Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 95080 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 475(@200wpm)___ 380(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 95080 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 475(@200wpm)___ 380(@250wpm)___ 317(@300wpm)
“Get a maid. I’m sure you can afford one now that you’re working at an actual practice and not at County anymore.”
“That’s not what I need.”
I nodded.
“Could you please come out to the patio so I can look at you?”
“I dunno if I can afford you now that you’ve moved uptown.”
He leaned close to my ear. “I’ll take a kiss in payment.”
“That sounds a bit steep,” I told him. He opened his mouth to argue, but I patted his shoulder to stop him. “I’ll meet you out there. I gotta pee first.”
His smile made his eyes glow. “Hurry up.”
I got up, told the girls to guard the table, and headed to the bathroom. It was on the other side of the club, behind the dance floor. The door was heavy when I pushed on it, and the inside was smaller than I anticipated. There were no urinals, and most of the stalls were backed up. I found a working one near the back, and when I was done, I hunted for soap at the sink closest to the door, which looked the cleanest. Standing there, I had an epiphany: I would have much rather stayed home and watched movies on my couch. I was completely over this whole scene.
“It’s official,” I told my reflection, smiling at the brown eyes and hair I saw in the mirror. “My club days are over.”
“Yes,” a voice said, startling me. I’d thought I was alone. I heard the squeak of a stall door, and when I looked that way to laugh with whomever it was, all I saw was a mask.
I only had time to gasp before everything went black.
FOUR
Who the hell was that?
Jolting awake, I would have sat up if there weren’t hands there immediately to soothe and comfort me.
“Baby, you’re okay.”
But I wasn’t, clearly, because I was in the hospital. White walls, the cold, the smell of antiseptic, the bed I was in, everything let me know I was hurt. I had a tube in my arm as well, which was probably responsible for the lack of pain, which I knew I should have been in because I’d been hit. The first time I’d ever been in the hospital, when I was nine and fell out of the tree in our backyard, the feeling had been the same. Only really good drugs got administered through an IV.
Turning my head, I found Breckin leaning down to wrap his arms around me. I grabbed hold of him hard, clinging, closing my eyes, breathing him in.
“You’re all right,” he assured me, his voice a husky whisper against my ear. “I promise you’re okay. Everything’s fine.”
I nodded but couldn’t stop making a funny noise in the back of my throat. It was like when you’re crying hard and winding down, the sniffling part that usually won’t stop.
“I’m right here.”
But that wasn’t comforting. I was still scared. I didn’t feel safe.
“You’re okay now. I’m here,” he repeated.
He took a seat beside me on the larger-than-normal bed and leaned me against him, trying, I knew, to give me solace. It was really very kind. But when Alex came striding into the room with a Styrofoam cup, I felt much better.
“Christ, Tracy, you scared the fuckin’ shit outta me. Again,” my brother griped as he set the cup down, then came around the bed and leaned down to gather me in his arms.
I pulled away from Breckin quickly, needing family comfort, and was surprised when that too didn’t take away the hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach.
I hugged Alex as hard as I could, and he held on to my hand when he straightened up. Courtney and April rushed the bed then, and each took a turn squeezing my other hand. Ira came last, and patted my shoulder. Matt came in not long after. He too held a Styrofoam cup, having gone for badly flavored beverages from a vending machine just like my brother. When he and Eric crossed the room to me, I knew from their faces that whatever I looked like was bad.
“What?” I asked Eric, knowing that the man who did the sports on Channel Five at six and eleven weekdays would give me the straight scoop.
“Were you beaten up?” he asked bluntly. “No one knows what happened but you.”
“I dunno,” I said, looking over at Breckin. “Was I?”
“You were hit with something,” he answered, standing up and shoving his hands in the pockets of his jeans. “Something heavy, like a bat or a club.”
I looked at Alex. “Did they catch the guy?”
He shook his head. “Of course not,” he said, his angry tone giving him away. “Nobody saw a fuckin’ thing.”
Knowing him as I did, I knew he was blaming himself. “You do realize that even if you’d stayed, you couldn’t have prevented what happened. I mean, can you remember the last time we peed together when we weren’t camping?”