Page 92 of Star Crossed
“That’s what I think of your apology!”
Wyatt huffed, his shoulders slumping. “Ju Ju Bean.”
Jules pointed at him, her voice a low hiss of warning. “Don’t you even try to pacify me after all this!”
“You don’t understand everything.”
“Oh, I understand!” Jules assured him. “I understand I got a brother who’s suffered from water on the brain one too many times and lost his damn mind. What gave you the right to step into my personal life and use the cage as an excuse to beat on the fella I told you last night I’m in love with?”
“I had reasons.” Wyatt folded his arms over his chest. “Darn good ones for doing what I did.”
“It’s my life, Wyatt!” Jules yelled, careless of her anger carrying back down the hallway. “You think I don’t wanna stomp down to Key West and give that bitch a piece of my mind for hurting you like she did?”
Wyatt’s eyes narrowed. “I told ya not to call her that.”
“Did I do it? Did I sue her ass for libel after she’s been using our lives for her own gain for years now?”
“You threatened to…on a weekly basis.”
“Did I do it?” Jules asked, this time more forcefully. “Did I retaliate against her for what she’s done to you?”
Wyatt shifted uncomfortably. “You know people can hear when you’re screeching like that.”
“I don’t give a fuck.”
“This is bad for your health.” Wyatt closed his eyes and took another deep breath. “I want you to calm down.”
“We don’t always get what we want, do we? I want to see Romeo,” Jules countered. “But I can’t ’cause his brothers seem to think I’m bad for his health. I wonder why that is.”
“Are you forgetting ’bout the Vegas fight issue?” Wyatt said in a whisper, keeping his voice low enough so others wouldn’t hear. “That’s fucking illegal as all hell, and I know you aren’t looking to get involved with a fella like that. Dad would roll over in his grave.”
“He didn’t throw that fight,” Clay said from behind them, his voice also low despite the fact that they were relatively hidden so far down the hallway. “I know he didn’t.”
Wyatt snorted. “It may dent your ego, but the facts are—”
“Did he actually say he threw my fight?” Clay countered. “’Cause in case you forgot, I was there, and every hit I took felt like it was the one to knock me out.”
Wyatt gestured to Jules as if that explained everything. “She said he did.”
Clay narrowed his eyes suspiciously at Jules. “He said he threw the Vegas fight? You heard those words leave his mouth?”
Jules considered Clay for a second before she stared ahead unseeing, trying to recall the argument with Romeo in the driveway. “Tino said, ‘Did you tell her ’bout throwing the fight?’ What other—” She paused, realization sinking in. “Lipton.”
“Jules.” Clay gave a grunt of disbelief. “That’s not something you should’ve just jumped to conclusions on.”
Jules swallowed hard against the new swell of fear. “What does that mean? Is he in some kind of trouble?”
Clay shrugged. “I dunno, but he sure hasn’t been training like a guy whose planning on losing a fight.”
“You think someone was gonna make him do it?”
“I don’t think he needs the money,” Clay countered.
“Jules.” Wyatt stepped closer, using his bulk to assert his authority. “I don’t want you getting mixed up with all this. It’s his issue, and you got your own set of problems.”
“The only issue I got is you.”
Jules turned to leave. She couldn’t see Romeo at the hospital and get real answers, but she still needed time to think clearly. Her anger at Wyatt was making that impossible.
“We need to have a serious discussion.” Wyatt refused to back down as he followed her down the hallway. “Now’s not the time to go running off half-cocked and—”
Jules turned around and glared, two steps away from attacking him again. “Wyatt, I’d back off. I can’t even look at you without feeling my blood boil!”
“Why can’t you just calm down? Why does everything got to be a damn drama with you?” Wyatt huffed impatiently. “The last thing you need right now is to be getting all upset.”
“Then stay away from me.” Jules turned once more to leave, this time determined to put real space between them. “If you wanna keep me off that bitch Tabitha’s back, you’ll make yourself scarce ’cause there’s a very expensive libel suit just waiting to happen.”
“We’re having that talk, Jules!” Wyatt called out as she walked down the hallway. “And I don’t care what you threaten, you’re sitting down and listening to what I got to say.”
“Not today, I’m not,” Jules said as she rounded the corner and left.
