Page 93 of Touch in the Night

“What’s going on?”

“What do you mean? I just told you.”

“I didn’t catch…” Nausea rolled through Jesse. He wanted to hang up, even though moving his thumb was too much effort. His head pulsed. Bitterness washed over his tongue. His brother was talking again. “Hey, mate…slow down, will you?”

“What the hell is wrong with you? Are you pissed?”

Jesse blinked his eyes open, groaned and shut them again. “No, I’m not fucking pissed. I’ve got a head injury.”

“You… You what?”

“I’m in A & E. Can tearing me a new one wait?”

Anton said something else Jesse didn’t catch and hung up. Jesse slumped back in his chair, shifting the melting ice pack and groaning when the bright lights on the ceiling shone red through his eyelids.

“The triage nurse will see you now.”

Jesse shambled after a young woman to a curtained bed where he lay down, and the world started spinning all over again. He answered her questions and followed her finger with his eyes then she was gone, telling him that the doctor would be with him shortly.

He gratefully closed his eyes again. He tried to chase his thoughts into order, then tried to make himself look at his watch to figure out how long until it got dark and Emory would find out about all this, but both actions seemed far too much effort.

He was jerked from his stupor when someone yanked back the curtain. Anton stood there with a face like thunder.

“Ant…” he mumbled, attempting to sit up. “This isn’t really the best time.”

“What the hell happened to you?”

“Some fucker threw a rock at my head, that’s what.”

“So it’s true.”

“What’s true?”

Just then the doctor pulled back the curtain and blinked at Anton in surprise. He stepped to the side and glowered like a gargoyle during the examination, apparently immune to Jesse’s bleary glares. By the time the doctor had diagnosed Jesse with a mild concussion, had glued and dressed the wound on his head and urged him to go home and rest, Anton’s expression had shifted from stormy to stony.

He tried to help Jesse off the bed, but Jesse yanked his arm out of his grasp. “What are you doing here, huh?”

“What do you think I’m doing here?” he said as they moved outside. Jesse lifted an arm that felt like lead to shade his eyes from the sunlight then stumbled to a stop when Anton stepped into his path. “Jesse, we are going to talk about this.”

“Talk aboutwhat?”

“You’re working for that fucking vampire, aren’t you?”

“Ant—”

“I’m so stupid. All that money out of nowhere? The live-in job that didn’t care about your record? And now some kid gets snatched out of one of the highest security houses in town?”

“It wasn’t that high security…” Jesse cut himself off and swore under his breath.

“It really was you.”

“Ant—”

“I can’t believe this.” His brother clutched his forehead. “Just when I thought you were finally getting yourself sorted, and all along you were being paid to kidnap little kids?”

“That isnotwhat happened.”

“What else do you call it, Jesse?” Anton’s face was stricken. “I can’t believe I’ve let you be part of my son’s life.”

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