Rock Her (Crimson Romance) (25 page)

Alec’s recently revamped image would come under fire when this story got out. And it would. Of that she had no doubt. People were already talking; she could hear them whispering about her and Alec and Matt.

Matt was currently chained to a gurney in the emergency room with a passel of police guarding him. Doubtless they would get the details of this Thanksgiving fiasco wrong, and Alec would end up the bad guy. She could picture the headlines “Alec Sawyer Hospitalized After Thanksgiving Day Drunken Brawl”.

This time when nausea threatened, she found herself on her knees in front of the biohazard trash receptacle, retching. When her stomach was empty, she sat back on her heels, sweating and shaking.

One of the emergency room doctors entered the room. She paused in front of Kate and gently helped her back into the chair. Pulling out her pen light, she checked Kate’s pupils.

The doctor disappeared only to return with a cola moments later. She opened it and put it in Kate’s palm. Then with a shake of her head, put the ice pack into Kate’s unresisting fingers and moved it to her face.

“Keep it on your eye.” She stroked Kate’s hair a moment, before she slipped back out through the curtain. Kate looked up; she hadn’t even had the wherewithal to thank her.

The doctor had repositioned her arm when she first arrived. The sharp pain of the maneuver that put the joint back in had been replaced by a throbbing ache. Good. She could focus on that pain instead of her heartache. Absently, she adjusted the ice pack on her shoulder.

Emma was out of the way. She hadn’t put up much resistance when Kate insisted that she go with their family friends the Morgans. Roy promised he would run Emma by the police station for a statement. He assured her he would to try to salvage what remained of Thanksgiving. The police had been kind enough to interview Kate during Alec’s examination.

The loss of consciousness and severity of the concussion meant an overnight stay for Alec. She’d be damned if she’d leave him alone.

She took Alec’s phone from the bedside tray and called Dave. She filled him in on the day’s events in a monotone. He wanted to come up immediately, but she forestalled him.

“Enjoy your day with your family. I’ll stay with him tonight. Can you pick him up and take him to Los Angeles tomorrow? He’s going to need a few days of enforced rest.”

There was silence on the other end.

“So, I’m the enforcer, am I? Where will you be?” Dave responded, a wealth of kindness in his voice.

Her teeth clenched as another wave of grief crested, washing over her. She waited for it to pass. It didn’t. “Here,” she managed.

“I think he’d rather you took care of him,” he said softly. “And I’m thrilled to hand off that responsibility to you.”

She didn’t trust her voice and tears welled in her eyes.

“Are you there?” Dave asked.

“Trust me, Dave; he’s better off without me and my psycho father.”

“The Alec I know is more than capable of handling someone’s daddy issues. Don’t underestimate him.”

“I’ve made up my mind.”

“Kate, please don’t do this. You’re the best thing that ever happened to Alec, and he knows it.”

“I have all your contact info in my phone. I’ll text you the specifics for tomorrow. The nurse will give you the discharge instructions,” she replied and hung up.

• • •

Alec had a private room but try as he might he couldn’t get Kate to lie down and rest with him. He knew something was wrong; her body was rigid when she embraced him. But between the headache, nausea, and a vague sense of confusion he couldn’t put two thoughts together. Alec had met with the police twice already, but he wasn’t much help. He couldn’t remember anything from Thanksgiving morning and didn’t remember the fight at all. Instead, there were jumbled memories of pumpkin pie making and Christmas music.

The ride in the ambulance to the hospital was the only memory he had. Normal with a concussion to have some amnesia, he was told. Maybe he’d feel better after sleep. At some point during the night he was restless; Kate woke him gently and crawled into the bed to lie in his arms.

The next morning he felt a hundred times better, but there was no sign of Kate.

Alec narrowed his eyes when Dave walked in. “Where is she?”

Dave lifted his brows. “She didn’t say goodbye?”

Alec scowled and swore. His head throbbed angrily in response. He relaxed his brow. Better.

Dave glanced around the room. “This might answer some questions.” He grabbed an envelope off the rolling hospital tray.

Alec ripped open the letter, scanned it and snorted.
Ouch
. Damn.

Dave pursed his lips. “I’ve been talking to the doctors. You need a few quiet days to recover. No theatrics.” He took the note back from Alec and studied it.

