“Take it from me, he did.” Jonas took Julia’s arm, guiding her to sit on the couch. “Please tell me that gun is licensed.”
“Of course. Why would I have an unlicensed gun in my home?”
“I don’t fucking know. I never expected you to have one in the first place,” he said, placing his arm around her shoulders.
“I don’t know why. I told you I can protect myself.”
“Believe me; we see that now.”
“Mika, is he really dead?”
“Yes, Julia, he’s dead.”
“I should be sorry he’s dead, shouldn’t I?” Anguished, Julia pressed a hand to her mouth.
Jonas left the living room to go into the bedroom, coming back to place a blanket over Julia’s shoulder.
“He was going to stab you when I shot him. So, no, you don’t have to have any sympathy for him.”
“Thank you, Mika.” Julia wiped her tears away. “You saved my life.”
“No, you saved your own life when you decided to leave him. He would have found another reason to go after you that way.”
The rest of the day was spent in a blur. Julia had called another friend to stay with, apologizing that she couldn’t stay with her. Mika understood. Fortunately, Jonas and Hammer had stayed with her throughout the day and the ensuing drama. After all the police questioning and returning back to the apartment, Hammer helped her pack a suitcase for the night, while Jonas found them a hotel room.
“Ready?” Jonas asked as they came out of her bedroom.
“Yes,” Mika answered.
The landlord was still repairing the door for her. As she talked to him, Hammer and Jonas stood to the side, talking. When she finished her conversation, they took the elevator downstairs, leaving the apartment building and scene of the crime.
At the SUV, Hammer held the back door. Climbing inside, she was surprised when both men got in the back, too.
“Is there a problem with the hotel room or something?” she asked.
“I couldn’t find a room. Every room in this city is already booked.”
“So, what are we going to do?”
Hammer reached up and pulled down a DVD screen as Jonas motioned for her to raise up.
“What are you doing?”
A click had the overly large and comfortable seat laying back down into a bed. Both men patted the leather bed. Pulling her shoes off, she crawled in between them.
“This isn’t bad.”
Jonas and Hammer snuggled closer to her as Jonas reached for the remote.
“What’re we watching?” she asked, rubbing her cheek against Jonas’s chest, while Hammer fit his hips snuggly against her bottom.
“Guess.”
When the screen came to life, Mika reached out to take the controller away from him.
“You don’t want to watch it?” he asked.
“Who needs imitations when I can have the real thing?”
Hammer rose up on an elbow to stare down at them. “I think we need to discuss how far California is away Tennessee.”
“I’ve already thought about that.” She slid her hand under Jonas’s shirt. “I emailed my resignation when I came back from Kentucky. I told them I’d be searching for a new job and gave them a month’s notice.
He grinned, laying his hand on hers to hold it still, but it was Hammer who asked the question she could see in Jonas’s eyes.
“Where are you going to be searching for a job?”
“I’ve always wanted to see Tennessee.”
BEFORE
“You really won’t come out with us?”
Mika finally sat up in the hotel bed, wrapping the expensive duvet cover around her so tightly that only her eyes were exposed, making her look like an Eskimo who was about to brave a winter storm. However, the goose down comforter did nothing to combat the chills rippling through her body from the inside out. “If you’re willing to push me and this bed along with you all day, then sure, I’ll come, Adrienne.”
Adrienne came over to her, placing a hand on her forehead, immediately feeling the warmth. “You’re burning up.”
“I told you.” She sniffled.
“Maybe we should stay and watch her?”
Avril came over then, barely placing a hand on her forehead before pulling it away and rolling her eyes. “Oh, please. She’ll be fine.”
Simone, who was posing her model face in the mirror, looked back at them. “We did not lie to our parents and spend hours getting dressed to not leave this hotel room.”
Mika rolled her own eyes now. She really hated being not only the ugly one in the group, considering her friends were successful models, but being the young one at only sixteen. For some reason, being a whole year older made any teenager believe they were a know-it-all over anyone who was even a day younger.
“I really don’t think we should leave h—”
“I said she’ll be fine, Adrienne,” Avril insisted as she grabbed her purse as she headed toward the door.
“Thanks.” Mika smiled at Adrienne, not wanting to ruin her friend’s day. “But I’ll be okay. I’m just going to sleep it off.”
She had spent too many vacations with her group of friends not to be familiar with how the hierarchy worked. Avril was the leader, Simone was next, then Adrienne; she came in last. It had never bothered her, too thrilled at being given the opportunity to be friends with the other girls.
If her father and Adrienne’s father weren’t best friends, she wouldn’t be lying in their hotel room, feeling like she was at death’s door. She was closest to Adrienne, but she had been spending more time with the other two since her father started allowing her to travel to France with Dalton and his family. The three girls gave her a sense of normalcy that had been missing from her life.
Her childhood was unconventional, with her father being the president of the Road Slayers, and her parents finding out they had a child prodigy on their hands. Her father and Adrienne’s met when they had belonged to another motorcycle club. Even when her father had split and formed his own motorcycle club, he remained close friends with Dalton.
She had grown up nonchalant that her “Uncle Dalton” was famous, and then the friends who showed her how to put on her makeup were becoming famous in their own right each with a career in modeling. To her, they were just another branch of her family, not related by blood but just as loved.
“Come on; let’s go. The cab is waiting,” Simone said.
“Call if you get worse.”
She nodded. “I will.”
Watching Adrienne gracefully walk away, it was everything she could do not to tell them to stay with her. Something in her gut nagged at her to open her mouth and try to talk them into doing
just that. In reality, it wouldn’t have been that hard, considering Adrienne could be swayed to stay in an instant. But then the fun would have been knocked out for the other two since, unlike Mika, Adrienne was an integral part of the group. Therefore, she didn’t say anything, always afraid of being the party pooper, considering she was the youngest in the group.
Out of the four of them, it was her dumb luck to be the one to get sick.
“Bye.” Avril blew her a kiss, staying well away from her.
“Bye,” Mika said, blowing her a kiss back then giggling as she sent another one in Simone’s direction.
Her friends gave her horrified looks, rushing out the door as if afraid her airborne kisses were contagious.
Adrienne was the last one to say it before the door closed. “Bye.”
“Bye… Love you,” Mika whispered, regret slowly seeping in that she didn’t at least try to get them to stay even five minutes longer….
AFTER
As she approached the nurses’ station, Julia placed a sheath of daily reports in the basket that would have to be copied and placed in patients’ files.
“I’m glad you listened to my suggestion and came in today. How are you doing?” Mika asked in concern.
“Fine. Thank you. You were right. All day yesterday, I just kept replaying what happened in my mind. Here, I’m too busy to fix myself a cup of coffee, much less wonder about the what ifs.”
“There shouldn’t be any what ifs, unless you’re trying to blame yourself for Dillion’s actions. He brought a knife and broke down a door to get to you, not out of love, but because the only thing on his mind was hurting you. You survived. That’s all that counts, and certainly nothing to feel guilty about.” Mika repeated the last sentence her father and Uncle Dalton had tried to convince her of for years, but it took her repeating the same words to Julia to truly appreciate their truth.
She shrewdly took in her friend’s harried movements as she answered calls from wanting patients. “The patients seem restless this evening.”