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Chapter Two
Kade
Well, that was not how I had anticipated that going down.
I scooped the young woman into my arms and carried her up the street. Her car had been destroyed, picked apart, and scavenged in the few minutes while she had been delivering food. Welcome to Devil’s Park, sweetheart.
I hated the injustice done to her, especially when she had intervened to protect Sheila, but she had fucked up all of my plans. I had been waiting for six months to capture Antonio with his pants down, figuratively speaking. Now, with his merry band of goons missing from the picture, would have been a fantastic opportunity save for the tiny little problem of him being knocked out cold.
Oh well. It wasn’t meant to be. Not tonight anyway.
Now that Sheila Delgado had run off and left the mysterious beauty on the sidewalk, I had little choice. I hoped this woman would trust me when she awoke, but I wasn’t entirely sure how to explain. I had some unique traits, some called them gifts, and some called them unholy and monstrous. It appeared the pizza delivery girl had some rare talents of her own. It also seemed like she had only just experienced them for the first time tonight. Which would explain her passing out. Fuck. She was in shock, coupled with all the nasty physical repercussions that came with sudden full-on power manifestation—that would cause this kind of stress to anybody. Fuck again.
Not knowing what else to do with her, I brought the small woman home to my house and searched her for identification. I found what I was looking for stuffed in a worn leather wallet in her back pocket. Her name was Caitlyn Monahan. It was a perfectly boring name for a woman who seemed to be the complete opposite of boring. According to her driver’s license she was twenty-four years old. Her address was far from both Devil’s Park and my neighborhood. I wondered again if the pizza had been a cover for some nefarious activity, but she just looked so innocent.
Looks can be deceiving, I reminded myself. Truer words have never been spoken.
One could slap a label on my forehead which read—cocky, arrogant bastard; charming with asshole-ish good looks. Fuck them all. I knew what my charm and handsome features did to the women (and some men) around my sphere, but I wasn’t any of the other things. Sure, I had money, but I had earned every fucking cent by working my ass off.
I set Caitlyn down on the couch and pressed a number into my phone. My sister Louisa answered on the second ring. “Hey, I’ve got a problem.”
“I’m working a double, so I don’t have time. I promise I’ll call you this weekend.”
“Wait!” I yelled to get her attention before she could hang up on me. “This girl passed out after she threw Antonio Morelli across a street with one hand, and that’s after she crushed his gun. Now she’s at my house.”
“Do you mean his dick?”
“No, Sis, I mean his gun,” I said with a sigh. “An actual gun. Anyhow, I think this girl is sick. I don’t think she’s used her you-know-what before.”
“I can’t have this conversation while running around the ER, Kade. Especially not one that involves who you just named.” Louisa blew out a breath, and kicked into nurse mode. “How’s her breathing? Does she have a fever? You spiked a high one after your gifts showed up.”
“Yeah, I’m aware,” I interrupted before she could continue. I wasn’t in the mood to rehash my origin story, not when it involved our parents. There were a multitude of reasons why I didn’t want to think about the aftermath. Louisa had become a nurse after she pulled me through, but she hadn’t been able to save our parents. Our father had been driving, and they had been less than a mile from the house when the crash happened. A supposed drunk driver, combined with pouring rain and terrible visibility. Then the story changed. I hired a private eye company to search deeper into the cause. My parents’ car had a damaged brake line. Beyond that, I still didn’t know the entire truth of what had happened.
I pinched the bridge of my nose and forced the memories away to focus on the conversation at hand. My sister wouldn’t deny someone medical care even if she were busy. I rested my hand on Caitlyn’s stomach and then her head, checking for a fever. “She’s breathing normally, but she’s burning up.”
“Find a thermometer, little brother.” Her voice was tinged with impatience. “If her temperature goes above 105, then you need to get her to the hospital, otherwise just make sure she gets lots of fluids. Give her ice chips, Gatorade, and water to stay hydrated.”
“Yup, got it.” I knew how to keep someone hydrated of course, it wasn’t classified medical information, but I kept my mouth shut and obeyed orders.
“Let her body do whatever it’s doing, so no medication,” Louisa continued, “not even a Tylenol. I’ve got to sleep after this shift, but I’ll come over tomorrow afternoon and check her out. Okay?”
“Thanks, love you.” I ended the call, and ran a hand through my hair.
What was I doing?
I wasn’t the sort of man who played nursemaid to a strange woman. I should have left her on the street, but knowing the kind of danger she was now in, and the confusion she would be feeling after she wakes up, my conscience wouldn’t let me.
Now I had a houseguest.
I glanced down into her face and willed her to wake up. Her brows furrowed as if she were in pain, but she remained caught in delirium somewhere between dreams and nightmares.
Did I even own a thermometer?
I wandered to the upstairs bathroom, the one inside the guest room. It had belonged to my parents when they were alive. I had converted my sister’s old room along with my childhood bedroom into one large suite, but left the bathroom alone. There was probably a thermometer in here, but I didn’t know where to look. I had never gone through all of their things; it was just too painful. You’d think after all this time I would have sorted through, but some days their loss felt like a few months ago rather than ten years.
I rifled through my mother’s medicine cabinet and the linen closet. I found a thermometer, but the pretty pear-shaped bulb wasn’t one you typically used on an adult. Good thing Caitlyn was unconscious. I grabbed it, along with the glass jar of lube sitting next to it, and ran back to the living room where I had left her.
Staring at the items in my hand and back at the pretty young woman, I sighed deeply and rolled her onto her stomach, pushing her shorts down her hips to give me the access I would need. God forgive me for this intrusion. Shaking the thermometer, I dipped it into the Vaseline and did what needed to be done. I felt wholly overwhelmed and ridiculously out of my league, but that was silly. If I could take down filthy lawyers by day and hardened criminals by night, I could take care of one sick woman.
Twenty minutes later, I had Caitlyn wrapped in a sheet with cool towels on her feet and one on the back of her neck as advised by my sister via text message. Her fever was a scary 103.7, and she was fluttering in and out of consciousness. Her chest rose and fell but her beautiful golden locks stuck to her forehead. I tucked a few stray locks back behind her ears. She was a stranger, but her vulnerability was affecting me in a way I couldn’t explain. She was angelic, and helpless, and I wanted to be her knight in shining armor, or, more aptly, the superhero that rushed to her aid.
The urge to protect this virtual stranger knotted in my gut, and I pushed the thoughts away. I wasn’t exactly boyfriend material. I sighed as I situated myself on the overstuffed armchair and pulled a blanket over my shoulders. It was going to be a long night.
