That was all she could manage before she threw up. Then the darkness at last reared up and swallowed her whole.
*
“Alice. Baby, you awake?”
Alice cracked her eyes open and breathed a sigh of relief at the dimness of the hospital room. By now she knew she was definitely in a hospital. She had a patchwork of disjointed memories, from being sick all over Stringer, which made him automatically recoil, to a flash or two of Loki physically throwing Stringer out the door and away from Alice, to Loki picking her up and literally running her out to his Hummer. Then the ER, where it had been much too bright and white, another bout of violent nausea, and a shot that was supposed to calm her stomach but instead knocked her out.
That was all she had in the memory bank, so with great care she turned her head to find Loki sitting beside her bed, both of his hands holding hers.
“This feels like a soap opera.” She was shocked to hear the words come out of her mouth, when she was pretty sure she hadn’t even thought them. “Wow. My mouth keeps talking when I don’t mean for it to. Weird.”
“A runaway mouth is one of the more fun aspects of having a bad concussion, or so the docs have told me.”
“What?”
“Yeah.” His eyes never left her face as he gave her fingers a warm squeeze. “Saying random shit is going to happen with you for a few days, apparently. I’ve already been warned to not take anything you say seriously. So fair warning—if you tell me to go away, I’m just going to chalk it up to your traumatic brain injury and stay right here by your side. I can’t take the thought of being away from you.”
“Okay.” Her hand tightened on his before she turned onto her side to more comfortably look at him. There was an IV in the back of her free hand, so she took care in resting it on the swell of her hip. “Why are you hanging around here like we’re in a soap opera?”
A corner of his mouth curled. “Is that what happens in soap operas? I wouldn’t know.”
“Everyone winds up in a hospital in soap operas.”
“Hate to tell you this, Stems, but most everyone in real life winds up in a hospital at some point, too.”
“I guess.” That baffling patchwork of memories flitted through her head, so fast it was hard to hold on to any one image. But there was one thought that meant everything to her. “You didn’t kill anyone, did you, Loki?”
“I didn’t have time.” Again that lopsided smile appeared, and he brought his chair closer so that their faces were separated by a few inches. “All I could think about was getting you out of there, so that’s what I did. Besides, I hear you dealt out enough badass beatdowns for the both of us.”
Her memory wasn’t helping when it came to details. “I think I stabbed a guy with my housekeys right in the eye. Maybe. I’m not sure. I hope he’s okay.”
“I don’t give a fuck if he’s okay or if he’s partially blind forever. It’s the least that shitheel deserves for attacking you.”
“I may have also taken another guy out by breaking his…something. I distinctly remember something snapping. But then there was a third guy…maybe?” Then she shook her head as the memories slipped away. “I can’t remember.”
“You did great, baby.” He pressed her hand to his lips, his burning eyes never leaving hers. “You kicked ass, and I’m so damn proud of you for being so strong and brave and amazing. You’re my dream woman, you know that? My absolute dream woman. That’s all you have to remember.”
“I do remember that Tyr might have a problem with the brothers he has around him,” she said confidentially, a dizzy little thrill that had nothing to do with being concussed shooting through her. Maybe it was the fact that she’d had her brain scrambled, or that she could have died, but suddenly their problems seemed somehow smaller than they had been. “Someone told your uncle that Felix was taken to the Gravedigger compound, and that I, Felix’s foster sister, was your girlfriend. That’s why Stringer took me. Hades told Stringer that I’d make great trade material. Who would tell your uncle that?”
A frown shadowed Loki’s tiger eyes before he shook his head and kissed her hand again. “Whoever it is, they put you in the line of fire. That means only one thing. They’re not long for this world.”
That dizzy thrill faded under a wave of ice-cold dread. “Please, don’t do anything that could ruin the good man you are, Loki. I believe in you. Do you understand that? I believe in the good man you are. Please, just let this go.”
“No one fucks with my family, and that’s who you are to me, Alice.” He rose out of his chair to press a kiss against her temple, then brushed a careful hand over her hair. “Remember when you said your dad was your everything? I get that now. That’s what you are to me. No matter how many times I fuck things up and make you want to walk away from me, never forget that you are my everything.”
That sense of dread got worse. Why did that sound like goodbye? “Loki—”
“I don’t want you to worry about anything, you hear me? The only thing you have to do now is rest and recover. You’ve been through hell today, so I don’t want you to stress about another thing, yeah?”
“I won’t stress as long as you stay with me.” She hated how clingy she sounded, when she’d never been clingy in her life. But this was at the heart of the problem between them. No matter how hard she tried to steer Loki off the dark path that tracked through the Gravediggers MC, she despaired he’d been lost to it a long, long time ago. And that meant he was lost to her. “I love you so much, Loki. I can’t stop. I’m just so scared you’re going to get hurt, or killed, and then you’ll be lost to me forever. I’ve had my world die around me once before, and I didn’t really recover from that until I met you. If I lost you, I’d be so destroyed I would never be able to recover. Never.”
He looked down at her for what seemed like forever, before he nodded once and bent once more to brush her brow with a kiss.
“Get some rest,” he said again, his voice rough and promising nothing.
And that was what he left her with as he headed for the door.
Nothing.
*
Loki hadn’t gone three steps down the hall before he spotted his brother Tyr, clearly chatting up a nurse at the nurse’s station. The moment he came out of Alice’s room, however, Tyr waved his farewells to his new friend and headed his way.
“How is she?” he asked immediately. “Any news?”
“Lots.” With a rough sigh, Loki dragged a hand through his hair before tilting his head toward a set of glass doors that led to a night-washed, grassy courtyard. “Walk with me for a sec. We need to talk.”
“Okay, let’s have it.” Tyr’s face was a stony mask by the time they made it outside. It was a muggy, uncomfortable night, and it fit Loki’s mood to a T. “I get the feeling you’re about to dump a truckload of shit on my doorstep, so just do it and get it over with.”
“Have you had a chance to talk to Stringer yet?”
That made Tyr raise a sandy brow. “I haven’t had a chance to. We’ve got him socked away at the compound, so I’ll get to him eventually.”