Reaching the bathroom, I flip on the light, and pull her inside with me, before kicking the door shut. I settle her back against the door, catching her legs with mine and shoving her hair aside to inspect the seep of blood down her throat. Anger is a hard bite that I direct at myself. I let this happen to her and I was too busy kissing her to consider the killer who held a blade to her neck might have actually cut her. “You’re not fucking fine.” I grab a washcloth, wet it, and wipe her neck to inspect the wound, which is thank fuck, a surface wound.
Her fingers close around my shirt, and she leans into me, tiny and perfect, the only damn thing in this world that matters to me and I almost lost her tonight. “You saved my life.”
“I should have swatted that fly a long ass time ago,” I murmur, my hand going to the door beside her head. “I hate I let this happen to you.”
“You didn’t let this happen to me. This happened because you tried to save a young boy’s life. Had you not have done what you did that day, you wouldn’t be the man I love. I’m in this with you. Rick. All the way. No matter how hellish it gets.”
I catch the back of her neck, my hand gliding higher into the strands of her hair. “It won’t be like this forever. I’m going to get rid of Tag and his lapdogs. Then I’ll choose what jobs I take, for us, for you—to protect you.”
“You were put on this earth to save lives. You chose your work to keep saving lives. And no, I’m not talking about in an operating room. I know that’s not where you belong.”
But she didn’t know when I left. I didn’t make sure she knew, and then I left before I gave her a chance to handle the reality of who, and what, I am. “Candace—”
There’s a knock on the door and I squeeze my eyes shut, cursing at the interruption.
Candace is suddenly on her toes, her lips a breath from mine. “I always knew you were dangerous, Rick Savage,” she says, proving her ability to read my thoughts, even when I don’t turn them into words. “Perhaps it even turned me on.”
My hands come down on her waist. “Now you’re just trying to distract me.”
“Is it working?” Her hand slides under my shirt as she adds, “Because the funny thing about almost dying is how much it leaves you wanting what you want. Right now, in this moment.”
“Oh hell,” I murmur, my tongue sweeping deeply against hers, and when she moans, I’m hard and hot, and ready to take her right here, in this hall bathroom. That is until there’s another knock on the door.
“We need you, Savage!” Adam calls through the door.
I grunt and pull my mouth from Candace’s. “This better be good!” I shout out irritably, but I don’t get a reply.
I kiss Candace one more time, hard on the mouth, and then lift her off the door, to angle her under the light, and give that slice on her neck another inspection. “No telling whose neck that bastard’s knife had been inside. When was the last time you had a tetanus shot?”
“Well, Dr. Savage, I cut my hand last year. And since you weren’t here to stitch it up, I went to the ER where I got four stitches and a tetanus shot.”
She’s being playful, I know, but every time I hear something I’ve missed with her, it guts me. “I’ll be here next time—every next time.”
Her lips curve. “I know. I’m not letting you run away again.”
I rotate her to face the door, and step behind her, my lips finding her ear. “I don’t run baby, but we’ll discuss that in more detail, later. When we’re alone and naked. And after I lick you into oblivion and back.”
The soft little gasp that escapes her lips has me opening the door before I stop giving a fuck what Adam wants, and don’t open the door. At least not until she’s gasping like that a few more times.
She turns to face me as we exit the bathroom, pointing a finger a me. “You’re bad,” she accuses.
My arm slides around her but I don’t dispute that statement. I am bad. The question is, can she handle my many shades of bad? I’m not sure she can answer that question until this is over and the wait is going to kill me.
CHAPTER THREE
Candace
With Rick’s hand settled low and possessive on my back, we enter the dining room to find Adam, Adrian, Asher, and Smith sitting at the rectangular table. Men that feel more like his family than his father ever has. They are brothers to Rick and those brothers, every last one of them, stand up when I enter the room.