“Oh God, I’m so sorry,” I said, immediately unlocking my legs from behind his back.
He carefully set me on my feet, but I didn’t let go. “Are you okay? Does it hurt? What happened?”
He smiled at my rapid-fire questions, that crooked grin that had always made my stomach do backflips. “I’m okay, Songbird. Come on, let’s get inside so Pete can patch me up.”
My mind was reeling as I helped him up the porch and into the house.
Weston was the one who kissed me.
What did that mean?
Chapter Eight
Bash
“Jesus Christ, hold fuckin’still,” Pete grumbled, threading the needle through my skin for what felt like the hundredth time. “This would go a lot faster if you quit tensing up every time I stick you.”
“Maybe I’d be able to stop tensing up if you weren’t so damn heavy-handed with that thing,” I shot back through clenched teeth. Pete stitched up members of the Kings for decades before Sandman joined the club. In fact, he’d done it so many times he could probably do it blindfolded.
Hattie sighed. “Would you both stop being mean to each other?”
I glanced over to where she was hovering, not liking how pale her face was. Every time her papaw pushed the thread through my skin, she’d flinch like she was the one in pain.
“It’s not that bad,” I lied, trying to ease her worry.
“Yeah. He’s just a big fuckin’ baby.” Pete grumbled.
She shot him a look that could have stripped paint. “Be nice papaw.” Then her narrowed eyes came to me. “And don’t you dare minimize this. You could have been killed.”
The anger in her voice made something twist in my gut. She was afraid. For me.
“There,” Pete announced, tying off the last stitch. “You’ll live, but you’re gonna be sore as hell for a few days.”
He reached behind him and came back with a clean white t-shirt, tossing it in my direction. “Here, crybaby.”
I caught the shirt one-handed, grateful for something clean to wear. The bullet had torn through my shirt when that fucker shot me.
“Don’t say I never gave you anything,”
“Thanks,” I said, standing up carefully. My shoulder protested the movement, but it wasn’t unbearable.
Pete grunted, already cleaning up his supplies. “Do me a favor, yeah?”
I nodded.
His eyes went to his granddaughter before coming back to me and narrowing. “Don’t make this a fuckin’ habit.”
I chanced a look at Hattie and my stomach turned. I hated seeing her upset, and I wasn’t the only one.
“I’ll do my best,” I promised as I pulled the clean shirt over my head, being careful not to aggravate the fresh stitches.
Pete grumbled something I couldn’t quite make out as he headed for the door.
The second he was out of sight, Hattie was moving. She crossed the kitchen in three strides and grabbed my good hand, her fingers wrapping around mine like a vice.
“We need to talk,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper. “Please.”
I looked down at our joined hands, at the way her smaller fingers fit perfectly between mine. It’d been eight long agonizingyears since I’d held her hand in mine, and my body remembered every single detail.
