Flash Point (Kilgore Fire Book 2) (21 page)

“You’re scaring me,” I rasped, my belly starting to make twists and turns that weren’t conducive to holding my breakfast down.

“You’ve already scared me,” he countered. “Do you have any idea what it’s like to know you’re responding to a call that involves your woman?”

“I don’t have a woman,” I informed him.

My levity in this situation didn’t go over well with him.

“Shut it,” he ordered. “Save your strength.”

I glared at him or his forehead anyway.

“What happened?” I asked, voice a little stronger now.

My voice sounded terrible, almost as if I’d been throat punched.

“Pain meds are working,” Booth suddenly barked, lifting his head completely from mine and staring at someone over the length of my body.

“Good,” another man replied, it was a voice I didn’t quite recognize at this moment in time.

Although that might have been because of the pain meds that Booth said were working.

My head felt like it was floating.

“The mom wants to ride to the hospital with her,” another unfamiliar voice cut in.

“Let her,” Booth said. “I’ll take lead on this.”

“You’re not taking lead,” another countered. “We haven’t done the narcotics transfer yet, and I don’t feel like getting my ass handed to me by the chief.”

I smiled at Booth’s glare.

“Let them do their job. Why are you here already, anyway?” I asked.

I’d left him getting ready for work, and he should have been there by now.

“You’d already left. What was the point in me staying at home when it’s empty?” He asked me, sounding tired and sad.

I frowned at him, or tried to. I wasn’t sure my face was working correctly.

“Unfair.”

He grinned and pressed his lips to my forehead.

“Nothing’s fair in love and war,” he countered.

“Is my face working?” I asked him.

He blinked.

“What do you mean?” He asked, looking slightly alarmed.

“Am I drooling?” I clarified.

He shook his head. “No, are you trying to?”

I sighed.

“You’re not being very fair, here. Usually I would smack you, but I don’t think my hands are working at the moment,” I said, slightly annoyed.

“Your hands aren’t working because they’re strapped down to the back board underneath of you,” Tai cut in, making me turn my head to him.

“What are you doing here?” I asked. “You’re supposed to be with Mia.”

“I’m here, too,” Mia said softly.

She sounded like she was crying.

“I can’t see you,” I told her. “Come into the light.”

Mia’s watery giggle had me smiling…
I hoped.

Mia appeared and not long after my mother did as well.

“Why are y’all not at work?” I asked my mom, startled.

“I was leaving when you…you know,” she gestured to me with her hand, encompassing all of my body.

“Do you think maybe y’all can back up and let me do my job?” A frustrated man’s voice asked, the same one that said he wouldn’t be letting Booth take lead.

Everyone backed up, and I turned my eyes to the new guy.

“Who are you?” I asked him, licking my lips when my voice cracked.

He was hot. Not in a cute way, though, but more like a ‘holy shit he’s sexy’ way. The man could easily pass for Thor, sans beard.

“I’m Frank,” he replied shortly.

I blinked at his attitude.

“You don’t look like a Frank,” I informed him.

I never knew when to shut up.

“Yeah?” He asked. “What do I look like?”

Was that a smile I heard in his voice?

It couldn’t be. The man didn’t look like he ever smiled.

“A butch, or a Thor or something,” I tried.

Yep, that’s exactly what I said.

To the man that looked like he could break me in half if he had a mind to do so.

Frank smiled at me, then turned his gaze to Booth who was still at my head.

“Pick her up in three,” he said. “One, two, three.”

I was lifted up and put onto the gurney that was directly beside the backboard.

I’d never once been in this position before, and I found myself not enjoying it half as much as I thought I would.

“When I was fantasizing about you, Booth,” I said, drawing Booth’s attention. “It was never supposed to be this way.”

“What?” Booth asked, a smile in his voice.

“Well,” I said as they wheeled me to the back of the ambulance. “I had these ideas,” I slurred as my eyes drifted closed. “They involved you and me in the back of an ambulance.”

“Oh yeah?” Laughter was now making his words shaky.

