Page 28 of Sinful Seduction
“What the fuck?” I whip my hand back and snatch out my phone, unlocking the screen with a vicious swipe of my thumb. Hitting her name, I bring the phone to my ear and wait… wait… wait… “She was supposed to be dress shopping!”
“Leave me the hell alone!” Minka’s voice cuts like a knife—not through the phone, but somewhere else. Somewhere nearer. Then her kinder words—through the phone—follow. “You’ve reached Minka Mayet. Leave a message and I’ll return your call at my earliest convenience.”
“Minka!?” Turmoil bubbles in my veins, like popping candy but without the fun. “Minka Mayet!”
“Archer?” A stark blue curtain slides open thirty feet to my left, revealing her sitting on a hospital bed, her torso still wrapped in that gown, but the skirt lifted to expose bloodied legs. Her eyes flare wide, then her cheeks redden. “Hi.”
“What the hell happened?” I steamroll across the emergency room and past medical personnel who get in my way. I leave Fletch behind. I leave thoughts of Benjamin and Molly behind. Hell, I leave my sanity plastered to the fucking wall. “You’re bleeding?!”
“I got a scrape.” She grits her teeth and sneers down at the doctor stitching her knee. “It’s a freakin’ scratch, but our junior intern down here is trying to pad their hours and expertise like they think it’ll impress their supervisor. Stop it.” She kicks out and almost clobbers the dude in the chin. “You’re making it bleed more than it would if you left it alone.”
I peer over the doctor’s shoulder and study thescratch. Which is actually a gash, the kind that exposes the meat inside her body. “That needs stitches, Doc?”
He peeks up at me, searches my face, then down to the badge I carry. Then he nods and goes back to work. “Needs about ten, and I’m halfway done. Patient claims a Band-Aid will fix it, but sutures will be quicker and safer, especially considering her medical history.” He slips the small, curved needle through Minka’s flesh, then out the other side. “She wanted for a crime, Detective? Because if you need to cuff her to the bed, I’d be okay with that.”
“Cuff me to the bed and I’ll hurt you,” Minka growls. “Why are you here, Archer?”
“I’m doing my job! Why areyouhere? And why is your phone off?”
“Where’s Mia?” Fletch slams into my back, shoving me forward a stepand creating a chain reaction where I hit the doctor, and the doctor falls forward. “Delicious!? Where’s my daughter?”
“She’s here.” She waves her hand… around. “She’s fine.”
“She’s here?” he explodes. “Here, at the hospital? My baby is in the hospital, and no one called me?”
“Why is your phone off, Mayet?”
“I lost it.” She slumps. Or, well, shetriesto slump, but the boning in her dress keeps her upright. “I think I left it on the road. And Mia’s at the hospital. But she’s notinthe hospital.” She leans a long way to the left, knocking the doctor aside and eliciting a scowl from the poor guy trying to pad his hours and impress his superior. Reaching out, she whips the curtain beside hers open and reveals Aubree laid out on her bed. “Emeri! Wake up.”
“She’s unconscious?” I storm to Aubree—alone, without my brother—and stare down at her serene face. “What the hell happened?”
“Where’s Mia?” Fletch snaps. “Mayet? Where’s my baby?”
“Charlie?” Fifi’s soft voice brings him wheeling around, her gentle sway with a dozing five-year-old pressed to her chest. Though to Fletch, that’s not a comforting sight. He crosses the emergency room at a fast clip, rage pulsing in his eyes, and with his hands out, prepped and ready to rip his baby from her arms. He carries poison in his veins. He wears stress that others could simmer. But Fifi, she’s been scarred by him too many times. Shouted at too much. “She’s okay.” Instead of tossing the girl and turning on her heels, Fifi sways and buries her lips in Mia’s soft curls. When Fletch tries to take her, she presses her hand to his chest and shakes her head. “She’s fine, Charlie. She’s napping. But she’s not hurt.”
“She’s not hurt,” Aubree murmurs, her eyes closed, but a teasing smile wrinkling her lips. “She’s tired, because it’s been a long ass day and the heat zaps our energy. And I picked up Mayet’s phone.” Blindly, she searches the folds of her dirty, torn gown, then she pulls the device out again and offers it. “She left it on the road, and I think the heat might’ve turned it off.” Finally, she blinks bright blue eyes open and grins. “Ya know how it does that when they get too hot?”
I take the phone and study my scowling reflection in the black screen.
“I forgot to turn it back on, and she’s been busy swiping at the poor doctor, so I didn’t think to give it back yet.”
“Are you okay?” I slip the device into my pocket and look down at the woman—the bride—and try to understand what the fuck happened since I last saw them. “Why are you lying down in the ER?”
“Because this dress is heavy as hell, it’s tight, so I can’t hardly breathe,and even in here in the cool, I’m sweating. Also, I’m a little concerned that the footage of me running on the road in my gown will become an internet meme. Oh, and Tim told me to stay down.” She folds her arms back, using them as a pillow, and glances at her boss. “We lost one, and she saved one. So we’re kinda tired, and I know Chief Mayet has a headache.”
“Stop talking about me like I can’t hear you.”
My heart skips and jumps around in my chest, so I leave Aubree and walk back to my wife. Grabbing her jaw, I earn a vindictive glare, but I tilt her head and wait for her eyes. “Your headache is thumping, huh? When was the last time you had any water?”
“Don’t know.” She tries to brush my hand away. “There’s water in Pepsi, isn’t there?”
“And since you’re bleeding, that probably means they’ve already administered your factor?”
She closes her eyes, hiding her pain. But the furrowing of her brows and the way they pinch together—she can’t hide that. “He gave me my factor. He sucks at it, by the way.”
I peer down at the doctor and scowl. “You pushed it in too fast?”
“I…” He shakes his head. “I pushed it in the way I was supposed to!”
