Page 64 of Power

Blake looked between the knuckles and my face, then glared at my boss’s boss’s boss’s boss with enough intensity to trigger a cardiac arrest.

“Jace, if this is a domestic violence thing, I’m going to kick your ass.” His fingers flexed at his sides.

Jace’s jaw tightened. “Really, Morrison? You know me better than that!”

“You have bruised knuckles. She has a bruised cheek. It’s a fair conclusion. You’d better start explaining now. Because we might be friends, but violence against women? I’ll give you a one-way ticket to the ICU if you did this to her.”

“Did you notice the injury to MY face?”

“He didn’t do this to me,” I assured, jumping in before they could start measuring testosterone levels.

“Jesus, Morrison.” Jace ran a hand through his already-disheveled hair.

In fairness, Blake was an emergency room physician, and this did look rather suspicious. And also in his defense, it would’ve been unethical for him to not at least ask, bro code or no bro code.

“Then what the hell happened?” Blake demanded.

“It would seem my cheek slammed into my sperm donor’s hand.” I replied.

“Your sperm donor?” Blake questioned.

“He doesn’t deserve the termfather. This isn’t his first rodeo with violence against my face.”

Okay, that appeared to have given Jace a full-on … red face attack. Seriously, the guy needed to breathe, or he might pass out. The vein in his temple looked ready to erupt from his skin.

“Christ, Scarlett.” Blake slapped on a pair of latex gloves with a snap that made me flinch.

Something Jace very much noticed, by the way.

“How do you two know each other?” Jace demanded again, gesturing between Blake and me with his injured hand.

“This is Tessa’s best friend,” Blake said, finally answering as he reached for an antiseptic pad from a metal tray.

Jace looked up at the ceiling. “You’ve got to be shitting me.”

“Does Tessa know about your sperm donor’s violent side?” Blake pulled up a rolling stool next to my bed, its wheels squeaking against the linoleum, and tilted my face for a better look.

“She didn’t tell you?”

“Should she have?”

I smiled, cringing as it pulled at my cheek. I had asked her not to, and that meant the world to me that she kept my information private. Speaking of private…

“Do not tell her you saw me here tonight,” I said, fixing Blake with my best attempt at a threatening glare. “She’ll freak out and overreact, and I don’t have the energy to deal with that right now.”

Blake began to clean my wound, the sharp sting making my eyes water. The little white swabs came back with small streaks of red, confirming that the skin was split slightly. I suspected a nurse could clean it just fine, but he was doing this himself because it was me. His girlfriend’s best friend.

“Do not call Tessa,” I repeated.

“If I don’t call Tessa, she’ll cut my balls off,” he said matter-of-factly. “I’m fond of my balls.”

“Blake …”

“Sorry, but she’ll want to know you’re here.”

It wasn’t that I didn’t want to tell Tessa; it was just that I was all talked out with this whole harassment situation at work (which, by the way, I also had to fill her in on), and now my father showed up, and my head was spinning, and?—

“I’m exhausted, and all I want to do is go home and sleep, please.”