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I moved numbly over toward one of the beds, dropping my bag down beside it and sitting down, palms on my thighs.
"You alright?" Lo asked, leaning against the wall by the door, arms crossing over her chest.
"No," I said honestly.
Lo simply nodded. "You will be," she said, turning and leaving me alone.
She wasn't wrong about me dealing with stuff. Too much had happened too quickly. Ben died. I met Johnnie and learned things I never wanted to know about how Ben treated him. I found illegal drugs in my wall and fled everything comfortable and familiar to me to fall into Johnnie's lap, laying my baggage at his feet for him to pick up. And he did. He did that effortlessly. He did it like it was nothing. Then, I let him in. I let him in in every possible way and he was under my skin. Even then, I could feel him there. Then I got myself kidnapped. Kidnapped! By some crazy drug dealer who couldn't let his obsession with his dead-ex go. I got beat and tied to a wall. I got choked. I watched a man's head explode right in front of me. I got taken to a hospital, got poked and prodded, got questioned by the police, then got taken... somewhat against my will, to some kind of illegal military camp thing.
On top of all that, I had my heart crushed. There was no denying it; that was what happened when Johnnie walked away from me. He took the heart I had unwittingly handed to him and he gave it back to me, even more bloodied and bruised than how it was when I handed it over in the first place.
That, well, that was just a freaking lot to deal with.
And everything hurt. Physically and emotionally, everything felt sore and exposed.
I sighed, looking down at my clothes with their blood stains. Some of it I knew wasn't mine. Some of it belonged in Luis' skull, but it wasn't in his skull because his skull was busted open. I should have been horrified by that. I should have been disgusted and freaked. But I felt none of that. All I felt was a strange sort of calm. My problems were over. Just like that. One squeeze of a trigger and I was safe again. Johnnie gave me that.
On a pained groan, I grabbed clothes out of my bag and made my way toward the bathroom Lo had pointed out. I turned on the shower and stripped out of my clothes, unraveling the bandages on my arms. The cuts there weren't that bad and even if they were, I didn't care. I wanted a shower. I wanted to wash that entire day away. So that was exactly what I did. I did this crying. No, not just crying. Big, ugly, snot crying. But I was alone, as promised, and I needed to get it out. Once I did, all evidence was washed down the drain. I got out and got into my jean shorts and a plain white tee and made my way back to my bed where I found a bottle of my pain medicine on the table beside it. I reached for it, shaking one into my palm despite having another four hours until I was due for another dose, throwing it back, and climbing into the bed. It would force me to sleep. If I slept, I would feel better.
Or, at least, that was what I was hoping.--I woke up a long time later, so long later that the clawing hunger in my stomach was what eventually broke through the drug-induced numbness of sleep and woke me up. My eyes fluttered open to look at the artificial bar lights on the ceiling. Hailstorm, apparently, had no windows. I imagined that was some kind of safety measure, but it made it impossible to know what time it actually was. I rubbed the sleep out of my eyes before I realized I wasn't alone. Don't ask me how I knew, but I knew. It was in the feeling of eyes on me that I swore made the hairs on my arms stand on end. My eyes flew from the ceiling to find four sets of eyes on me.
One set belonged to Lo, her brown eyes giving nothing away. Another set belonged to a younger woman with dark hair and tattoos, her light blue eyes somehow feeling like they were piercing through me. There was another set of familiar brown eyes on a woman with delicate, perfect doll-like features, the woman from Ben's apartment in Alabama. The last set belonged to a redhead with freckles who seemed softer, more open than the others.
"What the heck..." I started, shooting up in bed, ignoring the stabbing in my temple at the sudden movement.
"It's alright," Lo said, holding up a hand. "This is Janie," she said, gesturing to the skinny girl with tattoos. "She's Wolf's woman. And that is Alex, who is..."
"Breaker's woman," I said, remembering him talking about her. "You and Janie are hackers."
"Yeah. And I didn't fuck Shooter," Alex told me bluntly. "I know he told you, but I wanted to tell you too. Just so we are all clear."
I felt myself nod.
"And I'm Summer," the redhead said, giving me a smile. "I'm..."
"Cash's brother, Reign's, woman. You didn't know it, but you grew up in a criminal empire," I recalled.
She gave Lo a look then laughed at me. "Yeah, that'd be me. I see Shooter's been talking."
"I think he was trying to make me think I could fit in with all of you," I said with a shrug. "Not that it matters anymore."
"Well, see," Lo said, smiling a little, "that's why we are here."
"But not before we made a visit to Shoot," Janie said, giving me a smirk. "Just to check."
"Check what?"
"Well, see. Yesterday, Lo wouldn't let Shoot be involved with your rescue mission thing," she said, drawing my full attention. "She said he was too hot. He wouldn't have his head on straight. She wasn't wrong and she had some of our guys hold him back."
