Page 27

Twenty-Seven

Me realizing that 4 chips equals one tortilla…and I’ve had 87 of them.

— Aella’s secret thoughts

AELLA

8 days later

“Here, baby.”

I smiled, then groaned.

“Thanks,” I muttered, lips barely moving, as I popped the pain pill in my mouth.

If I’d thought that the gunshot wound to my face had hurt a couple of days ago, it was nothing compared to now.

I woke up every morning expecting the pain to feel better but was displeased to find out that it wasn’t.

Though, my doctor assured me that I was healing normally.

The problem was that as I “got better” I started to move around, talk, and eat a lot more.

And, since the bullet I’d been shot with traveled from underneath my eye in a downward path to lodge near my spine, it’d passed through several muscles that were pivotal. I couldn’t eat, sleep, talk, breathe, or even think without causing the healing muscles pain.

Hence the drugs that Chevy had gotten up to get for me.

Chevy caught a call, and he answered it before heading out onto the back deck, likely unable to hear over the loud announcer’s voice on the television.

It’d been eight days since I’d been shot, and Chevy hadn’t left my side a single second of it.

My dad was on the couch next to me.

My sister was in the recliner to the right of me.

Chevy was outside talking on the phone to someone at work, discussing tomorrow’s surgeries.

And my life was…perfect.

Tomorrow I’d be returning to school.

The pain was awful.

Despite it hurting to eat anything, I’d still stuffed my face with not one, not two, but three baskets of chips.

And all of those chips had been eaten on my own, because I was the only weirdo, according to Silver, that didn’t like the seasoning on the tortilla chips that came from Cancun Dave’s.

Cancun Dave’s was my newest obsession.

In the last week of being out of the hospital, I’d spent every single second of it on Chevy’s floating boathouse.

My sister and dad came by often, but mostly it was just Chevy and me.

He’d taken a week and a half off to help me heal, and I’d appreciated every second.

And, because Chevy was a good man, he hadn’t balked at my obsession with the Mexican food place around the corner that was slowly becoming ingrained in my heart.

They had the best queso.

Their hot sauce was fire.

And their sour cream enchiladas were divine.

“Apollo got back to me today,” Silver said out of the blue.

I glanced at her and murmured carefully, “What about?”

My sister and Apollo had formed a friendship over the last few weeks since we’d eaten at Whataburger the day that his son had died.

I think Apollo was happy for a distraction, and my sister loved making people smile.

Together, they formed a really unlikely pair.

Though, I didn’t sense any romantic vibes off of them.

Not that Apollo wasn’t still grieving and probably wasn’t thinking about that at all.

He’d lost his son.

He wasn’t all right.

“He got our credit fixed,” she chirped. “Now I don’t show that I took out a half a million in loans.”

My brows raised in surprise.

I’d expected to live with bad credit for the rest of my life.

“Your mother is a piece of work.” Cakes stabbed a chip so hard into his salsa that it broke into tiny pieces. “I wish I’d known.”

I gave him a bump with my foot, which was extended out between us. “You’re here now.”

“Too little and late,” he grumbled. “Missed your first steps. Your birth. Your first date. The only good thing I can say is that she’s going to be inside for a long time, which is where she fucking deserves to be.”

“I saw that she refused to post bail for herself,” Silver interrupted. “Which, if you ask me, is a great thing.”

Chevy came back into the living room, closing the door to the deck quietly behind him, and walked over to me.

He picked up the remote that was sitting on the arm of the couch and aimed it at the TV, changing the ball game that we’d been watching, and switching to the five o’clock news.

Channel 6 was turned up, and we all watched in silence as a news anchor reported on the newly deceased Congressman Arriel Jimenez.