Alec considered his friend. “A few days.” He started to nod, then froze and made a mental note not to move his head. “Yes. That’ll work.”

“I must say you’re handling
this
,” Dave shook the note “better than expected.”

He gave Dave a hard look. “Burn that.”

• • •

“Dave?” Kate’s voice was barely audible. She was trying not to wake Emma sleeping in the next room, so she had called from the bathroom.

“Yes?”

“It’s Kate. I wanted to be sure you understood the discharge instructions.”

“What discharge instructions?”

“
Dave
,” she hissed, “didn’t they tell you what to look for? Confusion, vomiting, dizziness, memory problems — ”

“I think maybe you’d better come here and take care of him. Sounds like he may need a private nurse.”

“Not funny.” Her shoulders slumped as the tension left her body. “Don’t tease me. Is he okay?”

“Physically? Yes. He’s fine, other than some headaches. But Kate — ”

“Listen, I gotta run. I wanted to check on him. Don’t tell him I called.”

Dave grunted.

“Take care of him for me.” Her voice broke, and she disconnected the call. She put the phone down on the counter carefully and turned on the shower, barely able to see through the veil of tears, fighting sobs that were sure to wake Emma. Stripping out of her clothes, she entered the shower. Within minutes, she was sitting on the tile, the water poured over her, mingling with her tears. She stayed there until the water ran cold. She was pruned and shivering but mostly back in control by the time she climbed out. Catching a glance of her reflection in the mirror, she flinched. The black eye was violet and swollen, both eyes bloodshot. Her fair skin was blotchy. She looked like hell and it had only been two days. It would get better. It had to.

Meanwhile, she would stay busy. Kate had a long overdue heart-to-heart last night with a tearful, remorseful Emma. They were slated to have brunch with Ava, then see a movie and avoid the post-Thanksgiving shopping hoards.

Emma had plans with high school friends for dinner that night. Kate would finally get to be alone with her grief.

She would get through this. Tomorrow she would take Emma to LA for her flight back to Washington, D.C.

• • •

Alec sat on his couch in Los Angeles, flipping through channels, bored silly, when Dave came back into his living room.

He raised an eyebrow and got a nod from Dave.

“Checking up on me?”

Another nod.

Alec grinned. “Should’ve told her I had a relapse.”

Dave put his hands on his hips. “Is that how you want to play it?”

Alec scowled and touched his forehead. “Goddamn headache is still here.”

“I overheard you talking to the police yesterday.”

“Yeah?”

“Did she really go after her dad after he knocked you out?”

Alec’s fists clenched involuntarily. “Apparently.”

“Tackled him?”

“Yeah.”

“And then approached him while the bloodthirsty son-of-a-bitch still had the knife?”

“That’s what the police told me.”

Emma and Kate relayed exactly the same story.

“He really was going to kill you.”

Alec’s reply was terse. “Stupid bastard. Kill the goose with the golden egg? He’s smarter than that, but he was pretty enraged and drunk. From what the police tell me, they were closing in on him in Vegas. He was getting desperate. Desperate people — ”

Dave waved. “Yeah, yeah, so essentially Kate saved your life.”

Alec met his gaze. “No ‘essentially’ about it, she did.”

“And you are going to let her go?” Dave asked, incredulous.

Alec resumed his channel surfing, expressionless.

Dave’s cell rang again. Alec grinned watching as Dave recognized the number, and the expression of puzzlement and surprise it generated.

Everything was falling into place.

A few hours later, one of the partners at the firm returned his call.

“Alec Sawyer.”

“Alec, Bill Emery. Listen, I’m sure you know the firm is not thrilled with your recent publicity — ”

“Thanks for calling me back. I quit.” As soon as he said the words, he felt liberated, truly free for the first time in years.

There was a long period of silence on the other end of the line.

“Sawyer, it’s not as bad as it seems. The positive publicity you got from the rescue counteracts this little drunken brawl — ”

Alec interrupted. “I’m not quitting because of that. I’m getting back into music. Appreciate the opportunity to work with you all, but it isn’t for me. I’ll wrap up what I can in the next few weeks and pass off the rest to an associate.”

