed with fear, pain, and relief at seeing Dylan. After a night of sleep, I wasn’t sure I’d give the same answer. Did I trust him?
“I do,” I said. “But I want to know what’s going on.”
“And I’ll tell you. First, I want to talk about trust.”
I stared at him, not sure what to say. I’d said I trusted him. What more did he want?
“Last night,” he went on, “That bastard called and threatened you. What did you do?”
“Dylan,” I whispered, wanting to stop him.
“You ran,” he said, ignoring my protest. He’d been so focused on taking care of me, I hadn’t realized he was angry.
“Dylan,” I said again, trying to explain. Dylan was done with explanations.
“You ran away,” he repeated. “Tell me what you should have done, Leigha. What should you have done when he texted you?”
“There wasn’t time.”
“Tell me,” he insisted, sliding out of the bed so he could pace out his frustration. “What should you have done when he texted you?”
I looked down at the sheets, avoiding his angry eyes and the distracting sight of his naked body. He was so pissed he didn’t seem to care that he was naked, but I didn’t think this was the best time to be ogling him.
“I should have woken you up,” I muttered, feeling like a recalcitrant child.
“Yes. You should have woken me up and trusted me to help you.”
His patient, firm tone suddenly struck a nerve. I was an adult, and I’d made the best decision I could at the time. He didn’t have the right to tell me what to do.
“I was trying to help you,” I said, irritated. I didn’t want to go over all this. I wanted to move on.