Page 12 of Inflame Me
I focus back on Dagger. I hate not having any control. It may just drive me to the brink of insanity at this point. Wait, I’m already there.
“The house. You locked it up and turned off the lights?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Did you do anything else? Move him or anything?”
I cringe, thinking of his lifeless body surrounded by a pool of blood. “I didn’t touch him after I figured out he was dead.” Bile rises in my throat, and I choke it down.
Mom’s eyes close, and the soft rise and fall of her chest tells me she’s asleep. So peaceful. So unhurt.
“Good. Need the address, and I’ll get it taken care of.”
My eyes flip to his confident ones. “How in the world will you do that?”
“That, my dear, is none of your business. Me and the boys will handle it.”
I shake my head back and forth vigorously. “Don’t you get that he’s a well-respected police officer there? You can’t just cover it up. You can put lipstick on a pig, but it’s still a pig!” My voice raises, and I instantly clamp my hand over my mouth, not wanting to wake up my mother.
“Tanner, it’s taken care of,” Dagger says. “Now this you-being-my daughter thing … I’ll be talking to your mother about that once I get back.”
Wait. What?
“Where are you going?”
“I have to clean up this little mess. We’ll roll out and be back in before ya know it.”
He’s going to roll out?
“You’re going all the way to Tennessee?” I ask, and Dagger nods his head.
“All right, what the hell is going on now?” A beautiful woman with dark hair and red streaks comes into the room carrying a tackle box. What, is she going fishing?
“Princess, Tanner. Tanner, Princess,” Dagger introduces us almost robotically.
I give a small wave with a “hi,” and she does the chin lift thing. That seems to be a universal sign around here.
“Need you to look over Mearna when she wakes up and Tanner now,” Dagger tells Princess.
“I’m fine,” I say, instantly rising up from the floor. Dizziness assaults me, and two large hands grip my sides, holding me up and steadying me. His touch is like a fire I’ve never felt. It’s hot, but it burns so deeply it radiates though my body. “I’m … fine,” I say on an exhale after catching my breath.
“Sure you are. I’m fine. You’re fine. The world is fine. Sit in the chair and let me check you over,” Princess says, coming toward me.
I have to say, she is definitely intimidating, so I listen and sit.
“Where does it hurt?” she asks, touching my arm in a spot that doesn’t hurt.
I chuckle. “Probably the only place it doesn’t ache is where you’re touching right now.”
The men in the room move off to the side and begin talking in hushed tones.
“So who won the fight?” she asks.
“He’s dead, so you tell me.” My eyes grow wide. I cannot believe I just said that to her. Oh, my God. A perfect stranger and I just blurted that out? Someone please shut me up.
She laughs, a full-out, throw her head back laugh. I don’t know if I’m relieved or scared shitless.
“Sounds like you did, then. Need you to go in the bathroom and wash all that shit off your face. You did a pretty good job covering it all.”
