Beast nodded slowly. “I know that, but you can’t go out there.”
“She needs someone with her, Beast. That should be me.”
Beast’s eyes widened and he reared his head back. “Why should it be you?”
She’s mine and I’m her man, sat on the tip of his tongue, but he wasn’t her man. He hesitated a beat longer. “I know her. Leave it at that.”
Tundra stormed around the corner. “Cops are here. So is the ambulance.”
Punc called his sister, but since it was three-thirty in the morning, it went to voicemail. He tried her husband, Michael, with the same result.
“Fuckin’ ‘Do not disturb’ mode,” he muttered.
For a fleeting moment, he considered calling Savannah’s dad, but he was such a piece of shit, he bordered on being a waste of space.
He didn’t want to call Catalina… this had to be done in person and Alanis was much more compassionate than him. He tried his sister twice more, with no answer, so he had no choice.
He slung a leg over his bike and rode to their house.
The ride to the Oakleaf neighborhood didn’t take half as long in the middle of the night. He pulled his bike up next to the cleaning company car Savannah drove earlier in the week. Before he shut down the bike, he revved the engine once to hopefully wake Catalina.
At the front entry, he rang the bell and pounded on the door. It wasn’t ideal since Catalina would be alarmed, but she’d know something was wrong regardless.
A dog barked inside the house. On the one hand, he liked that it was a deep, throaty bark that likely indicated a large dog, but on the other hand, he didn’t need a German Shepherd attacking him either.
Then he wondered where the dog had been when he was there Tuesday and Wednesday.
The front windows lit and he heard Catalina mutter behind the door, “Ted?”
“Yeah, Cat. Open the door, but make sure you can control your beast first.”
“Right. Hang on,” she said.
He listened to her cajole the dog away from the door. A minute later, she opened it. “Savannah isn’t home yet.”
He slipped past her and sat on the couch. “Can you sit down?”
She blinked and her eyes became guarded and annoyed. “No. I’m done sitting down for bad news. Where’s Savannah?”
He stood. If she wasn’t going to sit, he wasn’t either. “She’s been hurt and taken to Baptist Hospital. I can take you to her, but it’ll be on my bike - or if you got keys for her Buick, we’ll swing by Platinum’s and I can drive you in that.”
The way her expression shifted, it was like watching a set of armor come over her. “I need to change.”
Then he noticed her pajamas. The sleep shorts were cotton-candy pink with pictures of Pusheen the cat from social media all over them. Her matching short-sleeved shirt had a large picture of Pusheen laying on his belly and the words ‘So lazy…Can’t move’ written around him. The whole ensemble reminded him of when Alanis had been a teen… and Savannah would sleep over.
“Hurry up, then,” he said, shaking off the memories.
“It’s that bad?” she asked, her voice cracking once.
He took both her hands in his. “Cat, I don’t know, but it sure as hell isn’t very good. If you pray, now’s a good time to start.”
Her eyes got shiny. She pressed her lips together and nodded. “I’ll hurry, and let’s take the Buick.”
As much as Punc hated small talk, he hated the idea of Catalina worrying about her sister even more. While he drove the Buick downtown, he put in the effort to break the silence.
“School goin’ all right?”
She blew out a breath. “Yeah… school’s good, but I doubt I’m going to class tomorrow… or I guess later today, really.”