“Yeah,” I confirmed without opening my eyes. “You were supposed to say you had to check to make sure I was wearing clean panties.”

“Masen Crisfield,” my mother said sharply. “Stop talking, please.”

I grinned.

“You know, mom,” I said. “I’m not a virgin anymore. And I haven’t been since I was seventeen.”

My mother sighed and Booth laughed.

Frank’s rumbled laugh had me opening my eyes.

“What?” I looked at him.

“You’re feeling nice and loose, aren’t you?” He guessed.

I tried to nod, but the thing they had around my neck held me immobile. “That’s right. You may call me Loosey Goosey.”

Booth leaned down and took my hand, stretching it out in between his legs, and then prepared to start an IV on me.

“Don’t forget that…” I said.

He glared at me.

“I know your veins roll, woman,” he growled with exasperation.

I snorted. “No, I was going to say that my bags are all still in the back of the truck.”

He shook his head.

“That wasn’t what you were going to say,” he countered. “Now shut up.”

I smiled and closed my eyes again, flinching slightly when the biggest needle on this side of Texas was poked into my veins.

“Jesus,” I opened my eyes to glare at Booth. “Did you really have to use the biggest needle you had?”

He raised his eyebrows at me. “Actually,” he said. “I used an eighteen gauge on you. I could’ve gone bigger if you’d wanted me to, though.”

I wrinkled my nose at him.

“Do you think I have anything broken?” I asked him.

His eyes went serious.

“I don’t know,” he answered truthfully. “There’s a very good chance that you do. If nothing else, we know you have a concussion.”

I pursed my lips.

“Will you wipe my nose?” I asked him.

He did.

“Blow,” he ordered.

I did.

“That’s kind of weird,” my mother offered. “I don’t think your father has ever blown my nose.”

“That’s ‘cause you’re weird,” I told her.

It was a great comeback, let me tell you.

My mother chuckled, leaning forward to look over me.

“You were almost killed,” she looked into my eyes, grief all encompassing.

“I wasn’t, though,” I argued. “I was gearing up to really put a hurting on him.”

My mother snorted.

“Yeah, that’s exactly what it looked like when you were curled in the fetal position,” she said dryly.

I shrugged.

“I was getting to it,” I muttered. “I’m Superman, after all.”

“Is that right?” She asked.

I smiled.

“No one’s ever seen him and me in the same room, you know,” I explained.

She rolled her eyes.

“Her vitals are a little low,” Frank offered his two cents. “Still within the normal range, but definitely on the low side.”

Booth grunted in reply, making me turn to study him.

“What?” I asked him.

“Nothing,” he growled.

I closed my eyes.

Then, fell into a drug induced sleep.

Booth

Masen: I miss you

I smiled as I looked down at my phone, but it was wiped off moments later when I looked at Luke as he walked towards the station.

I crossed my arms, but my phone buzzed again, making me take a quick glance at it.

Masen: Sorry, that was my vagina.

I snorted, typing out a quick reply, then returned my attention back to the man that was now standing in front of me.

“You ready to talk now?” He wanted to know.

I nodded, not saying anything.

“Got the camera pictures,” he held his hand up, showing me the memory card. “I sent them to your email if you’re interested in seeing them,” Luke added.

I nodded again, still not saying anything.

“Tai told me that they’re holding her overnight,” Luke continued.

I nodded in agreement.

“I also have a neighbor two doors down from the Crisfield’s residence that has a live camera feed on his house because he’s been having packages come up missing over the last couple of weeks,” he fisted his hand. “I’ve asked him for those, but he’s had to call the company to request them, and expects them to get back to him within a couple of hours.”

That was the best news I’d heard since I’d left the hospital and the doctor said Masen would be just fine.

“Okay,” I clipped. “Now what?”

“Now you get your protection since it’s no longer petty theft,” he apologized.

“She doesn’t need protection anymore. I’ll do it or one of my boys will do it. What you need to do is figure out who the fuck did this,” I countered, slightly annoyed.

But I couldn’t help it.

If Luke had done something instead of saying his hands were tied, then we wouldn’t be in this position right now.

