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Oh, she’d just show him what a good girl she wasn’t.
As soon as the doctor released her, that was.
SEVEN
Jed hadn’t prayed in years, but as he drove from the small airfield outside Louisville the next evening, he found himself praying for patience.
He’d found a chance to question Bret Jordan and his friends Matthew Grace and Olivia Camfield. From their report, they’d heard Piper screaming in the suite next door and had come to investigate. Her door had been opened and a man they described as a “mountain” had been pounding on Piper as though he intended to beat her to death.
/> He also had the bastard’s description. The three had been amazingly observant and were able to provide several valuable details in regard to the assailant’s appearance. One of his contacts in the city had made a visit to the hotel and questioned the staff before going to the room and doing the job it seemed the police hadn’t, collecting what evidence of the attack had been left.
And there was the reason for the prayers. Patience wasn’t his strong suit. The second he had Piper safely at home he’d launch his own investigation. God help the bastard who had dared to touch her.
Once the assailant was found, Jed prayed he could keep from attempting to kill him with his bare hands. From showing the “mountain” what it meant to really hurt.
“Why didn’t you tell Dawg where I was?” Piper finally deigned to speak to him, something she hadn’t done since they’d left the hospital unless he’d simply left her no other choice.
“I promised to keep your secrets, Piper; I meant it.” Glancing at her, he drove the truck he’d parked at the airfield the morning before toward Somerset. “I won’t tell Dawg anything I know you’d want me to keep to myself.”
The flight back had been short, but Jed hadn’t wanted to arrive back in Kentucky until well after midnight. He’d spent the day getting her ready to leave and ensuring someone was investigating her reason for being there and why she had been attacked.
He hoped—hell, no, he was praying—that Dawg wouldn’t be anywhere near the inn when they arrived.
She shifted against the leather seats, no doubt trying to find a comfortable position.
His fingers tightened on the steering wheel as he fought back the anger he was determined she wouldn’t see.
“And that’s why you didn’t call Dawg?” She obviously didn’t want to believe him.
“That’s why.”
Dawg would have charged into New York City with Rowdy, Natches, and no doubt Chaya, Natches’s wife; the chief of Somerset’s police force, Alex Jansen, and Pulaski County sheriff Zeke Mayes; as well as Special Agent Timothy Cranston and Piper’s mother, Mercedes Mackay, ready to kill.
Dawg wouldn’t have left the city until Timothy had buried her attacker. If that attacker hadn’t been found, then Piper would have returned under such heavy guard she would have been smothered before ever reaching Kentucky again.
Silence descended between them, one that stretched until they had nearly reached the exit to Somerset.
“There’s no way to hide the bruises,” Piper stated, her voice low. “Dawg’s going to see them.”
Yeah, he would; there was no way to hide the damage to her face, though thankfully, her left eye was no longer swollen shut.
“What are you going to tell him?” Taking the exit to Somerset off the interstate, he knew Piper’s time was definitely running out.
Dawg had all but haunted Mercedes and Timothy, demanding to know whether Piper had called her mother yet. Elijah, Jed’s partner, had called earlier in the afternoon to report Dawg had contacted several agents at the surrounding airports and had her name run for flights out.
He’d told her earlier about the conversation he’d overheard between Mercedes and Dawg, as well as the fact that Dawg was questioning everyone he could think to question about her whereabouts.
“You can’t hide this from him, Piper,” he warned her when she didn’t answer him.
“I know I can’t,” she answered wearily.
The tiredness in her tone coincided with that unfamiliar tightness in his chest—something he experienced only with Piper.
“He’s been beside himself with worry,” he told her. “Christa’s accused him of running headlong into a stroke as he attempts to protect all of you.”
“If he would just wait until we need protecting.” Frustration immediately tightened her body as she pushed both hands through her shoulder-length black hair before clenching them in the deep waves.
God, he would kill to feel all that lush, warm silk against his body. Against his thighs as her lips parted and his dick pierced the heated dampness beyond. That particular portion of his body throbbed in painful hunger as the need for her began to grow impossibly.
