Fire & Ice (The Locklaine Boys #1) (30 page)

“The same Pepper who once told you that getting a vasectomy should be your legal obligation in order to spare future generations the suffering of having to deal with your future offspring?
That
Pepper?”

“She can be a little… hostile at times,” I defended.

Richard rolled his eyes. “You don’t say.”

It was my turn to roll my eyes. “So are you gonna help me or not?”

“I don’t know if I should,” he surmised. I had to curl my fingers around the edge of the bar until my knuckles turned white to keep from lunging at him. I was pretty sure his mom wouldn’t be too happy with me if I murdered one of her sons.

“Why not?” I asked through clenched teeth? The muscle ticking in my jaw.

“Well, if she broke up with you, then she’s fair game. And if she’s
really
interested in Chance and wants to move on, who am I to deny her what she wants?” the smug bastard finished with a grin.

“She doesn’t want him, trust me. It was just a tiny misunderstanding. We’re going through a rough patch, that’s all. Everyone has them. If you think about it, allowing her to go out with Chance while she’s still carrying a torch for me is negligence on your part. You could have prevented the poor man from getting his heart broken when we inevitably get back together, but instead, you took the low road and acted like a shit head. Careless, Councilor,” I
tsked
. “Very careless.”

He opened his mouth to rebut when both of our phones sounded with incoming texts. I shifted on the barstool to pull mine from my back pocket as Richard whipped his out of his jacket.

“Well, looks like this whole conversation was pointless,” he said as his eyes danced across the screen of his phone, his forehead creasing in what appeared to be concern.

“Why’s that?” I asked as I slid my thumb across the screen of my phone and saw it was a mass text from Navie. I began reading at the same time Richard answered. “Because Pepper’s in the hospital.”

“THIS IS RIDICULOUS,” I
pouted and I leaned back into the uncomfortable, paper-thin mattress on the hospital bed. I started to cross my arms over my chest when a sharp pain radiated through my shoulder, reminding me of why I was in the hospital in the first place.

“It’s not ridiculous,” Navie admonished. “Now, for God’s sake, stop being difficult!”

“I’m not being difficult,” I argued and watched as Rowan pulled an increasingly agitated Navie back against his chest.

“You were mugged,” she stated bluntly. “You refused to give up your purse and the guy beat the hell out of you—”

“I’d hardly say he
beat the hell
out of me,” I scoffed, unwisely.

“He hit you in the face twice and knocked you out cold. He nearly dislocated your shoulder.
What the fuck would you call it
?!” my brother thundered from his place in the corner of my hospital room. Wendy was wrapped around his side, like she knew just how close to losing it my brother was.

I winced as my brother’s words echoed through my skull, and not because of the killer headache I had thanks to my asshole mugger… well, not
completely
anyway. I also felt terrible. One thing my dad and brother had always drilled into my head was, that if I were ever being mugged to give up my purse without a fight. The very first time I got mugged on the streets of Manhattan, what did I do? I fought. Like an idiot.

And all I got to show for it was a face covered in bruises, a shoulder that hurt like a mother fucker, and six stitches in my forehead from being pistol whipped by my assailant’s gun. When I shared that tidbit of information with Dex and stupidly informed him that, seeing as the guy had a gun in the first place, it could have been much worse, I thought that tiny vein pulsing in his forehead was going to explode. If my brother was that pissed at what I’d done, I could only imagine how bad I was going to get it from my father.

After regaining consciousness—I was only out for a few minutes—police were on the scene, and I was being loaded onto a gurney. Luckily there were still a handful of bystanders in New York who were willing to call 911 when a person was being robbed right in front of them. Despite my protests that I didn’t need to go to the hospital—especially by ambulance—the paramedics insisted, seeing as I’d blacked out for an undetermined amount of time.

I’d called Navie from the hospital when I got there: one, because I didn’t want everyone and their dog to find out what had happened, and I trusted her to keep her mouth shut—a mistake, and two, because hers was the only number I had memorized.

Apparently, while I’d been getting an MRI and having my forehead stitched closed, my so-called best friend had taken it upon herself to mass text our entire circle of friends. So much for not worrying people. By the time the nurse got me back to my room, my brother, Wendy, Rowan, Navie, and Tomas were all waiting for me, looking none-too-happy seeing as Navie had filled them in on my refusal to relinquish my Michael Kohrs bag when I had the chance.

They’d spent the last ten minutes in different states of upset as they let me know just how many years I’d taken off each of their lives. Between their guilt and the officers coming in to ask questions about the mugging, I’d started to hope for a big, gaping hole to open up and swallow me whole. At least that way I’d get some damn peace and quiet.

When the door to my room flew open just moments after I shot up my silent prayer, a deep frown settled across my sore face, and I knew God was looking down at me and laughing his ass off.

“Jesus fuckin’ Christ. What
were you thinking
?” Griffin bellowed as he stalked into the room, followed closely by Richard Locklaine, Rowan’s twin brother. The fierceness of his tone startled a jump out of me, and my gaze quickly flew around the room looking for someone who’d jump to my defense in the heat of Griffin’s unexpected anger. No such luck. The women in the room looked somewhat startled by his aggressive demeanor, while the men simply looked like they agreed with him, wholeheartedly… even the damned uniform officers who’d just finished taking my statement.

