Total pages in book: 89
Estimated words: 105065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 525(@200wpm)___ 420(@250wpm)___ 350(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 105065 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 525(@200wpm)___ 420(@250wpm)___ 350(@300wpm)
“Already got it.” She gives me a little nod. “Lachlan gave it to me in case I need to get a hold of you.”
“Okay, well… Ronan’s gonna’ take care of you. Isn’t that right, Ronan?”
He grunts and I shoot him a glare as I get out of the car and shut the door.
“I mean it.” I poke him in the chest. “You fucking take care of her.”
He glances at the car and pushes my hand away from him like he’s just been caught cheating or something. Fricken weirdo.
“You just worry about taking care of Lachlan,” he says.
“Yeah, yeah…”
I don’t get to finish because he shoves me inside the door and slams it behind me. I make it two steps inside before I freeze again at the sound of angry grunting.
“I don’t see anything in there.”
“Ye don’t know your fecking arse from your elbow ya bloody muppet. Give me the goddamn things.”
I hotfoot it into the parlor to find wounded men strewn about the place like furniture. They’re propped on sofas and kitchen chairs, several of the unwounded men trying to tend to their wounds. Lachlan is sitting in a recliner, bent forward, while another one of his men pokes around his shoulder wound. Now that I can see where it’s at, I know for certain he saved my life. It’s about level with where my head would be on his body. If he hadn’t spun me around…
I shudder, and rush over to his side.
“Jesus, Lachlan. You guys need to go to the hospital. What the hell are you idiots doing?”
The man that’s sitting in front of him stops to look up at me like I have a death wish for talking to Lachlan that way. Lachlan just grins.
“Your concern touches me, sweetheart,” he slurs. “Truly. Ye think you can do better than Conor? I’m liable to believe you can.”
Jesus, he’s half-drunk to boot. I snatch the bottle of whiskey out of his hand and take a swig of it myself.
“You.” I point at the kid doesn’t know what the fuck he’s doing. “You’re outta’ your mind. Get the hell off him, now.”
“Oh, thank God.” He hands me the tweezers and bolts to the garbage can to vomit. Frigging maniacs.
“Ye gonna’ patch me up?” Lachlan asks.
He’s got a stupid grin on his face like I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. I want to slap it off him. Instead, I sit on the arm of the recliner and push him backwards so I can work. I sterilize the tweezers and clean some of the blood around the wound, and Lachlan reaches up to grab my wrist.
“Do ye really know what ye’re doing, sweetheart?”
“Do you think I can be any worse than this guy?” I gesture at Conor, who can’t seem to tear his eyes away from the blood but still looks like he’s going to faint at any moment.
“Go fix the guys some sandwiches,” I tell him. “They’ll need something to soak up all this alcohol.”
Lachlan laughs and Conor nods, walking back into the kitchen with a new purpose.
“Ye should tend to the lads first,” Lachlan grunts. “Mine’s just a graze.”
“I’m tending to you first,” I snap. “So sit back and relax. This is not going to be pleasant.”
Once I have the tools cleaned, I bring the bottle to his lips and let him take another swig. Then I go in. His shoulder is a mess, and the wound is right at the top of his bicep muscle. It’s still bleeding a lot, but it doesn’t bother me. I’ve seen it plenty of times before. Lachlan’s still watching me closely, like he can’t believe I’m really doing this. Every once in a while he grunts in pain, but he never tells me to stop. After a minute of poking around, I confirm he’s correct. No bullet, it’s just a graze. So I set to cleaning him and stitching him up.
“Where’d ye learn to do that, butterfly?”
“You know Doc Kilroy?” I ask.
Lachlan watches me, his eyes heavy with exhaustion and a flicker of curiosity. I suspect it’s the only thing keeping him awake.
“Aye, I knew him.”
His tone is one of respect, and for some reason, that makes me happy. Doc Kilroy used to help out with the aftermath of the fights in the underground. He died a couple years ago at an ancient age that I’ll probably never know. But the neighborhood just isn’t the same without him.
“He used to come over and patch up my dad and the crew he ran with,” I explain. “Got sick of the house calls at all hours of the night, so he taught me how to do it.”
That’s what I tell Lachlan, but the truth is I think Doc Kilroy saw the kind of guys my dad was getting involved with. He didn’t want to be anywhere near it. Can’t say I blame him.
After Lachlan is stitched and bandaged, I move to grab up my tools and tend to the other men. But he halts me by grabbing my hand and brushing his thumb over the back of my knuckles.
“Thank you, butterfly.”
“No biggie.” I clear my throat. “You should all probably get some antibiotics though.”
“Ronan’s on it,” he says. “Now, if ye don’t mind tending to my mates.”
“I’ll take care of it,” I assure him. “You get some rest.”
He nods and I slip away, but as I clean and patch up his men, he never takes his focus off of me. It isn’t suspicion this time, but something else in the depths of those gray eyes. Something that makes my belly flutter and my heart beat just a little bit faster.
When it’s all over, I head to the kitchen to see what Conor came up with. There’s a stack of peanut butter and jelly sandwiches waiting on a plate, and he’s snoring like a baby propped against the refrigerator.
I grab the sandwiches and cut them into two triangles out of habit and get a sharp little pang in my chest when I remember why. Talia and I used to share sandwiches this way. She insisted they tasted better when they were cut diagonally instead of vertically. She was right, of course.