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Jonah shrugged. “He seemed pretty insistent he wasn’t like that.” But my glare his way made him reconsider his words. After sending me a short frown, he let out a sigh and scrubbed a hand over his head before saying, “Fine. I’ll go look for him.”
He grabbed his coat and stomped down the stairs. Tess moved up beside me and rubbed my arm. “I’m sure he’s okay and will be home soon.”
I glanced at her and realized what an annoying, pain-in-the-butt worrywart I was probably being. Opening my mouth to apologize, I stopped short as Jonah hollered up the stairwell, “Found him.”
I hurried to the steps only to realize Jonah had already admitted Beckett inside the apartment and they were both starting up the steps together.
Beck lifted his face, and relief flooded me before I realized he was holding one arm where blood soaked through the long sleeve of his white thermal undershirt.
“Oh my God, what happened?” I flew down the steps to meet him halfway, clutching his arm to assess the damage. But his shirt was in the way.
“I’m fine,” he assured me, his voice quiet. It wasn’t filled with pain but maybe there was some hopelessness littering his tone.
“What happened?” I asked again, more rationally this time.
He shrugged and glanced away, letting me know he didn’t want to tell me. “It was stupid,” he said. “My own damn fault.”
I just arched my eyebrows, letting him know he needed to start talking.
His shoulders slumped as I led him through the living room and toward the kitchen where I pulled his shirtsleeve up to reveal a somewhat shallow four-inch cut running lengthwise up the back of his arm.
After leading him to the sink, I began to run water over his arm, making him hiss from the chill. Once that was done, I opened a nearby drawer that housed our first aid kit.
“So are you going to talk or make me guess what happened?” I asked as I lined the wound with a triple-action antibiotic and then began to wrap it with gauze.
“It was stupid,” he repeated, sighing again as if upset with himself. “I went looking for work and actually had someone offer me a job.”
I looked up, gasping in glee. “That’s great. Where?”
But he only frowned back. “A feed-packing plant. But don’t get too excited. As soon as I started to fill out my W-2 and handed over my driver’s license for proof of ID, they saw my name and tried to run me off the place, and I mean, literally, the guy charged me. So I went tripping backward away from him and stumbled into this coat rack thing he had by the door, knocking it over and slicing my arm open.” He sniffed his disgust and rolled his eyes. “It was my own fault for not looking where I was going.”
I didn’t agree. Seriously, who would’ve expected someone to charge them after being offered a job? My heart cracked with pity and anger on his behalf.
“Oh, Beck,” I said. “What’re we going to with you?”
“I’m thinking full-body bubble wrap,” he said.
I blurted out a laugh, but then couldn’t control myself. I threw my arms around him and hugged him, scolding, “It’s not funny. You can’t keep getting the crap beat out of you every time you leave the house.”
“Bailey, really.” He tensed against me. “A scrape on the arm isn’t exactly an ass kicking.” But then he hugged me back, and for some reason I rested my head—er, rather my temple because I was too short to get my whole head up there—against his shoulder.
Behind us, Tess hissed, “She’s hugging him again. Oh my God, she’s hugging him again.”
Realizing, oh my God, I was hugging him once again, I dropped my arms and stepped back. But he took my wrist to stop me from going away too far away.
I hissed when his fingers hit a tender spot.
Beckett looked down at my gasp and moved his fingers until he revealed a bruise. “What the hell?” His gaze sprang to mine. “Did someone hurt you?”
I was totally going to play it off, but Tess—curse her—blurted, “Yes. The cowboy guy and his sister.”
“What?” Beck zipped a startled glance to her, making her flush and hide her face in Jonah’s bicep. Then he whirled an accusing stare to me. “What happened?”
“We ran into them on campus,” Tess started. When I glared at her, she slapped her hands over her mouth and widened her eyes. Then, just as quickly, she dropped her fingers and rushed, “They cornered us, bullied Bailey, broke her phone when they saw the video on it, and then the cowboy grabbed her and reared back his arm to hit her, except Jonah finally showed up and scared him off.” She grinned lovingly up at her boyfriend at that part.
Beck stood there blinking for a good five seconds, before he shook his head. That’s when his eyes flared with rage, and he started from the kitchen.
“I’m going to kill him.”
