Star-Crossed (32 page)

* * * *

With a brother like Wyatt and a best friend like Clay, Jules had been to Mercy General’s emergency room plenty over the years. She was extremely familiar with the large, white building and knew exactly where she was going. She slipped past the automatic doors in a dead run, heels clicking against the tile until she bumped into the front desk.

“I’m here to see Romeo Wellings,” she told the woman behind the counter.

“Tommy should’ve brought him in from Garnet.”

“Are you family?” the receptionist asked.

“No.” Jules frowned as she thought of a better answer. “We’re, um—involved.”

257

“Have a seat.” The woman stood and gave her a smile. “Lemme go back and ask if he’s taking visitors.”

Jules breathed a sigh of relief. “Thank you.”

“No promises. I know he’s got two family members with him already. One of ’em will have to come back to the waiting room.”

Jules groaned, knowing Romeo’s brothers were likely pissed at her, especially considering Wyatt was the reason she was in this waiting room to begin with. Too nervous to sit, she stood by the desk tapping her foot, wondering what the hell could’ve gotten into Wyatt. He wasn’t exactly a brother to defend her honor. He was loyal, sure, but he knew Jules could take care of herself.

When Nova appeared, Jules ran up to him. “Is he okay?” Rather than respond, Nova grabbed Jules’s arm, pulling her to the corner of the waiting room. If she wasn’t so frantic, she would have been really annoyed. Nova was clearly used to operating in ways that demanded others obey him, and Jules didn’t respond well to that type of authority.

When they were alone, Nova let go of her arm and said, “Look at me.” Jules arched an eyebrow and did just that, looking him dead in the eye. They were the same height if Jules was wearing flats, but Jules’s heels gave her at least an inch on him. Nova wasn’t more than five-eleven, but he was broad and muscular and his presence could be downright intimidating.

“I’m looking,” she said smartly, refusing to be bullied. “Nova, I know you’re mad—”

“Mad?” He let out an incredulous laugh. “I’m more than mad. You’re ruining our lives with your long legs and shiny blonde hair. Now he has to forfeit the Lipton fight.” Jules gaped in horror. “God, really? What’s wrong—”

“In case you missed it, Daisy Duke”—Nova’s dark eyes narrowed furiously—

“you’re bad for my brother’s health.”

258

Jules completely ignored the Daisy Duke jab when she considered Romeo hurt to the point that his fight had to be forfeited. “Please lemme see him.”

“No,” Nova said with a look of disbelief. “I want you the fuck outta our lives.

Disappear,
Juliet
, before I’m forced to get mean.” Jules pulled back, hearing the warning in his voice. She let her gaze run over Nova for one long minute before she pulled herself to her full height and asked, “Are you threatening me?”

“I don’t threaten. I give advice,” Nova assured her with unnerving confidence.

“I’m telling you to stay gone, and I suggest you do it.”

“Well, I don’t respond to threats or heavy-handed advice,” Jules told him simply.

“It’s all hot air to me. Now you listen to me—”

“Romeo’s not taking visitors. I’ll be sure to forget to mention you stopped by.” Nova left before Jules could finish, making it obvious he’d said all he’d planned on saying.

Jules focused on her breathing, hearing Romeo’s voice in her head counting to twenty in Japanese in a vain attempt to center herself. The rage she felt was making her vision red-hazed, but she knew this was the wrong place to cause a scene. She wasn’t Romeo’s family. She couldn’t demand to see him, and what argument did she have when her own twin was the reason he was hospitalized to begin with?

Jules was always solution oriented, but right then, the solutions to this problem seemed few and far between. The deep breathing wasn’t working. She was angry and scared, and she turned to leave, thinking now would be the perfect time to give Wyatt a piece of her mind.

* * * *

Jules pushed at the men’s locker room door and called out, “Wyatt Fredrick Conner, you better get your ass out here or I’m coming in!”

259

Shaking in anger, Jules waited impatiently, wondering how much time she should give him before she embarrassed the few other men who worked out in the early afternoon. Instead of her brother, it was Clay who rushed around the corner after a minute, tying a towel around his waist unselfconsciously considering he’d lived with Jules since he was a teenager.

“There’s other fellas in here besides us. Ya can’t just come stomping into the men’s locker room. Talk ’bout bad for business.”

“Ask me if I give a shit,” Jules snapped, still leaning against the open door.

“Romeo’s brother just told me off for even thinking ’bout seeing him, and who the hell can blame him? Have you lost your good sense? How could you just stand there and let Wyatt do that?”

“I’m sorry.” Clay used his bulk to back her into the hallway, allowing the door to close behind them. Standing there naked save the white towel around his waist, Clay ignored the giggle of two women walking toward the women’s locker room. He grabbed Jules’s arm and leaned down to say earnestly, “I should’ve stopped it, I know that, but I didn’t think it’d go that far.”

“That doesn’t make me feel better.” Jules swallowed hard, fighting tears once more. “What am I gonna do now? They won’t even let me see him.”

“He’s sick over the fight y’all had,” Clay said softly. “He wants to make up, Jules.”

“Really?” She turned back to Clay hopefully. “He said that?” Clay gave her a weak smile. “Course then Wyatt showed up.” Jules put a hand to her forehead and took a shuddering breath as she fought to pull herself together. She didn’t know how to handle the surge of emotions that left her feeling unusually scattered.