I wouldn’t have had to run a call on my woman only hours before, scaring about twenty years of my life off of me.

“I understand,” Luke sighed. “I’ll keep you updated on our progress. I just wanted to touch base with you, and keep you in the loop.”

I grudgingly offered him my hand.

“Thanks,” I grunted.

“You’re welcome,” he said, turning to go.

“What would you do had it been your wife?” I asked.

He shook his head, turning around long enough to say, “I don’t know. I can say that I’d do whatever the fuck I had to do to figure out who was behind this.”

“And you’ll let me?” I asked him.

He nodded. “I would expect nothing less. Just don’t get caught doing anything stupid.”

I grinned. “Got it.”

With one final visit to Masen to ensure she was sleeping, I went to the neighbor’s house that had the live camera feed and waited.

What I should’ve been doing, however, was watching over my soon to be wife and not fucking around waiting.

If I had been, I would’ve been there to protect her from the sick fuck that came after her a second time.

People need to understand the difference between want and need. Such as I want a shapely ass, but I need that supersized fry.

-Masen’s secret thoughts

Masen

My eyes, swollen as they were, opened what little they could.

When I’d been beaten with the bat earlier, one hit had rained down on the top of my head before I could fully get it covered. I’d been left with swelling that started to overtake my face, even though I hadn’t actually been hit in the face.

The sound of the door opening and then closing had me turning my head, making me thankful that they’d finally taken the collar off my neck, enabling me to do so.

I tried to focus my eyes, but it was dark in the room, and the only lights were coming from the hallway through the cracks of the closed door.

I could vaguely make out a black shape, making my heart start to race.

“Booth?” I asked, sounding hopeful.

“Wrong,” a man’s voice said.

A familiar one, but I couldn’t place it.

“Who are you?” I asked.

Then something covered my mouth, and I breathed in to scream out of reflex, which turned out to be the wrong thing to do.

The towel that was over my mouth had something on it, and in the next instant I was out of it.

I came awake slowly, almost as if I was still under but not quite.

What had woken me?

Then I heard it again. Shuffling.

“Hello?” I asked.

Everything hurt.

I patted around on the bed I was laying in, but I didn’t find the button that would call the nurse.

I’d always wanted to be on this side of the bed, not because I wished myself sick, but because I always wondered what it would be like to have someone at the other end of my button.

But I didn’t find the button.

In fact, I didn’t find anything.

Not the phone that’d been there earlier. Not the bedding that Booth had piled on top of me before he’d left to go to the neighbor’s house. Not even the water bottle he’d been sure to leave at my side.

Not a damn thing was there except a mattress.

“Hello?” I called again, confusion in my tone.

“God, would you shut up? You’re making it to where I can’t think,” the same familiar voice from earlier whined.

My eyes widened as my mind raced.

What was going on?

“What did you do to me?” I asked, remembering the foul smell just before lights out.

There was shuffling again, then a light turned on beside the bed I was laying on.

“Don’t flatter yourself, Masen. This has nothing to do with you and everything to do with my family,” Dash growled. “I’ve got stuff at stake that you couldn’t fathom, and I can’t have you ruining it with your stupid bitch mouth.”

I blinked, surprised at Dash’s outburst.

I’d never, not once, heard him talk to me like that.

“Can you tell me what’s going on?” I pleaded.

He turned his glare on me, letting me feel all of his displeasure in that one, single look.

“I told you,” he repeated, turning back to the empty wall he’d been staring at. “I’m busy.”

He was busy.

It sure looked like he was busy.

He got up and looked out the window, staring at something I couldn’t see.

“Your man’s blocking the mailbox,” Dash growled.

I blinked, surprised that we were anywhere near where my ‘man’ would be.

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

He hissed at me.

“Shut up!” He grabbed his head with both hands, but held onto the blinds as he did, shaking the entire window treatment with the force
of his head hitting it. “God, would you stop talking?”

I hadn’t said anything in well over fifteen seconds since his
whatever
had started. I wasn’t sure what to call what he was doing at that moment in time.