Page 30 of Blood & Heartache

“It was me, wasn’t it?” Liu blurted, stepping forward. “When I said my part of the oath, I added in some of the Raffa Family’s oath in addition to the Caprioni. I was trying to show you I’d be loyal to all you control.”

Ryker snatched up the man’s right hand and looked down at it. There on his right hand was a fresh cut diagonally across the palm. “You completed the oath?” he demanded.

Liu nodded, pulling his hand out of Ryker’s. “Yes, I’ve given Astin my solemn oath of loyalty to her and this Family.”

“You didn’t do that for the boss,” I pointed out. “Why do it now?”

“Hold up,” Astin cut in, waving both hands furiously. “Liu, you never gave my father your oath?”

“No, he told me that taking his name was all the oath he needed and for me to give it to you if I chose to stay in this life. For some reason, he always believed I’d choose to leave and move on to something else in the normal workforce,” Liu explained. “I was going to tell you, but the moment I finished, you dropped and started to convulse.”

The door to the office burst open, and Boykov entered, dragging a bedraggled Dr. Hayden by the arm. “Where is she?” Boykov demanded.

We parted ranks, having instantly created a shield to protect Astin and made room for the doctor as he set his bag on the coffee table before pulling out a small flashlight.

“Look at me, please,” he instructed as he flicked the light at both her eyes.

“Your bodyguard tells me you collapsed,” Dr. Hayden commented as he tucked the flashlight in his shirt pocket and pulled out his stethoscope. “Can you tell me the last thing you remember?”

“I had a repressed memory triggered,” Astin said bluntly. “Not sure there’s much you can do for that, but if you have something that can help this monster of a headache and the body pain, I’d willingly take that.”

The doctor looked at her with a worried expression. “Repressed memory, you say? Does this often happen for you to be so confident in that call? I’m wondering if we need to take you to the hospital and have your brain scanned for a tumor. They can cause hallucinations, seizures, and migraines, all of which you’ve just described.”

“Trust me on this, doc, I’m absolutely positive on the memory thing,” Astin assured the man. “For your own sake, I’m not going to say more. On this, the less you know, the better.”

“Madam, I’ve signed an NDA and worked for your father for many years. I’m well aware of who you are and what this family does, seeing as many of your men carry scars from wounds I’ve patched up. I appreciate you being discreet and not knowing me well, but I’ve given my oath to your father. I’m happy to give it to you as well if that helps matters,” Dr. Hayden explained, clearly offended at Astin’s insult to his character.

She waited a moment as if to see if the man was done speaking before she responded, “It wasn’t my intention to imply you weren’t discreet, Dr. Hayden. In fact, it was for your protection that I’m not telling you everything. When I was going through training, things happened, and the only way to fix it was to use hypnosis to wipe out those memories. Being here is opening up Pandora’s box, and I’m finding out the memories I have could be dangerous for others to know. So by keeping you in the dark, no one will choose to torture you for information you don’t possess.”

“Oh, I see,” Dr. Hayden commented before clearing his throat and grabbing his bag. “Do you have any pain meds left over from what the hospital gave you for your leg?”

“Yes, she has plenty,” Braxton answered, pulling out the pill bottle from his pocket and handing it to the doctor.

God, I loved how that man was determined to prove to Astin how he could help make her life better and simpler if she’d just let him. I’d known for a long time that what I provided him in our relationship wasn’t everything he needed, which is why he’d been searching for it. Watching him the past three weeks with Astin made me curious if he’d found it.

The doctor looked at the medication and nodded. “It’s wise to be cautious when dealing with narcotics, they have been the downfall of many since their creation. This would be what I’d prescribe to you right now, so I suggest you take one and allow yourself to rest. If what you say is happening, the stress your body will go through with your mind fighting itself will be immense. This isn’t going to be what you want to hear if you're anything like your father, but taking the time to give your mind a chance to recover will keep things from getting worse.”

That being said, he took out a pill and handed it to her. Liu clearly knew this office better than any of us as he pulled out a water bottle from a hidden mini refrigerator and handed it to Astin.

“I’ll take this and rest, I promise. First, I’m going to give these men their marching orders on a few matters we need to deal with,” Astin shared, giving the doctor a smile and dismissing him.

Hayden took the hint and gathered his things. “I’ll come by to check on you in a few hours to make sure the headache is being managed. There are other things I can give you for that specifically that won’t knock you out.”

Reaching out, she shook his hand. “Thank you, I’d appreciate that.”

Boykov escorted the doctor out of the office and shut the door behind him, knowing what we were going to cover couldn’t be interrupted, and he was going to make sure of it. I’d always liked the older man, but now I respected the hell out of him for the way he dealt with Astin. He was a perfect match for her, and we needed someone she wasn’t going to fight or slip away from. Knowing he had her back helped me focus on other things we needed to deal with to keep her safe.

“All right, catch me up to speed,” Astin ordered as she popped the pill into her mouth. “You have about an hour before this kicks in, so keep on target.”

I decided to take a seat. We were going to be here for at least an hour, so no point in standing. Plus, I felt like everyone needed to take a deep breath and chill the fuck out. Astin was fine-ish, and there was nothing we could do about her memory returning, but we could help her with other things.

“Let’s start with the biggest piece of information I think we found out,” I said as the others took my lead and started to sit. “Your car wasn’t in the garage. It was sent to a shop for maintenance and to replace the tracking devices you removed. There was no record of when the car was picked up or what shop it was taken to, so based on our information at the time, your car was still here. In actuality, it was picked up by Extreme Imports Automotive last week, according to our surveillance.”

“Hold on… this means whoever stole it isn’t someone on the inside?” Astin questioned. “Why would they hold my car for that long? I highly doubt it takes multiple days to put in GPS trackers and change the oil.”

“Once Jace told me they had the car, I did some digging into that question myself. For most cars, you’d be correct to only need a day, maybe two. Thing is, you don’t have just any old car,” Luca pointed out. “There was a part they claimed needed to be fixed, and the part was on backorder. Their paperwork shows they reached out to someone here to let them know what was going on, but there was again no record of that on our end.”

Liu pulled out his tablet and handed it over to her. “This is the number they were calling.”