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I survey my body and chuckle lightly.
ME:You’ll see.
I get to my feet and pocket my phone, doing my best to tidy up the mess that I am. I lick at my upper lip to test how it feels and taste the iron and salt over the plump surface. There isn’t much to be done about that, so I go to work on my pants, dusting off dirt. I take my jacket off and fold it over my arm, hiding my jacked-up left hand before rolling my shoulders and stepping up to the large back window of Brooklyn’s SUV. My reflection isn’t half bad, but I think the devil might be in the details that you can’t see in dim garage light and window tinting.
When I hear the garage door slam shut behind me, I turn slowly, hoping my appearance doesn’t freak her out. She stops in her tracks when her gaze reaches my face, staring at me with an open mouth that shuts after a few seconds. Her head falls to the side slowly as her mouth forms a tight straight line. I hang my head because Brooklyn’s not stupid, and she knows me well enough.
“Did you literally follow him from the café or was this a coincidence?” Her tone is wry.
“You say coincidence, but I would classify it as rather fortuitous,” I respond.
“Damn it, Cam,” she huffs, dropping her bag on the ground at her feet after pulling out a roll of paper towels. She unwinds several feet of it, which makes me wonder if I look worse than I thought.
“I got it,” I say, reaching to take the pieces from her. She jerks back and shoots me a stern look.
“Get in the car and let me take a look, you dumb idiot,” she chastises with a slight rolling of her eyes. I smile in response, which basically confirms what she called me. I can’t help it, though. She’s cute when she’s irritated.
I move to open the backseat door, figuring now that she’s seen me, she’s probably serious about putting me back there. Hell, I may end up in the cargo area.
“Don’t be a martyr. Get in the front seat,” she says. I let go of the back handle and move to the front, but she cuts me off, opening the door and sticking her arm out to block me from getting in.
“Give me your jacket,” she commands.
I hand it to her, and she lays the inside on the seat before taking a step out of the way and holding an open palm out to welcome me in.
“I don’t have any blankets or towels in here, and yeah . . . you’re a mess.”
I smile on the side of my face that isn’t throbbing and slide into the seat.
“I’m glad you find this amusing. I’m the one who’ll have to field the litany of questions my dad is going to have because, sadly, Cole’s dad and mine really do talk all the time. And I’m sure by now Cole has turned this into an epic tale.” She swats my hand away from my face, so I let her go to work on me without interference.
“I wish I could say you should see the other guy, but that raggedy-ass chump is scrappy.” I wince when she touches my eyebrow. I didn’t even know he hit me there. Maybe that was the ground.
“He’s a black belt, and he went through some combat training thing. I don’t know what it was called. But when you’re an asshole like Cole you need to have tools to defend yourself.” She retrieves her bag, bringing it to her car and setting it on the floor, pulling out a water bottle and a packet of Advil.
“I don’t need that,” I say, taking it from her hand and tossing it back in her bag.
“Lemme guess, you’ll use the natural stuff?”
I shrug as she purses her lips to scold me.
“It works better. Just does,” I say.
“Whatever,” she grunts, pouring water from her bottle onto a folded paper towel. “Hold still.”
She presses the makeshift compress against my eyelid, holding it there through the sting. She pulls it away and I see how pink it is from blood. I’m in worse shape than I thought. She repeats the process a few times, eventually getting to my busted lip.
“It’s pretty bad, Cam. Coach is going to have questions,” she says.
My lip twitches at her touch and she pauses, her fingertips hovering millimeters away from my skin as her eyes flit up to meet mine.
“I’ll tell him I was defending a woman’s honor,” I say, my chest collapsing when her eyes soften, and her shoulders fall a tick.
“Is that what happened?”
I lick my bottom lip, a nervous habit that isn’t great in this condition, and take a ragged breath. I can’t lie to her.
“Not exactly,” I admit, which brings all of the ire and resistance back to her expression.
