I try to reach out to her, but she saves me the pain and takes my hand in hers instead.
“I’m sorry, Tiffany.”
She kisses my hand. “Thank you, Blaze. It was hard. He’s not the man I thought he was. That seems to be happening to me a lot, lately. I was wrong about you — you are so much more than your credit score would lead me to believe,” she says, and a small smile plays across her face. “There was a point where I had to defend myself. It was bad. But he’s in jail, now. And I put together a report and turned it in to the mayor and the police and my dad will probably be in jail for a very long time.”
Her eyes turn down and I’m eager to get her back onto a subject that isn’t painful for her.
“So, what’s the new job?”
Her grin comes back. “I took my report to the mayor first. I told him things would get difficult for him if he didn’t give me my dad’s old job.”
“You threatened the mayor?”
Now it’s my turn to feel proud. What a woman. How can I not love her? She’s sexy as hell when she’s willing to get a little bad. Or a lot bad — blackmailing the mayor is more than just a minor crime.
She nods.
“Yeah, basically,” she says. “I told him what would happen if he didn’t appoint me to the position, and then I gave him my number and told him to call me when I could start my new job.”
“You know, I may have lost a lot of blood, but this stuff you’re telling me is getting me hard.”
She gasps and squeezes my hand. “Blaze, not now. You’re hurt. But later? Yes, definitely. I’ll hold you to it.”
I laugh, and even that is enough to make searing pain lance up my side. One of the monitors that I’m hooked to starts beeping and a nurse enters the room. She gives Tiffany a stern look.
“I’m sorry, Ms. Santos, but you will have to go. Mr. Dunne needs rest. A lot of rest.”
Tiffany nods. “Sorry. Blaze, I’ll be back to check on you tomorrow, OK? Until then, get a lot of rest for me, because I will hold you to what we talked about earlier.”
I think for a second. Then I grin. “You mean?”
She smiles. “Yep. So get that blood back, OK?”
I stare after her as she leaves. Because, God damn, does she have an incredible ass.
“Is she your girlfriend?” The nurse says. She sounds disappointed.
“No. She’s more than that,” I say. “She’s my old lady.”
* * * * *
It takes days of rest before I’m able to walk on my own. The surgery, the gunshot wound, the beating I took when Anna’s thugs had me captive, they all took their toll on my body and I spend the next week paying for it.
But, after days of feeling my ass grow fat and lazy, with Tiffany at my side every single day and consistent visits from my brothers in the club, I’m able to walk without feeling dizzier than if I’d drunk a full bottle of whiskey. In fact, today I feel good. Great, even. There’s stiffness in my side, and some aches and pains, but nothing I can’t handle.
“Where is she?” I say to the first nurse I find passing in the hallway.
She’s a young woman, probably fresh out of nursing school, and she gives me a look of bewilderment. “Where is who?”
“Eleanor Dunne. My mom. She was brought in here because she got shot and she needed a liver transplant.”
She doesn’t have an answer for me, but I glare at her and that lights a fire under her pancake ass; she runs to fetch a doctor. And that doctor guides me down to the ICU.
Then I see my mom.
She looks so different. So much older than I saw her last. So pale. So much smaller. Diminished and frail. It hurts to see her like this, but it’s a hurt I’ll happily take over the alternative of losing her for good.
And she’s awake.
Hooked to a bunch of monitors, but awake.
I knock on the door, and she beckons me in.
I can’t walk fast enough to get to her bedside, to put her in a gentle hug. And when she squeezes me back, my heart soars.
“Hey mom.”
“Declan. Please, sit. You look terrible.”
“Me? The docs say I’m good to go home whenever I want,” I say. Truth is, they have told me that for the last couple days.
“Then why are you still here?”
“Because you’re here. I didn’t want to leave until I could talk to you,” I say. Then I stop for a moment — the words I’ve spent days thinking about how to say are suddenly stuck on my tongue — and I take a deep breath. “I want to apologize. This whole thing got out of hand. I never meant for you to get hurt. All I wanted to do was help the best way I could, and you got hurt because of it. I know we disagree on a lot of things, I know that I’ve upset you so many times, but I hope you know that, no matter how much we disagree, I do love you. And I hope that you’re not too disappointed in me.”
My mom is quiet for a long time. For a while, I’m worried that she’s too upset to answer. I ready myself to hear her say the kind of things that’ll cut me deep. Things that she’ll have every right to say. Things that I’ll endure — no matter how much
