“Careful,” Owen called as he rounded the vehicle. “The doctor said no exertion. Otherwise, you might pop your stitches.”
“Doctor?” My vision was boomeranging between them. “Stitches?”
That was when I got a really good look at her just. She was pale and wore no jewelry or makeup, her hair tossed up in a messy bun on top of her head, like she’d just woken up. She wore an oversized t-shirt and some leggings, and there was a surgical dressing sticking out of one sleeve, and another bandage on the top of her hand.
In two steps, I had crossed the lot and swept her off her feet and into my arms. Her arms were around me just as quickly, squeezing so hard I could barely breathe.
I didn’t care. She was here. In my arms. She was all right, even if she had clearly had some kind of procedure?—
“What the hell are you doing here?” I demanded. “What happened after I left?” I looked over her shoulder to Owen. “Tell me. Now.”
My brother shrugged. “She had surgery. You didn’t tell us she had a heart thing, by the way.”
“And I wasn’t going to, since it’s none of your fucking business,” I snapped back. “What happened?”
“After I fainted, the police radioed for an ambulance,” Laney put in.
I remembered that. Remembered clawing at the doors of the squad car like an animal when I saw the EMTs pull up, then losing my fucking shit when the police came back down and drove me away.
She then proceeded to detail everything that had happened between fainting in her apartment and getting here. By the time she was finished, I honestly thought my heart was about to stop.
“Christ,” I said for the tenth time as I buried my face in her neck. “Jesus Christ, Laney. You almost died. And I—goddamn it, I wasn’t there to help you!”
“Hey.” She ran her fingers through my hair, cradling my head close. “I’m okay. I had the procedure. Ronan, I’m going to be okay.”
Then I was kissing her because I couldn’t hold myself back anymore. And my wife, thank God, was alive and kissing me right back.
“I love you,” I told her. “I love you so fucking much. In case you don’t remember. In case you forgot.”
She smiled, and her big green eyes were brighter than any jewels. “I do remember. But Ronan—I love you too. More than anything.” Then she frowned. “Wait, why aren’t you in jail?”
Suddenly, she was twisting out of my arms, wriggling to the point where it was almost difficult to hold her. “He didn’t do anything! He was with me that night! All night! I can testify?—”
“Christ, stop,” Liam put in. “Laney, I told you not to do that.”
“You told her?” I asked. “When, exactly, did you tell her?”
“When we picked her up from the hospital.” Owen was rubbing his forehead, looking like a very weary Bane in his nose brace. “I kept telling her all the way here she needs to stop saying that.”
I just grinned and kissed her again. Not just to shut her up—because the fact that Laney Fisher still loved me felt better than anything I’d ever imagined.
When I pulled back, we were both breathless.
“I—what—” She couldn’t quite get her words out, and it was fucking adorable.
“Baby, I love you,” I told her again. “But you need to stop lying. For one, I don’t need an alibi. Billy Richards is alive.”
“He’s—Billy Richards—you mean you didn’t maybe commit murder?”
“I absolutely did not commit murder,” I assured her. “Although it’s pretty damn hot that you thought I possibly did and still rushed down here to be my moll. Turns out he’d just… disappeared for a while. Personal reasons. No foul play involved, right?”
I glanced at Ares, who was watching this exchange with mild amusement.
He inclined his head. “Happy to help. And since you clearly don’t need a ride, I’ll just be in touch.”
He got back into the Mercedes, and we all watched as it pulled out of the lot and drove away.
I looked at my brother. At the man who’d helped orchestrate the Meráki acquisition behind my back and whose nose I’d neatly broken because of it. The man who’d apparently escorted my post-surgical wife seventeen hours across three states to get to me.
