He rolled over onto his back, not a single spot of blood to be seen anywhere.
Dillon wanted to weep in relief, to lean down and pepper kisses all over his face, but all she managed to do was furiously shout, “What the fuck, Nasa?”
He grunted out a laugh as he sat up and reached for her, undeterred by her hostile demand. He pulled her right in and practically crushed her in his embrace.
“I'm fine, I promise,” he reassured her.
“FINE? There are bullet holes in the back of your cut because that mother fucker shot you! How are you not bleeding out all over the place?”
“Yeah, he shot me. Shot me in the fuckin' back. Dickhead!” Nasa winced when she reached under his shirt to touch the smooth, unbroken skin on his waist.
“How?”
“Dragon Scales,” he told her smugly. “Bought it for everyone after our first hostile Leviathan encounter and had a second set of leathers made to cover it.”
Confused beyond measure, all Dillon could say was, “Dragon what?”
Nasa took her hand from under his shirt and pushed her fingers into the leather over his heart. “Feel the ridges? Its ceramic disks layered over one another to make a lightweight ballistic vest, strong enough to stop an armor-piercing round at ten feet away.
“That fucker shot me point blank, and all I felt was a dull thud followed by his boot on my ass, shoving me down the stairs. I’m gonna buy so much stock in that company when we get home.”
Something clicked then, the pressure of her fear and confusion, her anger at him for continuing to antagonize Ghost into shooting him, the stress of everything that had happened in the last ten minutes or so...
The floodgates opened, and the tears she'd been holding back for weeks exploded out of her in a torrential gush of emotion.
“Whoa, easy. Don't cry, Tiger Lily. I'm here; we're okay. I'm with you.”
Dillon came undone, clinging to him like a barnacle as the tears just poured down her cheeks. She could barely hear him speaking over the sound of her sobbing, and a few minutes later all hell broke loose.
Police came busting through the front door; Elka went wild, barking and snarling like crazy.
The cops were shouting, Nasa was shouting, Patti was trying to be heard, and Dillon couldn't do a thing but hold on and cry.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
It took an eternity for the whole mess to get sorted out. The cops made everyone come outside for questioning despite Patti showing the detectives the video footage of what went down.
Nasa was on his knees on the sidewalk, hands cuffed behind his back while he was vigorously questioned as a potentially hostile suspect.
The bomb squad showed up with their dogs and equipment once Nasa shared the part where Ghost said one of the women had a backpack full of C-4.
All the women who'd come to take refuge in the shelter were terrified, huddled up in a tight knot across the street, clinging to their kids or to one another while their eyes constantly roamed around looking for their abusive spouse to materialize and drag them off by the hair.
In short, it was a clusterfuck of epic proportions.
The only tiny bright speck was the fact Rain had joined in on the call and was trying to help calm things down.
Her partner, Preston Quaid, had some serious prejudice against bikers, though, and was struggling to believe Dillon didn't have Stockholm Syndrome or was covering for a violent gang member.
Dillon tried to be reasonable and understanding, trying to look at it from Quaid's perspective. Answering an emergency call from a shelter for domestic violence victims, finding Dillon in the arms of an enormous man wearing a leather vest that clearly marked him as a member of a motorcycle club, bawling her eyes out in a place where two other bikers had previously broken in after killing a woman.
It looked bad, but the video surveillance should have cleared everything up and made it obvious Nasa wasn't the problem despite his appearance.
Unfortunately, Detective Quaid couldn't wrap his head around the events as Dillon and Patti described them.
“Look, whatever hold this guy has on you, I promise, he can't hurt you anymore. Tell me the truth and we'll get him out of here. You'll never have to see him again.”
The patronizing tone Quaid used dry humped Dillon's last nerve, and it must have shown on her face, because the athletic, attractive, well-groomed detective suddenly looked surprised and uncertain.
“I'm not sure how many different ways I can say this, but I'll try again, one more time,” Dillon bit out, her fist wrapped tight around the leash Patti dug up from somewhere for Elka.
“I own this building, and I came here today with my boyfriend—who I definitely want to see again when this shit show is all over—to update the security system. He's a registered private investigator in Austin and specializes in digital security.
“I wanted to make sure this place was as safe as I could possibly make it for all the women who come here seeking shelter, so I asked him to help me because of the recent attack.
“If you quit standing there giving me shit about my man’s appearance and make one goddamn phone call to the Austin Police Department, you can confirm his club is comprised of nonviolent do-gooders, and the status of his PI license is valid.
“You'll also be able to confirm he does business with the cops, the FBI, the DEA, and ATF. He is not beating me, or threatening me, or hurting me in any way, and I don't like the assumption that because he rides a motorcycle and wears a leather vest to say he's part of a club, he's automatically a violent person.”
Quaid opened his mouth again, probably to argue Dillon was upset, hysterical, or whatever else women were when they were wrong, but was saved from looking like an even bigger asshole when Rain lifted her hand to silence him.
“Preston, I've worked with
