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I open my eyes and see a sleeping Jasmine next to me. She’s curled up on her side, one hand under her face, the other holding mine. She looks so peaceful. I reach to move some hair from her face but hiss as pain radiates down my side.
“Welcome back.”
I turn my head to see Christian sitting in a chair by the side of my bed.
“How did I get back here?” I ask as I look around and see all three of my brothers now standing around my bed.
“I brought you back,” Maximus says quietly. It all comes back to me, him trying to defend me and taking down one of Hudson’s lackeys before dragging me out of the shithole we found them in.
“You saved my life,” I whisper, unable to miss the way his face drops.
“If I had done a better job, you wouldn’t be so cut up.”
“Don’t do that. Don’t beat yourself up. Otherwise, I’ll do it for you when I get out of this bed.”
“Don’t make me bang your heads together.”
I turn my head to see Jasmine staring at me. I lift her hand and place a kiss on it wanting nothing more than to pull her into my arms, but I’m not sure if I can handle holding her yet. Just kissing her hand hurts. I lift my hand to the left side of my face and feel the cut stretching down one side. Jasmine reaches over and takes my hand.
“Don’t touch it,” she warns.
“How bad is it?” I ask as I look at her.
“Dr Evans thinks it will scar,” Christian explains as Jasmine leans in and places a soft kiss on it.
“You are still just as handsome,” she whispers smiling at me. “If anything, it makes you sexier,” she adds. I look into her blue eyes and wonder how the hell I got so lucky. I’m lying here cut up and she still makes me feel like I could take on the world. I am not worthy of her love.
“Want to tell us what happened?” Christian asks, dragging me back out of my head.
I tear my eyes away from Jasmine and look at my older brother who I know is going to be pissed off with me. I broke our golden rule and paid the price.
“After Jazzy had her nightmare, I was too angry to sleep, I needed to do something. So, I left and went hunting for Hudson. It took the best part of the day to find some of his friends and to get out as much information about his known whereabouts as he has been keeping people out of the loop. No one could tell me who he was working for, even after me beating the shit out of them. I had to admit they were as much in the dark as the rest of us.
“It was around lunchtime when Maximus caught up with me I tried to send him home at first but after he kept following me, I accepted his help and we started working together.”
“It’s a good job you did. If he hadn’t been there, we would be organising your funeral right now.”
I look to Christian and nod.
“This is why we don’t go hunting people down on our own, you know this. It’s the one rule we have, we are a team, the four of us,” he adds firmly.
“I know and I won’t make that mistake again,” I admit as I look to Maximus.
“So where did you finally find him?” Sean asks.
“He was at a warehouse someone had spotted him at just half an hour beforehand. We raced over and found him there with two of his new lackeys. As soon as I confronted him, he pulled out a knife and we started fighting. I had a gun, but I wanted him to pay for how he attacked Jazzy. Whilst we fought Maximus took down one of his guys, he will have to tell you how it went down with the other guy as I was a little preoccupied.”
“Hudson is stronger than he was, plus my exhaustion was kicking in. I know I got in a few good stabs, but he managed to get in a few himself. Nothing compared to the ones I got in but I know he caught my face as the blood ran into my eye and blinded me, that was when he got two deep ones in.
“I remember getting one to his neck and then everything started to go black as I struggled with the blood loss. I don’t remember anything until waking up here.” I let out a sigh as I turn to Jasmine and see a tear rolling from her eye and across her nose as he continues to lie on her side.
“I would do it all again in a heartbeat to make sure you are safe. The only regret I have is not making sure he was dead.”
Jasmine reaches over and cups my cheek before pressing a kiss to my lips.
“There is no way he was still alive, he wasn’t breathing when I carried you out. When our clean-up guys went to the location it was already on fire. They heard the fire crew say there were three bodies.” I hear Maximus say from where he is standing beside the bed. “We didn’t find out who they were working for, but I don’t think we would have managed it anyway as they were determined to take that to the grave,” Maximus sighs as he runs his hand over his head.
“So, is it all over?”
