Page 8 of Love Over Easy

“Ha! I am the law here. Now take it off. I’m not leaving until you do. I’m not having you come back and say I denied you treatment if you are injured.”

She stares me down and doesn’t budge an inch. She has a great death glare. It’s really cute the way her nose turns up.

I blow out a breath of frustration and rub the back of my neck. Fine. I will concede, for tonight. “Listen, we’re both tired. Get some sleep, but tomorrow I want answers.”

I back out of the cell and shut the door. I don’t bother locking it. Where would she run to? This is an island and, besides, she won’t be able to get by me. I’m a light sleeper.

I grab a blanket from the closet and stretch out on the couch. There’s no way out except by me. I’ve only just settled when I start feeling guilty for not giving her a blanket and turning the light off. I get up, grab another blanket, and walk to the back. I smirk when I see she has indeed taken her hoodie off. But then my stomach threatens to erupt when I see…

“What the fuck happened to you!” I roar and yank open the cell door. What I can see of her body is a mass of black and blue. She shrieks and whips around, her eyes wide with fright. I hold my hands up in surrender, step out of the cell, and mask my anger at whoever did that to her. She’s been through enough. My God, what does it look like under her tank top and pants?

I take a deep breath to steady myself. She doesn’t need my loud tone or anger, even if it isn’t pointed towards her. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you. I thought you might like a blanket. Honey, is whoever did that to you looking for you? Is that who hit me?”

She holds her ribs and gingerly sits on the cot, wrapping her arm across her torso. Her shoulders sag. “No,” she says and I hear the exhaustion in her voice.

“I’m going to go call the doctor and have you checked out.”

I start to leave to do just that, but she says, “No. Don’t do that. I’m fine. If…if you have some ibuprofen, that’s all I need. My ribs are just sore.”

I swallow the bile in my throat and force a calm demeanor. “They could be broken.”

She shakes her head. “They aren’t. I know they aren’t,” she quickly affirms.

It makes my stomach heave to realize she knows the difference. I am going to find whoever did this to her and they are going to regret touching her. My shoulders slump when I think of how I’ve treated her. She may have broken into the Randall’s house, but it’s obvious she needed to.

I approach her slowly and lower my voice. “Come on, honey. Let’s go back to my house. I have plenty of extra bedrooms and you’ll be much more comfortable there.”

She laughs and then bites her lip to keep from crying out in pain. “I’m not going to your house. Do you think I’m stupid?”

I wait until she’s looking at me and say, “No. I think you are a survivor and I want to give you a soft place to land that’s safe from whoever did that to you.”

Her brows pull together making a sweet V just above the top of her nose. I want to ease her stress with my thumb. “Why?”

Has she never known kindness? “Because it looks like you could use a friend. I promise no one will ever hurt you again.”

She looks down at her hands and I know she doesn’t believe me. But she doesn’t know me. For the first time, I realize the hoodie is gone from her head and I can clearly see her face. She’s gorgeous. Naturally beautiful. She has not one bit of makeup on and her complexion is clear and creamy and looks soft. I want to reach out and discover if it truly is.

Her nose is perfectly proportioned for her face and is straight with a slight upward tilt at the end. I can’t decide if her eyes are a clear striking blue or more like a sea blue. Her lips draw my attention to their pink heart-shaped bow. Her flat brown hair is the only thing that looks out of place. That color doesn’t look like it fits her beautiful face.

She can’t be more than five and a half feet tall, but every inch of her appears to be tight and ripped. Her upper arms are developed with impressive muscles like she works out a lot.

I want to rip the tank off her body, anxious to discover if the rest of her is just as tight.

I close my eyes to keep from groaning out loud. She’s off-limits. She needs my kindness, not my lustful attraction. She follows me out of the office and as I secure the door she gets in the truck.

The trip home is quiet and uneventful. I’m not surprised when she falls asleep soon after we leave town. Once I pull in the driveway and cut the engine, she doesn’t wake. I could carry her inside, but figure that might scare her or make her panic. Instead, I gently touch her shoulder.

She startles awake, her eyes void of recognition until she turns my way. She gives me a tiny grin. “I guess I fell asleep.”

“Come on. Let’s go in and I’ll show you to your room.” I remind myself again that I should not be thinking about fucking my ex-prisoner, my roommate, a woman I know absolutely nothing about.

* * *

Once I have her tucked in my sister Jenny’s old room, I wait until almost dawn to make sure she’s asleep. I set the security alarm and let myself out of the house and make the trek on foot back to the Randall’s house. I let myself in using the key hidden under a rock in the flower bed by the door.

I have no idea what I expect to find. Her accomplice. A trashed house. Clues to her identity and where she is from. The name of the person who beat her. I am sorely disappointed. The downstairs hasn’t been disturbed at all. I wonder if I’d prevented her from entering the house.

Upstairs, in the back bedroom, I find her things. A worn, black backpack, a small canvas suitcase that looks more like an oversized gym bag, and a plastic bag that she used to store her trash. A thoughtful, clean robber? As far as breaking and entering goes, she’s the neatest felon I’ve ever seen. The bed is bare. No sheets, or blankets. She must have slept on the bare mattress.

As much as I hate invading her privacy, I put her rucksack on the bed and unzip it. Inside, neatly folded, I find jeans, tanks, shorts, a few sundresses, a lot of expensive workout clothes, and underwear. I don’t linger over that because I don’t want to come across as a creeper.

There’s a toiletry bag that has the normal toothbrush, toothpaste, brush, comb, razor, shaving cream, some clear lip gloss. What I find incredibly unbelievable is there’s not a single tube of lipstick, hair product, or makeup. That is highly suspect. My sister wouldn’t go anywhere without the basics.

I find a plastic grocery bag filled with apples, bananas, chips, candy bars, and a few dozen protein bars. A strange diet for a burglar.

As I’m putting her things back into the case, I feel a lump on the side. I dig a little further and I discover a zipper pocket. When I open it, I sink down onto the mattress as I pull out handfuls of money packs. Packs of hundreds. I count the money. She has over fifty thousand dollars. At the bottom of the pocket, I find a rolled-up black cloth. I know what it is before I even open it. These are professional tools used to pick locks.

I’m devastated. I wanted her to be innocent. Did she steal the money from whoever beat her? If she did, can I look the other way? I know the answer—I can’t.

I put the money back and take her things with me. I leave them on the counter in my kitchen for a conversation I don’t want to have when she wakes. It’s already six so there’s no need to try to get any sleep now. I get a pot of coffee going and head upstairs to take a cold shower to wake me up.

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