Page 115 of Dirty Hit
He ignores me because he’s a cat, and bolts under the bed instead.
I step into the living room and freeze.
Dominic is on the floor, half-collapsed against my coffee table. The lamp by the couch is on its side, shade dented, the bulb somehow still working and casting a skewed, harsh light across the room. There are shards of glass on the floor from the picture frame that sat on the shelf edge, my graduation photo now staring up at us from a spiderweb of cracks.
But Dominic looks worse.
There’s blood on his face, a dark smear along his cheekbone and temple. His hoodie is torn at the shoulder, revealing skin I know too well and a gash I definitely don’t. One side of his mouth is split, swelling already, and his knuckles are raw.
My brain tries to catalog everything at once—the wounds, the sway in his posture, the way his eyes are unfocused and glazed.
Then, he lifts his head slowly, like it weighs a hundred pounds, and squints at me. “Hey, Little Sin,” he says, voice a little slurred. “Door chain’s a bitch, but I locked up again.”
I lurch into motion.
“What the fuck,” I gasp, dropping to my knees beside him. “Dom,Jesus, what happened, why are you… I told you to come to the cottage, not break into my place like a—”
“Breaking and entering’s my love language,” he mutters, trying to push himself upright, and failing. His legs give out, and he sinks back against the low table, breath hissing through his teeth. “Fuck. Okay. That’s not… ideal.”
His bravado isn’t helping; tears burn behind my eyes, hot and infuriating.
“You’re bleeding,” I say stupidly, because it’s the only thing my mouth can manage around the panic.
He huffs a short, humorless laugh. “You should see the other guy.”
“Did you drive like this?” I demand, hands already hovering over him—afraid to touch, afraid not to. “Are you drunk? Are you concussed? Oh my God, sit down, don’t… just… sit down.”
“I am sitting,” he points out, head rolling back against the table’s edge. “You’re the one hovering.”
“And you’re the one leaking all over my rug,” I snap, some part of me clinging to sarcasm because the alternative is screaming. “Stay there. Don’t move. I mean it.”
He snorts again, but when I push gently at his shoulder, he lets me ease him onto the couch. He grunts, hissing when a likely torn muscle complains, but he doesn’t fight me. That scares me more than anything. The Dominic I know wrestles control from every situation, even the ones where he’s bleeding; seeing him pliant and heavy in my hands makes my skin crawl.
“Hold this,” I say, shoving a throw pillow behind his back, so he doesn’t topple sideways. “And don’t fall asleep. I’ll be right back.”
“Bossy,” he murmurs, eyes half-lidded. “I like it.”
“Shut up,” I say, already sprinting toward the bathroom.
My first-aid kit is in the cabinet under the sink; a small-town upbringing and an anxious mother trumped city complacency. I grab it, shove an armload of clean towels against my chest, fill a bowl with warm water, and stumble back into the living room.
He hasn’t moved much, his head lolling against the back of the couch, eyes now closed, breathing shallow but steady. Blood has tracked from his temple down to his jaw, dry in places, fresh in others, and there’s a split on his lip that keeps oozing. His hoodiesleeve is soaked through at the biceps, near where the gash on his shoulder is.
“Hey,” I say sharply, setting the bowl down. “Open your eyes.”
He does so slowly. His eyes are glossy, pupils a little blown, but they focus on my face.
“Pretty,” he says, like an idiot, and pats my cheek. “My pretty boy.”
“Don’t try to flirt your way out of medical attention,” I say. “It’s not going to work.”
“Worth a shot,” he mutters.
My hands shake as I soak a towel and start cleaning his face; the water turns pink immediately. I dab carefully around the cut at his hairline, biting back a wince every time he flinches.
“This is going to sting,” I warn him, reaching for the antiseptic wipes.
“Everything already stings,” he says. “Go for it.”
