“Seems like a brilliant plan to me,” Brody quipped. “What better way to draw suspicion off yourself than to commit the crime in a way that would guarantee he’d be a suspect?”
“Like a killer calling in the crime and claiming to have found the body,” Christian added in.
Both she and Brody slid their attention to the team’s leader—and medic—while the other man wrapped a wide strip of transparent film dressing around the bandaged wound on her upper left arm.
“Exactly.” Brody motioned a hand toward his supportive friend.
To her, Christian switched subjects long enough to educate her on what he was doing. “This film is waterproof, and I covered the original bandage completely, so you’ll be able to take a shower without worrying about the wound getting wet. Just make sure you don’t do a lot of quick movements or heavy lifting with that arm for a few days and follow the care instructions the hospital gave you.”
“Thank you.”
She offered her friend a tiny smile but hissed in a breath between her teeth when his fingers pressed a little too closely to where the bullet had entered—and exited—the fleshy part a couple inches below her shoulder.
With her free hand, Ro fisted a section of thick comforter beside her.Brody’scomforter. On Brody’s bed. In Brody’s house.
Because that’s where the enraged man had insisted the team bring them once she’d been released from the E.R. Two trips in a week’s time. Not exactly a record she intended to break.
God, I hate hospitals.
“Sorry.” Christian adjusted his hold.
“It’s okay,” she mumbled softly.
“The fuck it is.” Brody tossed an angry scowl her way. “There’s not a goddamn thing about this that’s okay.”
Pacing the length of his bedroom, the man looked like he was ready to start an all-out war, and Ro wasn’t sure how to stop him. She also didn’t know how to get him to see that what happened wasn’t his fault.
“Clayton didn’t do this,” she reiterated her earlier point. “Even if he’d wanted to, the guy had just walked off stage when it happened.”
“Exactly.” Those eyes of his burned into hers. “He disappears somewhere backstage, and seconds later, someone takes a shot at you. A shot that came from that very same direction.”
“What?” Her eyes widened, dread filling the pit of her stomach. “I didn’t…you never told me that part.”
“I’m sorry. Guess I’ve been a little busy, what with making sure you’re okay after being fuckingshot.”
“You heard the doctor, Brody. It’s literally just a flesh wound.”
Still hurt like hell, but at least no bones or major arteries had been struck. If that had happened, she’d be in a whole other world of hurt.
Or worse.
“She’s right, brother,” Christian backed her up. “I’m as pissed as you about this whole thing, but itisjust a flesh wound.”
“She shouldn’t have a wound atall!”The man’s angry voice echoed off his bedroom walls. To her, he added, “And you weren’t just shot, Aurora. You were also unconscious for four-and-a-half minutes.”
“Yeah, because I hit my head on the floor when I fell, not because I got a through-and-through in the fatty part of my arm.”
That’s what the doctor had told her, anyway. And she didn’t even have a concussion, so…
Storming over to where she sat, Brody stood directly in front of her. All hard lines and furrowed brows, his fiery gaze made him appear madder than she could ever remember seeing him.
“This is serious, Ro.” He announced this as if she wasn’t already aware. “If that idiot hadn’t bumped into you at the last second, you’d be dead. You get that, right?”
She stared up at him with a tilted head and a sarcastic, “Yeah, I’m pretty sure I was there for that part.”
Unlike the night of Cade’s birthday party, Ro remembered every single thing about the moments leading up to tonight’s shooting…
The rustling nerves she’d felt standing up on that stage. The prayers she didn’t fall on the way up—or down—those stairs. The pride she’d felt at seeing things through and finishing the job.