“…was found dead in his limousine last week. The heated temperatures of the parking garage were too much for the congressman and his bodyguard to survive. Both perished. When police asked the limousine driver what had caused him to leave the two there under the building, he said that he was asked to give them some privacy as they discussed One Way, the newest veteran outreach program where you can stay for extended periods of time to acclimate back into civilian life. When the driver of the limo went to take a smoke break outside the parking garage, he was jumped by two gang members. Bystanders found the limousine driver outside the parking garage doors and he was transported to a hospital for minor injuries.” She took a breath, and the cameras switched to a different view. The parking garage where the limousine had been parked popped up on the feed, and the anchor continued to talk. “The congressman and his bodyguard were found by construction crews Monday morning. The two men had perished long before they were found due to the extreme heat of the parking garage. It is also suspected that they were carrying on a clandestine relationship with each other. As for now, we have more questions than answers, but you can rest assured that Channel 6 investigative reporters won’t stop until we have answers.”

“Good riddance,” Silver grumbled.

Silver didn’t outright know exactly what happened like I did, but she knew enough to realize that this was no accident.

Cakes grinned and tossed a chip at her.

She caught it and ate it.

Chevy took the spot between the two of us and then said, “Cutter gave me his houseboat and land. I’m thinking about building a house.”

I blinked and turned, staring at him.

“Really?”

He nodded.

“Hey, Cakes?” Chevy asked as he switched back over to the ball game.

Cakes turned to him. “What?”

“Can I have your daughter’s hand in marriage?” Chevy wondered.

My heart stalled in my chest, and I couldn’t decide if it was the pain killer coming to life inside of me, or the fact that Chevy had just casually asked my father if he could keep me.

Cakes blinked. “I dunno, man…I just found her.”

My eyes started to fill with tears.

Gosh, I was coming to love my father.

Hell, there was no “coming to love.” I was already loving the hell out of him.

It was a really foreign feeling, and Cakes made it so easy to feel the way that I did.

He was a kind, caring, and genuinely great man.

I was relieved to find out how freakin’ nice and caring he was. Even if he was only nice and caring to me and Silver.

Silver snorted. “Just say yes. You know he’ll do what he wants anyway.”

That was true.

My heart was pounding, and I was staring at the man that’d just shocked me to the core, waiting for him to tell me what was next.

“Oh, all right.” Cakes groaned. “But you have to have a wedding where I can walk her down the aisle. I’ve missed enough of those dad moments. You won’t take this one away from me, too.”

Chevy turned to me, and when I looked down, he had a blue velvet box in his hand.

I licked my lips, my heart pounding, and stared as he pulled the box open and showed me the ring inside.

It was…huge.

There was no other word for it.

“That’s massive,” I breathed.

“I wanted it to be big and ostentatious so that any man that saw it would know that I’m over the top. Then Cakes offered me this ring, and I thought…perfect.” he paused. “Will you marry me, Aella Diane?”

Tears spilled over my eyes, and I nodded my head frantically. “I’ll marry the hell out of you, Chevy Andrew Clayborne. Today. Tomorrow. Next week. Next month. Next year. Next millennia. Next Tuesday. Next Wednesday. Next…”

“You should probably ask her again when she’s sober,” Silver interrupted my word vomit, reminding me that I’d just taken a pain pill.

I turned to her, my eyes narrowing, and said, “What were we talking about?”

“How cute you think motorcycle clubs are,” she explained, a grin on her face.

I knew that grin.

She was instigating, yet I still nodded, remembering where I’d left off, though I was fairly sure that I’d had that discussion with her days ago while in the hospital.

Which, as it turned out, was when I was made aware that the pain medication I was taking made my mind do some crazy things.

“Then there’s the way that they always look so grumpy and mean, then turn into these little soft teddy bears when they’re around the ones they love.”

Chevy’s lips came to my ear and he whispered, “You can call me your teddy bear in private, but you call me your teddy bear in public, and I’ll spank your ass.”

I smiled, forgetting my father was in the room momentarily when I said, “Ass play. Nice.”

“I’m out.” Cakes got up and left.

I giggled.

And giggled.

And giggled.

Maybe I was intoxicated after all.