Before Nico could reply, his phone vibrated in his hand, startling them both.“Oh, it’s Mal.”
“See?” Shiloh said with a smile, standing to leave.
He swiped to answer. “Hey, Bunny. Are you almost home?”
There was a long pause. “Nico, it’s Jericho.”
Nico’s heart fell into his stomach. He didn’t know what his face was doing, but Shiloh stopped dead in his tracks. “What? What’s wrong?”
“What happened?” Nico said, barely getting the words out, panic clawing at his insides as every possible worst case scenario ran through his mind.
“What’s going on?” Shiloh said, now looking just as worried as Nico.
Nico hit the speaker button so Shiloh could hear, too.
“He’s fine,” Jericho said. “But?—”
“But what?” Nico snapped. “What do you mean he’s fine? Why wouldn’t he be fine? Where is he? What happened?” There was a deep guttural groan in the distance. “Is that him? Where are you? Is he in the hospital? Say something.”
They hadn’t had a chance to put their location apps on each other’s phones yet.
“I will if you’ll calm down,” Jericho said, voice low and soothing, like he was trying to calm a wild animal. “We’re at the penthouse. He got jumped at the studio. Said it was two guys from the market. Low-level gangbangers, trying to intimidate us.”
“Us?”
“Whoever sent them thinks you’re looking for Casey’s mom on my orders.”
“What?” Nico said.
Jericho didn’t elaborate. “Freckles is patching him up now. Levi’s on his way to come get you.”
“How bad is it?” Nico asked, his insides cold. “Why didn’t he call me himself?”
“It’s not that bad. But we had to give him some medication.”
“Okay?” Nico prodded. “And?”
“He’s not handling it well,” Jericho said carefully.
“What does that mean?” Nico shouted.
Jericho chuckled. “You’ll see when you get here.”
“Do you know what he’s talking about?” Nico asked.
Shiloh nodded, biting back a smile.
“Yeah, Mal has an extremely low tolerance for any kind of pain medication.”
Nico made a noise of frustration. “But what does that mean?”
“You’ll see,” Shiloh said, now looking a tad too excited.
The front door opened and closed.
“Hey, I’m here!” Levi shouted, from the front door. “Let’s go.”
Once they were in the truck, the three of them smooshed together, Shiloh in the middle, Nico took to interrogating his best friend.