At the sight of Griffin standing next to my hospital bed, I felt renewed tears building behind my eyes. God, I missed him, but I
refused
cry in front of him. So instead, I resorted to my typical response when feeling backed into a corner—or just pissed the hell off—sarcasm.

“Well, at that moment I was thinking, ‘
Hmm, what can I do that would piss Griffin off enough to give him an aneurism today? I know! I’ll get mugged!
’”

“Not wise to be a smartass right about now, sweetness,” he said in a low, growled warning, those icy eyes of his flashing with something that made me swallow audibly. I’d never seen Griffin so wired in all the years I’d known him. Turning away from me, he looked at the two uniformed officers standing near the bathroom, both looking like they were trying their hardest to contain their laughter. “Do you have everything you need from her?”

“Yeah, Griff, we got everything,” one of them answered. Of
course
they knew him.

“Okay, good. You think of anything else, you can call me tomorrow, and I’ll get you whatever answers you’re looking for. For now, she needs her rest.”

“Uh, excuse me!” I snapped as Cop 1 gave Griffin a chin lift and Cop 2 muttered, “You got it man. Take care.” Then they both just left.

“What the hell, Griffin? You can’t just come in here and—”

I didn’t get any further in my rant before he leaned down and bit out, “When someone holding a
goddamned gun
demands your purse, you
do not fight back
! You give them the fucking
purse
! It’s a material possession, Pepper, not worth your fucking life. Buy a new one! ”

Gritting my teeth, I counted to ten, trying my best to get control over the riotous emotions flooding through me. Maybe it was the fact that I hadn’t seen Griffin in four days after he’d ripped my heart to shreds, maybe it was because I was overly emotional from the stupid mugging, maybe it was because there was some serious head trauma going on or a massive adrenaline rush, but whatever the reason, I felt warm tears brimming in my eyes. And to my abject horror, as Griffin continued to rage, the tears fell free and I broke into huge, trembling sobs right there in front of everyone.

Son of a bitch
!

“It wasn’t about the purse, okay?!” I shouted at the top of my lungs, sending sharp bolts of pain through my aching head.

“Then what was it about?” he continued to yell. “What could possibly be so important you’d do something so stupid?”

“Your note was in there, all right? You happy now?”

“Uh… I think maybe we’ll give you guys a minute. We’ll just be out in the hallway,” I heard Dex murmur uncomfortably before the sounds of everyone shuffling to the door filled the room. My big brother never was one to handle women’s tears very well.

“Oh, hellz no,” Tomas declared. “This, right here, is better than my stories. No way I’m missing it, honey child.”

“I’ll grant you five uninterrupted minutes of staring at Rowan if you don’t make a scene,” Navie offered.

“Deal,” Tomas said with a clap of his hands.

“Fuck my life,” Rowan mumbled under his breath. Then everyone was gone.

I probably should have kept my mouth shut once the two of us were alone, but I was too far gone to stop and think about what I was saying. The flood gates had opened. It was verbal diarrhea at its worst.

“I know it’s pathetic, but I’ve been carrying that stupid fucking note around for four years. At first it was just to remind me how much I hated you—but then you told me the truth about that night and it started to mean something different. I know I should have just given the asshole my purse, okay? Rationally, I know that, I mean, look at my face, for Christ’s sake, do you have any idea how painful it is to be pistol-whipped? That shit hurts! But all I could think was that note was all I had left of you and you’ve already broken my heart
twice
. I didn’t want to lose that, too.”

I was out of breath by the time I finished my long winded, and utterly humiliating, rant. I could feel the heat in my cheeks underneath the bruises.

Griffin’s voice had lost all of its harshness as he said, “Pepper,” in a quiet tone.

“What?” I snapped, looking anywhere but at him.

“Sweetness, will you look at me, please?” I felt his fingers under my chin when I didn’t grant his request. He applied gentle pressure, forcing my head up until I was looking directly into his eyes. His face had grown soft, concern replacing the earlier fury that had been etched into every line. “Christ, you’re killing me, baby,” he whispered as he brushed the tears from my face with his thumb, leaning in so close I could feel his breath whisper against my cheek.

“Yeah, well, I could have died over a fucking note, so screw you and your skanky new girlfriend.”

He opened his mouth to say something, only to be interrupted when the hospital room door swung open and an older man in a white lab coat comes through, his eyes scanning the charts in his hands.

“Well,” the doctor declared lightly. “Good news is you only strained the muscles in your shoulder. My guess is it happened when the man tried to snatch your purse and you held on, the exertion wrenched your shoulder, causing the muscles to pull. It’s going to hurt for the next few days, but there won’t be any long lasting damage.”

“That’s good.” I sighed with relief. “So when can I get out of here?”

The doctor lowered the charts and met my eyes. “That’s the not so great news. The scans show that you definitely have a concussion, which is expected considering you were hit in the head hard enough to be knocked unconscious. Normally, that wouldn’t be an issue. We’d send you home with instructions for someone to check on you every hour, but since you explained to the nurse that you live alone, I’d feel more comfortable that we keep you overnight for observation. It’s strictly precautionary.”

“I just want to go home,” I whined at the same time Griffin said, “She’s coming home with me.”

“
What
?”

“Oh, fantastic,” the doctor said. “In that case, I’ll get your discharge papers ready and get you out of here.”