“Doesn’t have the power to do that either.” He raised an eyebrow. “Only you do, brother.”
“What did she say to you?”
“I won’t betray her confidence.” He sighed. “Butyou’re right, she wants you out.”
“Goddamn it!”
“I’m not releasin’ you,” Hatch assured. “Unless you want it.”
“I don’t.”
He smirked. “I know.”
“I want these fuckers who did this to me dead,” I snarled.
“Right now, I want you to focus on healing your body. And gettin’ your head right. I will take care of the fuckers who did this to you. I will also handle your mother. But you need to apologize to her and cut her a fuckin’ break.”
“I want to help dealing with the Spiders.”
“No.”
“What the fuck, Hatch? You can’t cut me out—”
“I can do whatever the fuck I wanna do. I’m your goddammed president.”
I scowled at him. “This is bullshit.”
“Look, I get that you want to take care of this, but you can’t right now. Literally, brother. You need to heal. As soon as you have your leg back to fighting shape, I’ll read you in. Deal?”
I scowled at him for a few more seconds before giving him a curt nod. “Yeah, fine.”
“Oh, thank you, benevolent one.”
“Now, about going out without wearing my colors.”
“Not rehashing that,” Hatch said. “Katie will pick you up on Thursday and take you to your first appointment. You’ll be nice. And not my version of nice. Maisie’s version of nice. On second thought, Iwant you Sadie’s version of nice.”
“What the hell, man? You gotta invoke the name of a nun? Like I can compete with the goodness of a holy sister.”
“Technically, she’s an ex-holy sister,” he corrected.
Sadie had in fact been a nun when she’d met and fallen in love with Ryder Carsen. He was the son of the ex-president of the Gresham Spiders, but we didn’t hold that against him, considering he’d had our club’s back from the beginning and continued to do so, even though he refused to patch in.
“Whatever, Hatch. You brought her up.” I sighed. “But I get it, okay? I’ll be a goddamn ray of sunshine, emitting puppies, rainbows, and maybe a few Skittles if I can’t hold back a fart.”
“That’s exactly what I wanted to hear.” Hatch chuckled. “You got a couple hours to nap before dinner, so take advantage. You’re due for meds. You want them now?”
I nodded, and he got them for me before leaving me to sleep.
Waverly
THURSDAY MORNING, I walked into work with what I thought would be a full schedule. What I found, instead, was that my two appointments right before lunch had canceled last minute. And we had a very strict last-minute cancelation policy which required the client to pay a fee, provided they weren’t in some kind of peril, of course. I held myself in check but the second I closed myself into my office, I did a happy little dance. I loved long lunches, especially when they were paid for.
Logging into my computer, I went through my schedule and pulled up the patient notes for the folksI was seeing today. I had a new client this morning, so I paid a little extra attention to his case.
I frowned. There wasn’t much information in his chart but the x-rays showed extensive damage relating to an ‘accident,’ but other than that, no information.
I sighed. I was going in somewhat blind, but I did love a challenge and a challenge was what I was being presented today.
