Page 107 of The Kings of Kearny

“I will,” she said.

My hands itched with the desire to curl into fists. “Can you excuse me for just a second?”

Gran waved me off, saying, “Sure, kiddo,” but Dr. Perez eyed me for a long moment before nodding. She was a good read of people—it was what landed her in trouble in the first place—and she must have seen something in my expression that worried her.

I broke her gaze and beelined for the door before I gave anything else away.

The guard shot me a questioning look when I reemerged from the room.

“I just need to step away and make a phone call,” I told him. “I’ll be right back.”

He nodded. “You’ll need to go outside. They’re pretty strict about cell phone usage in here.”

“Okay, thanks,” I said, heading toward the elevators.

One of the nurses at the station, a plump middle-aged black woman who’d been helping Dr. Perez the past few days, recognized me and smiled. “Hey, Krista.”

I forced myself to smile back at her. “Hi, Michelle.”

“Here to see the doctor?”

“Yup. Just need to make a quick call.” I widened my grin a bit, coaching myself to act normal. “You lend her that bodice ripper?”

Michelle barked a laugh and pushed her short braids back from her face. “Lend? Honey, I wheeled our mobile library up to her, and she picked it out herself.”

“I knew it.”

“Don’t tease her too hard now,” Michelle said.

I snapped her a salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

Michelle’s laughter faded as I stepped into the elevator. No one else was in it with me, and I dropped my mask the second the doors closed and indulged in some low-level growling. I was pretty sure that if I let out the scream that threatened, someone would hear it and come running. Fucking Redding. That goddamn shit had slipped through Nick’s fingers, and if Redding was vindictive enough to go after Danielten yearsafter Daniel wronged him, I had no doubt that he was coming back to Kearny to finish what he started here.

No fucking way would I let that happen.

I punched the ground floor button and stepped back to wait. The walls around me were steel, so shiny that I saw my reflection in them. I looked scary. My eyes were wild. The left side of my lips kept trying to curl up into a snarl. The hospital was only six stories tall, and Dr. Perez’s room was at the top. I spent all six of those stories, entertaining a brief but vivid fantasy of dismembering Redding piece by piece with my bare hands. Maybe I could hide him away somewhere in one of the Kings’ forgotten warehouses. If I took my time, I could drag it out formonths.

A chime sounded when I reached the bottom floor, and I did my best to school my features before walking through the lobby. My phone was at my ear the second I stepped outside.

“Pick up. Pick up,” I said.

Over a week had passed since I’d stormed out of the Larsons’ house. In that time, Gran and I had gotten a little R & R at Iliza’s farm, I’d found a new apartment, settled Gran back into a now Joker-free Magnolia, and gone back to work at Charley’s. Jakob and I hadn’t spoken that entire time—he was giving me the space I asked for—but every night I worked, without fail, he came to the bar. He sent a flunky to order his drinks, staying put in a booth in the back. His eyes never left me. I could feel their intensity every minute of every shift.

Other people had started to notice. They knew something was up between us, but since neither Jakob nor I would tell them what, they were left to make their own assumptions. Apparently the assumption was that I’d done something to piss the Viking off, and now people were avoiding me like the plague, which I would have welcomed if not for the fact that it meant that hardly anyone was ordering drinks from me, so my tips had plummeted. Good thing I still had a couple of grand left over from Liam’s check squirreled away. I could live off of that until people came back to their senses and realized that Jakob wouldn’t kill them just for speaking to me.

The phone rang several times before Jakob picked up. “Your two weeks aren’t up yet,” he said. “You throwing in the towel early, Evans?”

I ignored his goading and got right to the point. “Redding made bail.”

He sucked in a sharp breath. And then he laughed. “Halle-fucking-lujah.”

The line went dead.

I pulled my phone away and stared down at the screen. I had four bars, so I didn’t drop the call. Jakob must have hung up on me.

I called him back. He didn’t pick up. I tried texting him.

What are you going to do? I want in!

---