She spun around when the locker room door opened and Wyatt came out wearing only the tan pants from his sheriff’s uniform. He held up his hands in a form of surrender, but Jules didn’t care; she launched herself at him. Furious, she let her raging emotions flow at her as she punched her brother. Then she kicked his shin with her 260

heel, forcing him back against the wall because he was oddly passive. Usually he fought back, blocking her blows rather than endure them, but this time he just let her lash out.

She thought about how powerless she’d felt at the hospital and stomped on Wyatt’s bare foot in retaliation.

“Fu—” Wyatt choked on the curse when he looked past Jules, obviously seeing the crowd they were attracting. “Come here.”

He took a deep breath past the pain and then ushered Jules to a private corner down the hallway near the exit doors. Out of earshot from curious onlookers, Wyatt held up his hands once more. “Look, I’m sorry.”

Jules punched him again, this time catching him with a hard right hook, being sure to use the growing bruise on his jaw as a target. His head snapped to the side, and he grunted in pain, making it obvious Romeo had left his mark.

“That’s what I think of your apology!”

Wyatt huffed, his shoulders slumping. “Ju Ju Bean.” Jules pointed at him, her voice a low hiss of warning. “Don’t you even try to pacify me after all this!”

“You don’t understand everything.”

“Oh, I understand!” Jules assured him. “I understand I got a brother who’s suffered from water on the brain one too many times and lost his damn mind. What gave you the right to step into my personal life and use the cage as an excuse to beat on the fella I told ya last night I’m in love with?”

“I had reasons.” Wyatt folded his arms over his chest. “Darn good ones for doing what I did.”

“It’s my life, Wyatt!” Jules yelled, careless of her anger carrying back down the hallway. “You think I don’t wanna stomp down to Key West and give that bitch a piece of my mind for hurting you like she did?”

Wyatt’s eyes narrowed. “I told ya not to call her that.”

261

“Did I do it? Did I sue her ass for libel after she’s been using our lives for her own gain for years now?”

“You threatened to…on a weekly basis.”

“Did I do it?” Jules asked, this time more forcefully. “Did I retaliate against her for what she’s done to you?”

Wyatt shifted uncomfortably. “You know people can hear when you’re screeching like that.”

“I don’t give a fuck.”

“This is bad for your health.” Wyatt closed his eyes and took another deep breath.

“I want you to calm down.”

“We don’t always get what we want, do we? I want to see Romeo,” Jules countered. “But I can’t ’cause his brothers seem to think I’m bad for his health. I wonder why that is.”

“Are you forgetting ’bout the Vegas fight issue?” Wyatt said in a whisper, keeping his voice low enough so others wouldn’t hear. “That’s fucking illegal as all hell, and I know you aren’t looking to get involved with a fella like that. Dad would roll over in his grave.”

“He didn’t throw that fight,” Clay said from behind them, his voice also low despite the fact that they were relatively hidden so far down the hallway. “I know he didn’t.”

Wyatt snorted. “It may dent your ego, but the facts are—”

“Did he actually say he threw my fight?” Clay countered. “’Cause in case you forgot, I was there, and every hit I took felt like it was the one to knock me out.” Wyatt gestured to Jules as if that explained everything. “She said he did.” Clay narrowed his eyes suspiciously at Jules. “He said he threw the Vegas fight?

You heard those words leave his mouth?”

262

Jules considered Clay for a second before she stared ahead unseeing, trying to recall the argument with Romeo in the driveway. “Tino said, ‘Did you tell her ’bout throwing the fight?’ What other—” She paused, realization sinking in. “Lipton.”

“Jules.” Clay gave a grunt of disbelief. “That ain’t something ya should’ve just jumped to conclusions on.”

Jules swallowed hard against the new swell of fear. “What does that mean? Is he in some kind of trouble?”

Clay shrugged. “I dunno, but he sure ain’t been training like a guy whose planning on losing a fight.”

“You think someone was gonna make him do it?”

“I don’t think he needs the money,” Clay countered.

“Jules.” Wyatt stepped closer, using his bulk to assert his authority. “I don’t want ya getting mixed up with all this. It’s his issue, and you got your own set of problems.”

“The only issue I got is you.”

Jules turned to leave. She couldn’t see Romeo at the hospital and get real answers, but she still needed time to think clearly. Her anger at Wyatt was making that impossible.

“We need to have a serious discussion.” Wyatt refused to back down as he followed her down the hallway. “Now’s not the time to go running off half-cocked and—”

Jules turned around and glared, two steps away from attacking him again.

“Wyatt, I’d back off. I can’t even look at you without feeling my blood boil!”

“Why can’t you just calm down? Why does everything got to be a damn drama with you?” Wyatt huffed impatiently. “The last thing you need right now is to be getting all upset.”

“Then stay away from me.” Jules turned once more to leave, this time determined to put real space between them. “If you wanna keep me off that bitch Tabitha’s back,

263

you’ll make yourself scarce ’cause there’s a very expensive libel suit just waiting to happen.”

“We’re having that talk, Jules!” Wyatt called out as she walked down the hallway.

“And I don’t care what you threaten, you’re sitting down and listening to what I got to say.”

“Not today, I’m not,” Jules said as she rounded the corner and left.

264