“How the fuck could you not even remember her name?!” Bill gasped, rolling on top of Logan as he began pummeling his face. “You two were together for months!”
“I told you,” Logan hissed between gritted teeth, “it was a lot more casual than all that. At any rate, I’m not the one you should be talking to. You should go home and speak to your wife!”
With a massive show of strength, he flipped Bill around and came out on top—punching only hard enough to keep the man down. Using only enough force to incapacitate.
Unfortunately, Bill liked to fight dirty.
“For fuck’s sake!” Logan let out a sharp cry, as the man grabbed onto a fistful of his hair and pulled for all he was worth. “My hair? Are you serious?!”
“Are you seriously fucking my wife?!”
“Past tense!” Logan cried, as the man rolled him into the coffee table. “Past tense!”
The flimsy wood buckled beneath them, before shattering into a dozen pieces. While Logan cast a panicked look at the floor—unable to believe he was literally breaking off portions of his brother’s house—Bill took advantage of his distraction to slam his head into the ground.
There was another disembodied growl, as the picture flickered before his eyes.
“BILL!”
Logan turned his face into the hardwood, tasting blood. For a split second, he considered rallying. But before he could, there was another flash of fur, and the world went dark.
Chapter 14
“Dylan...can you hear me? Please wake up if you can hear me.”
Logan pulled in a deep breath, as his eyes fluttered open and shut. They were slow to focus, slow to latch onto the breathtaking face floating amongst the shadows. His brain was even slower to comprehend where he was, or why there was a giant dog lying across his chest.
“...am I dead?”
The face broke into a smile, albeit a quick one.
“You’re not dead,” Lacy answered quietly. She was looking him up and down, scanning for any damage, while seeming incredibly reluctant to meet his eyes. “You got knocked out—”
“Bill,” Logan gasped, pushing aside her gentle hands as he tried to sit up, “he did this—”
“Actually, it was your dog.” The two of them locked eyes, and Lacy blushed a bit before continuing. “It was your dog who knocked you unconscious. I guess he’s a little over-protective. When Bill came at you, he jumped over your head to stop him and knocked you down.”
Logan blinked in shock, before staring down at the colossus perched upon his legs. The second Spartacus saw him watching, he snarled and stalked away—making sure to push heavily off of Logan’s stomach as he did so. Apparently, their bond activated only in life or death situations. For everything else—they were still locked in a cold war.
“Well that figures,” Logan mumbled, pushing again to a sitting position. Even when the dog decided to help him, he still managed to knock him out. “But what about Bill?” His head twisted around, as if at any moment, the man could come flying out of the shadows. “Where—”
“The police took him away,” Lacy answered stiffly. Her face looked bleak. “Charged him with assault. Bail’s probably astronomical. That’s how these things work.”
An ambulance had been called and Logan refused treatment or to go to the hospital.
“The husband is gone,” the woman said.
For a second, Logan was wildly relieved. Good—the crazy man with the bloody fists was safely behind bars. Now he just had to get himself out of this tiny house, and he was home free.
But one look at Lacy’s face made him think differently.
“Of course he took a swing at me,” he said quietly, wiping a smear of blood away from his face. “After Ja—I mean—after I was sleeping with his wife? I would have hit me too.”
A peculiar look flashed across Lacy’s face, and for the first time, Logan realized why she was having such a hard time meeting his eyes. “Yes—he had a right to be angry. He even had a right to confront you. But he never had a right to hit you.” Her slender shoulders fell with a deflated sigh. “That was never supposed to happen. His wife called me and warned me that he was coming for you. So I rushed over. But I should’ve called the police first thing. This is all my fault.”
“Hey,” he took her hand without thinking, squeezing it tight, “not a single part of this is your fault, do you understand? You are the only person here completely without blame.”
...along with myself. Not that you can ever know that.