Always Someone’s Monster (Battle Crows MC 1)

Never.

“Yeah.” I shrugged.

And, again, wrong freakin’ decision.

Worst idea on the list of the worst ideas ever.

I groaned when the movement caused things to separate, jiggle, and move.

Tears leaked out of my eyes in reaction, and my breath hitched as I tried to hold my breath to keep the pain under control.

It was useless.

Like, biggest freakin’ fail ever.

I started to cry, and then I started to hiccup, and then an alarming look crossed over his face as he hurried to my bed and pressed a button beside my head.

I was crying so hard that I didn’t realize that I was starting to feel better until I finally calmed down enough to realize why I was feeling better.

Haggard had me in his arms, and he was singing to me.

“…burst capillaries in her eyes,” I heard someone—probably the doctor since it sounded so familiar—say. “It’s going to be something that will have to work itself out.”

I closed my eyes, wondering what ‘burst capillaries’ looked like.

Hoping that it wasn’t nearly as bad as it sounded.

“She’s in pain,” Haggard’s deep voice rumbled underneath my cheek. “Is there anything else we can do for her?”

“Can up her morphine,” the doctor murmured. “We had her on a low dose since she’s so small but… nurse said she was doing fine.”

“Well, the nurse is lying,” Haggard grumbled. “I heard her say that she needed some more before I even came in here. I was getting an update from you when the nurse said it.”

There was some more talking, and then some grumbles from both men, but I was starting to feel like I was floating.

The pain was finally gone, and I was in the one person’s arms that I felt safest in.

Especially after today.

“I got ran over,” I found myself saying. “Blakely did it.”

There was a pause in the rumble of conversation, then, “Did she now?”

I cleared my throat as my eyes started to close. “She did.”

“I’ll deal with Blakely,” he murmured.

I hoped he fucking dealt with her.

If he was in the business of killing people, then I hoped he made it hurt.

The twat.

There was no way in hell that girl didn’t see me as I was walking across the parking lot.

I wasn’t stupid.

I knew the sound of a truck revving. There was no way you ‘accidentally’ rev an engine when you’re claiming that you meant to hit the brake and hit the gas instead.

I wasn’t sure how long it was later when I heard the murmur of voices again.

At no point in the last, however long it’d been, had I stopped feeling ‘okay.’ Meaning, I had no clue how much time had passed.

I did, however, notice that the living, breathing bed beneath me hadn’t once shifted.

The rumble of his voice made me feel at peace.

Listening to it felt like everything in that moment.

I wasn’t alone.

I was with him.

“What happened?” he rasped.

I listened with half an ear as he spoke with another person in the room.

One of his brothers, but without opening my eyes, I couldn’t tell which one.

“From the video feed,” his brother said, “it looks like she was walking to her car for lunch. She had her lunch kit in her hand—the shop hands say she eats in her car every day because of Blakely—and she looked both ways before she crossed the lot to her car. Blakely pulls out of her parking spot a few over from where Sophia was parked. Blakely claims that she hit the gas instead of the brake, but on the video, you can hear the engine rev a few times, causing Sophia to look up. You don’t accidentally ‘rev’ the engine before you accidentally hit the gas. She had her foot on the gas and knew it. Blakely hit her at about twenty miles an hour. In the video, you clearly see her swerve slightly to hit Sophia. The front and the back tires run over her after she gets clipped as Sophia tries to dodge the truck.”

I felt slightly ill.

I’d remembered that.

I’d tried to jump out of the way, but I’d missed and was hit with the bumper in the front right corner. I also clearly remember being run over by both wheels.

I also remember watching as the driveshaft spun over my head, and the way that the oil leaked.

A drop of it had hit me in the face.

In fact, I could still feel the burning oil as it landed on my upper cheek.

I raised my hand and placed it over the spot on my face, catching Haggard’s attention.

He shifted and caught my hand, pressing it softly against his chest.

“What’s wrong?” he rasped. “Are you in pain?”

I swallowed hard and said, “I have to pee.”

There was a long moment of silence before the bed underneath of me shifted—his body—and he stood with me in his arms.

He walked me to the bathroom as someone else followed with my IV pole.