The man on the other end of the phone sighed. “You know, in one way I’m sad to lose you, Sawyer. You worked hard for the firm and were quite the rainmaker … on the other hand, I was a huge fan of Reeking Bliss and am happy to hear you’re getting back into the business. If there’s ever anything you need — ”

“Thanks. There are a couple of issues I’m dealing with, like the attempt on my life you probably read about. If I need help, I’ll throw the work your way. There’s another issue I want to talk about, and I know you’re the best the firm has for this type of work.”

“You okay?” Emma looked over, frowning.

“Totally fine, lost in thought,” Kate lied, watching the road carefully. In a few hours she would drop off her sister, and then Emma would be gone until Christmas. Maybe she could pull herself together by then. Right. Like she would ever recover from him. At least Kate wouldn’t have to keep pretending everything was fine. Putting on a good front required every ounce of energy she had these days and it still wasn’t fooling anyone.

“You did a pretty good job hiding your black eye with makeup.” Emma said, looking her over critically.

It had been four days and the swelling had diminished, but the delicate skin around and under the eye was an exotic combination of green and yellow. A few more days and she wouldn’t have to look in the mirror and relive that awful scene — the terror as she realized her father was going to kill her unconscious boyfriend, the fight in the kitchen.

The media frenzy had finally abated. The first day or two, paparazzi loitered in front of the hospital, at Alec’s beach house, all over Cielito. She could only image how upset he was. God, what a mess. Roy had let her know this morning that Alec was pressing charges against her father. Adding his charges to the ones she already filed would increase the likelihood that Matt Gibson would not make bail. He would go to prison for a long while — or he could be paroled in a few years.

Keeping Alec in her life wasn’t worth the risk. Insomnia, grief, and endless bouts of weeping had left her numb. Drained. She’d caught the sympathetic looks from Emma, Roy, Diana, and Ava over the last few days. Ava had made it very clear she didn’t accept Kate’s reasons for breaking up with Alec, but once she realized the fragile state Kate was in, she had become silent on the matter.

“Kate,” Emma’s tone was buoyant. Kate turned to her, recalled from her daze.

“My friend’s brother texted me. He’s a waiter at this awesome West Hollywood restaurant. I thought it would be cool to go in for lunch before you drop me for my flight. He says he can get us a table. Please?”

“Uh … how come you didn’t mention it this morning?” Her hands tensed on the wheel and she shot her sister a glance.

Emma flushed and her eyes darted away.

“Em?”

“I just got the text.” Emma sounded defensive.

“Em, I dunno — ”

“We were planning to eat in LA anyway. Please Kate?” she begged. “He is
so
fine.”

Oy. She was not in the mood. But after all they’d been through the past few days she wasn’t going to chance a fight with Emma right before she had to fly back to school. She could tolerate a meal out, couldn’t she?

“I guess.” Her reply was begrudging.

Emma bounced in her seat.

“I don’t want you to miss your flight. You know how L.A. traffic can be.” She made a final attempt to change Emma’s mind.

“It’s not far from the airport,” Emma assured her sister breezily. “My phone says we’re only thirty minutes away.”

Kate found parking easily, locked the car and followed her sister up the street to the restaurant.

“This place?” Kate said in disbelief, standing in front of the entrance. “Even I’ve heard of this place, Em. It’ll be a fortune.”

Emma was already craning her neck toward the patio, looking for a hot guy or celebrities or both.

“God help me,” Kate whispered, trying to rub away the tension that kinked her neck as she followed her sister into the establishment.

“Hi!” Emma greeted the bombshell hostess. “I’m Emma? For the patio?”

The girl beamed at them. “Follow me,” she instructed, leading them through the restaurant. Emma walked as slowly as possible, looking this way and that. She nudged Kate and hissed, “Look.”

Kate caught sight of the actor who played the caped crusader on the big screen, sitting at a table with another man, even better looking in real life, if that was possible. She looked away. She didn’t want to be caught gawking. Emma seemed to have no trouble with it. She sent a huge smile in his direction. Kate bit back a laugh, the first in days. Emma was her usual irrepressible self. Granted, Kate still had work to do to repair the damage from her half-truths and lies, but the bond was solid; all the truth Emma needed to know about their dad and their finances were out there and for that she was grateful.