Page 45 of Broken Skulls (Rebel Skull MC #7)

Chapter Forty-Four

Elizabeth

W hen I wake up, a man I’ve never seen before is shining a bright light in front of my face. I hold my arm up, confused as to where I’m at.

“Hey, hun. You’re okay. We brought the doc in to take a look at you. It looks like you hit your head pretty hard,” Dirk says.

Instantly I try to sit up, but they stop me, forcing me to lie back down. Dirk tugs Jacob’s flannel over the top of my thighs to protect my modesty. I glance around the room. Jacob is gone and so is his dad, but the blood and mess remain.

“Where’s Jacob?” I ask, rubbing my hand over my forehead.

Dan and Dirk give each other a look.

“I need to see him.” Again, I try to rise.

The doctor places his hand in the middle of my chest. “Give it a minute, then we’ll try to sit you up. Do you have pain anywhere?”

“My head, but I don’t care about that. I need Jacob.”

Dirk brushes my hair behind my ear, leaning over me. “We had to lock him in the room downstairs.”

“What?”

Dan tries to help his friend console me. “He asked us to.”

“She has a concussion,” the doctor tells the two men by my side. He turns his attention to me. “You’re going to need to rest for a few days. After that, if you’re feeling up to it, you can slowly return to normal activity.”

Dirk asks Dan if he called Jesse and Lily.

Dan runs his hand over his mouth, nodding that he did. “They’ll be here soon.”

The doctor continues to run through a list of things, but I’m only half listening. The smell of the blood is making my stomach turn.

“You can take acetaminophen for your headache. I’ll stop back tomorrow and check on you.”

Dan hops up. “I’ll walk the doc out and find something for her pain.”

Three men walk in. I roll my head to the side and see they’re here to clean the room. Two of them begin to mop up the blood. When the third picks up a broken pot, tossing it in a black trash bag, I jump to my feet. Dirk tries to pull me back down, but I’m not having it.

I slip on the blood in my rush to stop the man with the trash bag. It sends me to my ass, but I push myself up and snatch the bag from his hand. “Stop! We can’t throw any of this away!” I scream as my eyes roam over Jacob’s destroyed plants.

Dirk pulls me into his arms. “Shh, it’s okay.”

“It’s not.” I shove away from him. “I don’t need to be consoled right now. I need to rescue the plants and the planters. I need to save it all.”

Dan comes back into the room with Lily and Jesse.

My frantic gaze meets Lily’s. “We have to save them,” I beg her. “The pots, everything. Please! He’s kept them alive since his mom died.”

The room is quiet as my words sink in.

“I’ll save them,” Lily promises. “Go with Jesse and get cleaned up. You need to rest.”

I fall to my knees, picking up a stray leaf. “I want to help,” I say quietly.

Lily starts barking orders. “Dan, go back home and get the mason jars and the two bags of dirt I have in the shed. I think there are some plastic pots in there too. Grab them.”

He doesn’t even hesitate; he turns and walks out of the room.

She places her hands on her hips. “Dirk, have Jackson run home and get Willow. She’s a plant expert. If anyone can save them, she can.”

Her attention turns to the man with the bag. “Pick up all the pieces of porcelain from the pots and put them in a bucket.” She kneels beside me. “They’ll never look the same, but we’ll do a mosaic with the pieces or something, okay?”

I nod at her, wiping my tears with my bloody hands.

“The cards,” I say, pointing to one on the floor.

Her eyes soften. “I’ll save all of them,” she promises. “Now, please go with Jesse. You’ll be no good to him if you don’t heal your concussion.”

When she senses my reluctance to leave the room, she tries again.

“You can help with the plants when you get to feeling better, but until then Willow will keep them alive.”

Jesse and Lily pull me to my feet, and Jesse wraps her arm around my waist, helping me into the bathroom. Tank is there with a pair of latex gloves on and a sponge in hand.

“Sorry,” he says. “I was just trying to clean up the blood we washed off JD before locking him up.”

“Is he hurt?” I ask.

He shakes his head. “No. He didn’t have a scratch on him.”

“Good,” I say, dropping my shoulders.

Jesse drops the toilet lid and pushes me to sit down. “I’m going to go grab her some clean clothes. Can you wait with her a minute?” she asks him.

He nods, pulling the gloves from his hands and dropping them into the trash can. He has blood all over him.

“Are you okay?” he asks, reaching in to turn the water on.

“I’m fine.”

He laughs. “I don’t think you’d tell me if you weren’t.”

“Probably not,” I agree tiredly, rubbing my head.

Dirk walks in with a glass of water. “Here’s that Tylenol.”

I take it from him. “Thank you.”

He waits until he’s sure I have it down, and then he leaves the room.

Tank and I wait for Jesse to return. I point to his clothes, realizing he must have been one of the men who had to pull Jacob off his father. “Thank you for helping.”

His brows pull together, and he scratches his head. “You really love him, don’t you?”

“I do,” I admit quietly. “I love all of them.”

He sighs. “Yeah. They kind of grow on you, don’t they?”

“Yeah. I’m sorry if my being here is awkward for you,” I tell him honestly.

He chuckles. “It was at first, but I don’t think it will be anymore, do you?”

I give him a small smile. “No. I don’t think so.”

Jesse walks in and busies herself, setting my clothes on the counter.

Tank stands to leave, but he stops in the doorway, knocking lightly on the doorjamb. “If you need anything, you call me.”

“I will.”

He nods before walking away.

Jesse helps me out of Jacob’s shirt, tossing it in the trash. She grabs my arm lightly before I step into the shower. “Lexie told me you sent her out to call for help, and you didn’t run with her.”

“I couldn’t leave Jacob. He … well, he was tied up.”

“His dad tied him up?”

My cheeks turn bright pink. “Um, no.”

Her eyebrows jump high on her face. “Oh, oh, crap. You mean he caught you guys in the act? That would explain why the guys found JD naked.”

I tell her the whole story as I shower.

Once I’m dressed, she chucks me under the chin. “I’m proud of you. You saved Jacob’s life.”

“Never surrender,” I remind her.

“Never surrender,” she repeats, smiling at me.

“Besides, he saved my life once, so I kinda owed him.”

She laughs, wrapping her arm around me and guiding me to the bedroom. I expect her to get me settled in and then leave, but she crawls in with me.

“No offense, but I’ll lay on top of the covers,” she jokes.

I smile at her sadly. “I miss him.”

“He’ll snap out of it. He just needs a little time.”

“I hope so.”

My eyes fall closed. I’m suddenly so tired, I can’t keep them open.