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“Wouldn’t be much of a mess in your case,” he says softly, and that’s how I know he’s okay. The asshole instinct is strong enough to keep him alive.
I crawl to the corner and then strain my eyes trying to see where the shot came from, hoping to find a clue before whoever fired it can move. There are some nearby buildings, but nothing too high. There are the ships themselves, of course. But judging by the angle, I think whoever fired that shot was higher up.
The cranes, then. The real big ones that unload the shipping containers.
That’s where I would’ve gone, if I was looking to take out someone on the docks, and I was enough of a dickhead to use a laser sight. PacSyn must be more organized than I thought. Why the hell they didn’t shoot earlier, I don’t know, but that’s PacSyn. Why do anything competently when you can proudly fuck it up?
Now that I know the angle, I can get Julian up and out of here. “You gonna stay conscious enough to hang on to me on the bike?” I grunt as I pull him to his feet.
“As dull as you are, Leo, I’ll try to stay awake.”
“That’s my boy.” We hurry out of the area, back toward my bike, and I help Julian onto the seat. He’s still unsteady, but he manages to get on and hang on tight to my waist, his head leaning against my shoulders as I take off into the night.
I keep one eye on the road and the rest of my attention on the strength of his grip around me. We make it back to my apartment soon enough, and I help Julian stumble inside. I get him to the bedroom and he flops onto the bed, still seemingly groggy from the knock on his head.
“You can’t go to sleep,” I tell him.
“Thank you, Dr. Bernardi,” he says. “I have, in fact, had a concussion before.”
“Cool. Then you know you need to get it checked out.”
“And I will. Tomorrow.” He sits up on his elbows and looks around the room. “Where the hell are we? Is this some Bernardi dive safe house?”
“You keep talking, you’re gonna earn yourself a second concussion,” I tell him, but I’m already busy calling up a medic. He’s the guy who covers The Cellar, too, when shit goes down, and he knows how to keep his lips sealed.
“Who are you calling?” Julian asks, sending a suspicious look my way.
“My grandma,” I tell him. “It’s her birthday today.” I step out of the room as the medic picks up. “Yeah, I need a house call...”
Julian is on the bed where I left him when I re-enter, staring around the place and taking it in. I try to see it through his eyes—his snobby, asshole eyes—and I bet he doesn’t like what he sees. I walk over to the bed and sit on the edge, feeling the cheap frame creak under my weight. Julian watches me with a look of disdain, as if the mere sight of me disgusts him.
I can’t help but be turned on by that haughty attitude, though. There’s something about Julian’s arrogance that makes him all the more desirable to me. He’s a challenge, a puzzle that I want to solve. I want to bring him down to my level. Make himlikeit.
I reach out and tip his chin up, force him to look at me. “You have a problem with the décor?” I ask, my voice low.
“I think anyone with eyes would have a problem with the décor.”
The walls are a dingy off-white, stained in places from water damage. The floor is covered with a threadbare tan carpet so well-trodden, it’s beginning to fray. A dresser sits against the wall, filled with clothes that have been hastily thrown into it without any attempt at folding or organizing.
The bed takes up most of the space, and it’s only a double.
When I look back to Julian, his eyelids are drooping. I have to keep him awake. “You telling me you don’t like the job my interior decorator did?”
The eyes fly open. “Interior decorator? You mean the rats that live in the walls?”
I smile and pat his cheek gently. “I see whatever shook loose in your brain, it wasn’t the part that makes you bitchy. Sit tight. My guy’ll be here soon.”
Sure enough, a few minutes later the buzzer sounds, and I let up the medic. He barely raises his eyebrows at the sight of a live instead of dead Castellani in a Bernardi bed, and checks Julian over, treating him for concussion. He gives me some standard advice about what to do for the next day or two, tells me not to let him sleep for at least the next three hours, hands over some painkillers, and tells me to get him to a hospital if he passes out.
I show him out and come back to lean against the doorframe as Julian frowns out the window. “Which part of LA is this?” he asks.
“The okay part of the shitty part.”
“But your father is rich.”
“Myfatheris. Yeah.”
“And you’re the Bernardi Enforcer.”
