Page 92 of A Vicious Rumor

"Can you walk?" he asked.

I nodded my head.

"Good." He leaned down and fished keys out of Tyson's pocket. "Go get his Jeep and drive it onto the field. We'll load them in at the same time."

I nodded and tried my best to keep my feet steady as I made my way back to the parking lot, feeling extremely on edge despite the fact that there was no sign of the previous visitors. Within fifteen minutes, I had the Jeep up on the field, we had both victims roughly secured in the backseat, and Paper was driving us towards his place.

Which was good, because as soon as we got onto the road, I passed out.

28

TYSON

I woke up in a bed I vaguely recognized. My vision was still hazy, and I felt like I'd been run over by a freight train, but I was still alive, which I guess was something.

When my vision cleared enough, I realized I was at Paper's house. He came in a couple of minutes after I awoke, which only confirmed my suspicions that the whole entire house was under some form of surveillance system.

"Glad to see you awake," he said.

"What happened?" I asked. "What day is it?" Memories of the fight came flooding back to my mind. Of Scissors hitting me way too hard, of Lily coming to the field. Of Lily yelling and being taken.

I frantically tried to leave the bed, but Paper was there to push a hand onto my chest. I went down easily. "Lily! Where is she?"

"She's safe and having lunch."

I took a deep breath. "I need to talk to her," I said, trying to get up again.

Paper pushed me back down, and I growled at him. "Stop doing that! I need to see her."

"She doesn't want to see you right now," he said.

"What do you mean, 'she doesn't want to see me?'"

"Considering you almost got her kidnapped by a drug cartel, can you blame her?"

I ground my teeth but stayed seated. Eventually Paper would leave and then I would go and talk to her.

"What happened?" I asked him.

He took a seat at the small table across from my bed. "Zachary thought it would be okay to wear brass knuckles for the fight. He got you twice across the temple. Lots of blood. Several stitches."

I reached up to touch my forehead, but Paper put a hand up. "I'd ask you not to do that. We don't want to mess up the good doctor's work."

"I don't feel anything."

He chuckled. "That's because you had an IV of quite a lot of pain medication for the last day and a half."

"What day is it?" I repeated.

"Sunday, afternoon, to be more specific."

"Shit," I said, trying to process all of this information. "What happened with Lily? How is she safe?"

"Let's just say that you're lucky I have a bit of an influence in the organization you found yourself mixed up in."

I furrowed my brow at him. "The fuck does that mean?"

"It means, that I took care of it."

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