Page 47 of Dolls & Daggers
“Come on.” Dove tugs my arm, pressing an ice-filled bag to my lip. “Let’s get you home.”
“You didn’t haveto do that, you know,” Dove murmurs, pressing a rose-shaped, raspberry-and-mint-infused ice cube—because that’s all she has—to my lip. I wince slightly from the sting but refuse to show her any real weakness. I rushed in to be her knight in shining armor; I shouldn’t be crying over a simple cut.
Ryan got me good, though, splitting my lower lip open so badly that Dove tried dragging me to the hospital for stitches. But I didn’t want to sit in a stuffy waiting room full of sick people and overworked nurses too sleep-deprived to bother with a kind bedside manner.
I just wanted to go home. Apparently, that meant her place. I’m not mad about it.
Fang sets a paw in my lap, begging for attention, but before I can scoop the rat up, Dove gently shoos him away. “Your big, bad friend is hurting right now, baby boy. We have to nurse him back to health.”
Suddenly, my brain is filled with images of Dove in a slutty little nurse costume, and a groan escapes my throat—which she mistakes for something else entirely.
“You really shouldn’t have started shit with him,” she repeats for the umpteenth time since we left the bar, letting me take the ice from her.
“Duly noted. Next time, I’ll leave you to the two-hundred-pound beefcake whose sole mission is to let his dudebros gangbang you,” I mutter, slowly massaging the cube around my lip.
Dove sits back on her knees, huffing air out of her nose like a tiny, angry dragon. I imagine sparkly pink smoke curling from her nostrils, infusing the air withglittering fury. “I still can’t believe he said that. He totally had me fooled, and usually, I’m a pretty good judge of character.”
Yes, I told her exactly why things went down the way they did. She also made no fewer than three calls to every police contact she had to report him for gross misconduct—even though, technically, I started it.
She pushes off the couch, arms crossed, one bare foot tapping against the floor as she stares at the wall. “I am a little proud of the Olympic blowjob reference, though. Iamcompetitive in sports,” she muses.
I can’t help but laugh, wincing when the smile that threatens to split my lip all over again widens too far.
“Poor songbird.” She sticks out her bottom lip mockingly. “That’s what you get for being mean to me.”
“Meanto you?” I repeat incredulously, tugging at my collar. Despite the ice against my skin, her apartment is stifling. I abandon the cube on a coaster and stand, shrugging off my jacket and tossing it over the arm of her couch before yanking my tie loose and unfastening the top three buttons of my shirt.
Dove hops onto a stool by the island, propping her chin in her hand, watching me unabashedly. Again, I try to envision her as the dark, unhinged Doll who goes around chopping off men’s dicks.
Foreverything she went through when she was younger, she’s so bright and happy.
Did I hit the bullseye when we first met and assumed she was being fake? That she was hiding something behind that cotton candy smile?
Do I even care?
At this point, Dove being the Doll would be the best thing to ever happen to me. I could selfishly have my cake and eat it, too. Black buttercream with a side of pink glitter sprinkles every fucking day for eternity.
“I told you my story, and you ghosted me, Wren,” she says bluntly. “Even when I reached out repeatedly, you ignored me. See? Mean.”
“I’m sorry. I didn’t—” I trail off, realizing I never even considered it from her perspective. She let me in, and I slammed the door shut, as if her trauma was too much for me to handle.
I’m such a fucking idiot.
“Dove—” My phone rings, the shrill tone slicing through my apology.
Dove half-turns to peer at my phone where it lies next to hers on the counter. She blinks, murmuring, “It’s your mother.”
Leave it toherto ruin the moment.
“I’ll let you get that.” Dove is already disappearing down the hall before I can tell her I don’t want to take the call. The bathroom door clicks shutbehind her with one last, undecipherable look cast my way.
Thoroughly frustrated, I hit decline—only for Hunter’s name to pop up a second later. I answer. “I’m assuming Bunny told you?”
“Yeah. How you feeling, buddy?” he asks in his best Deadpool impression.
“I’m fine, you sarcastic shit. What do you want? If Bunny told you what happened, surely you know I’m with Dove.”
“Is the little hottie gonna nurse you back to health? Don’t forget your sucker for being a good boy and taking your ass-beating like a champ. Or are you the one with the sucker for her?” He laughs.
