Page 26 of Killer Kiss

“Then why would you assume I do? I’m not sick. I don’t have allergies. I’m not the mother of a snotty-nosed, dirty-fingered two-year-old.” I had the scarf I was knitting for Fawn, but I wasn’t about to ruin that. It had taken me hours to pick up all the stitches I’d lost when I’d used the needle as a weapon.

My head really was bleeding though. It was running down my neck in a little river of red. Dammit.

Augie pulled off his T-shirt, revealing a tight set of abs I would have drooled over if my head hadn’t been suddenly throbbing like a motherfucker. Even with it, my gaze trailed involuntarily over the ridges and lines of his stomach.

“Here,” he offered, holding out the shirt. “Use this.”

“I’m fine.”

His hand dropped to rest on the center console, and he rolled his eyes. “Just take it. You’re getting blood everywhere. Jesus Christ.”

I snatched the shirt from his grasp because he wasn’t wrong. I was smearing blood all over anything I touched. “Shut up. It’s not like it’s your car. You aren’t the one cleaning it.” But I pressed his shirt to my wound and let it soak up some of the blood.

Augie leaned out the door and shouted to the bouncer, “Terry! Can you get us a first aid kit, please?”

“You all good?” the older man called back.

“Yeah, I’m fine, but Fawn’s sister is as clumsy as she is.”

My mouth dropped open at the insult. Fawn, as much as I loved her, was not the most coordinated person. It was part of what made her working at a strip club so unbelievable. I didn’t even know she could dance. But then, I was beginning to realize there was a lot about my sister that she’d kept from me. That stung almost as much as my head did. “I am not clumsy,” I protested.

“The way you just smashed your head says otherwise. Move the shirt. Let me see it.”

I found myself doing as he’d asked. My brain pounded in protest.

He winced. “I don’t know what you hit your head on that was sharp enough to cause that, but you need to get yourself to a hospital. That needs medical attention.”

“No.” I didn’t have time for all the fuss of doctors, and them asking for ID and insurance. I didn’t even want to think about what Riddick would do if I just didn’t show up. I doubted anyone had ever disobeyed him before. As much as it pissed me off that he was calling the shots, it was something I was going to have to just go along with for now until I worked out some way of getting him off my back.

Augie paused, and I braced myself for a barrage of questions. But they didn’t come.

He just shrugged. “You gonna let me stitch it then?”

I recoiled at the thought as Terry came back with a first aid kit and a worried-looking Eve behind him. She clapped her hand over her mouth at the sight of Augie’s blood-covered shirt. Which really made the whole situation seem worse than it actually was. Head wounds bled a lot. I’d had enough of them to know that.

“Holy shit!” Eve gasped. “What happened!”

“She’s fine,” Augie said at the same time I claimed the same thing.

Eve slapped his shoulder. “She’s not fine. She needs stitches.”

“I just told her that.”

Eve leaned in around Augie’s shoulder and squinted at me. “He’s good. Let him stitch it.”

I pulled my hand away from the injury again and instantly felt a new flood of blood. “Shit,” I muttered.

He was right. It wasn’t closing up. It needed stitching. Or glue. I didn’t have time to go to the hospital and get it done. Riddick was going to murder me. Quite possibly literally.

I gave in. “Fine. Whatever. Just do it quick. I have somewhere to be.”

Augie took the first aid kit from Terry’s fingers and nodded at him and Eve. “Go. There’re people lining up. I’ve got her.”

That annoying tingle down my spine came again at his words. Nobody ever had me. I never needed them to. I had myself. Relying on others only got you in situations you couldn’t control.

But for the tiniest of seconds, some stupid caveman-level, damsel-in-distress bullshit liked the way those words had sounded.

“For fuck’s sake,” I muttered to myself. “Get a grip.”

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