Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 73043 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 365(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73043 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 365(@200wpm)___ 292(@250wpm)___ 243(@300wpm)
I walked up to him and pulled his IV out. He’d already started it halfway, so I wasn’t really doing anything that he hadn’t already started.
Technically.
“You got a Band-Aid?” he asked.
I raised a brow at him and snorted. “Do you think I just carry Band-Aids around with me like dollar bills?”
He gestured with his head for me to go get one, and, rolling my eyes, I did.
I threw a handful at him and turned to survey his room.
“I’m early. But what the fuck? What’s with all the flowers?” I asked. “I don’t have enough room in my truck for all these.”
James snorted. “I have the nurses picking them up and taking them to a few other patients that don’t have the number of concerned visitors who think it’s appropriate for a grown male to have so many goddamn flowers that I do.”
I snorted.
“I swear to God. I tell them to stop sending flowers up here, and they send more. They think it’s fuckin’ funny.”
“And who are these offenders?” I questioned, amusement lacing my voice.
“The fucking SWAT team, mainly the Spurlock brothers, Benny Bear, Nico, Luke and the god-awful Red-Headed Bastard.”
My lips twitched. “Isn’t that the entire SWAT team you just named off?”
He shrugged. “We’re getting older. We have a few younger guys, but they’re not at the others’ level just yet.”
“They gotta learn sometime. Y’all aren’t always going to be able to do what you do,” I told him. “Hell, even I can’t do what I used to do. Twenty years ago, hikes with my gear over twenty miles was nothing. This last time I was there and had to do that, I thought I was going to die. Then there are all these little boys at my side, holding fucking conversations while I can barely fucking breathe. I gotta admit, it’s a young man’s game now.”
James grunted in reply. “Don’t fucking remind me. And don’t think that I like that some old man is dating my daughter.”
So, we were going to do this now? I guess I could get down with that.
“No warnings?” I waited for the inevitable ‘hurt her and I’ll kill you.’
James looked over at me, grinned widely, and then shook his head.
“I’m not going to give you a warning,” he said, crossing his arms over his chest.
“You’re not?”
I was kind of surprised by this. I would’ve expected more from the man who is the father of the daughter that I was about to cross that line with. Only, he didn’t offer me anything of the sort, instead, he shrugged his shoulders.
“No,” he repeated. “I’m not.”
“Why?”
Why couldn’t I figure out how to keep my fuckin’ mouth shut?
But seriously, why the hell wasn’t he warning me off? He had to know what I wanted from his daughter. He, as well as a lot of the other people in this organization, didn’t really like me much.
I was lucky ‘Uniball’ was one of the only things they called me in front of others. It could be worse.
“Because I don’t have to warn you. If you hurt Janie, she’ll take care of you. I won’t have to lift a finger.”
I found my first smile since I’d walked through the hospital’s doors.
She really could take care of herself. I didn’t have any doubt in my mind that she could.
“I guess that’s true.”
“It is,” he assured me. “I taught that girl everything she may need to know. She knows how to shoot. How to hunt. And,” he paused, looking over at me. “How to call for help.”
I didn’t miss that threat.
He would be there if his daughter wanted him there, and there wasn’t a damn thing in this world I could do about it.
“Well, I’ll just go ahead and tell you what I have to say, then.”
James sat on the side of the bed, crossed his arms over his chest, and waited.
“When I met her, I knew she was someone special.”
James scowled.
“And over the years, as we came into contact, I stayed away, but that feeling never left,” I continued.
James’ scowl became fierce.
Now came the moment of truth.
“This job—my last one that I ever wanted to do—my coup de grace, if you will, I was never meant to survive,” I said. “Whatever Layton is involved in, it’s big. So big, in fact, that I’ve been working for years to get to this moment. Little jobs, here and there. And last month, with Dante’s case, I think it was pure accident that I was able to stumble on a single one of Layton’s toes. He thinks he’s hidden well enough, but he’s gotten sloppy. He thinks he’s untouchable, and I want to prove that he isn’t.”
“You’re not going to do this alone,” he said. “My daughter loves you. Has loved you since the day she saw your broken self enter our compound.”
My lips twitched. “I don’t have that plan any longer. I’m backing off. I’m leaving this particular ball of snakes to someone else for them to handle.”