Page 116 of Dirty Hit
I clean the worst of it, working in small, methodical circles. Forehead. Temple. Cheekbone. The cuts are deep enough that they probably needs stitches, but not bad enough for the ER—if he were a normal person. Which he’s not. He hates hospitals and any institutions where anyone else has control over his body.
“Do you remember what happened?” I ask quietly as I work. “Any dizziness? Nausea? Blackouts?”
“Got hit. Hit back. Got hit again.” He shrugs his good shoulder, then winces. “I’m fine.”
“Yeah, you look great,” I say, deadpan. “Cover of GQ.”
He huffs a tired laugh, and his eyes flutter heavily.
“Hey,” I snap again, lightly tapping his cheek. “Stay with me. You fall asleep and I’m calling an ambulance.”
“No hospitals,” he slurs, panic flashing under the fog. His hand clamps onto my wrist, fingers digging in tight. “Brendon, no. I’m not… don’t—”
“Okay,” I say immediately, dropping the threat. “Okay. No hospitals. But only if you cooperate. That means staying awake and letting me poke you in ways you won’t like.”
He smirks faintly. “That a promise?”
“Wrong kind of poking,” I say, heat creeping up my neck despite everything. “Pervert.”
His grip loosens, but he keeps his hand around my wrist. I don’t shake him off. I move on to his lip, cleaning it as gently as I can. He hisses, swears, and tries to jerk away, but I keep my thumb pressed under his chin.
“Hold still,” I murmur. “You’re the one who decided to headbutt concrete, or whatever you did.”
“Didn’t headbutt concrete,” he mutters. “Guy was taller than I thought. My aim was off.”
“Comforting,” I say, grabbing the suturing kit from the box.
His eyes widen slightly. “You know how to do that?”
I shrug, trying to seem more confident than I feel. “Small-town life,” I say. “When your dad insists on saving money, and glue only does so much, you learn things. I’ve stitched up my cousins. You’ll be fine.”
“That is not reassuring,” he says, but he doesn’t try to stop me when I thread the needle.
“Bite this,” I say, handing him a folded piece of cloth. “Or my hand, but that will make me slap you, so pick your poison.”
He snorts and takes the cloth, clamping it between his teeth. His eyes meet mine, darker now, a flicker of trust there that makes my chest ache.
I work as quickly and carefully as I can. The cut at his hairline takes four stitches. His shoulder is worse, but doesn’t look as bad as I feared once I peel the torn fabric away; eleven stitches there. The whole time he swears, muffled around the cloth: ‘fuck’, and ‘Jesus Christ’, and a string of Russian I don’t understand but can guess at from the tone.
I clean his knuckles next, swabbing away the blood and dirt, then check for anything that looks broken. The skin is split in several places, angry and raw, but nothing is at a weird angle. His hands are big and warm in mine while I work, the muscles in his forearms jumping when the alcohol hits his skin.
“Who did you hit?” I ask, before I can stop myself. “Or what?”
He laughs, low and humorless. “You don’t want the answer to that, Little Sin.”
“I already know you kill people,” I say quietly. “You’re not going to shock me now.”
“You should be shocked,” he says. “You shouldn’t be sitting here stitching up a monster like me.”
“What, you want me to faint?” I ask. “Scream? Run?”
“That’d be logical.”
I wrap gauze around his hand, snug but not tight, and tape it in place. “You lost your logic privileges when you showed up bleeding on my rug, instead of going home.”
He stares at me, then his gaze drops, lashes lowering. When he speaks again, his voice is softer—the words starting to blur at the edges. Whatever adrenaline got him here is wearing off, leaving behind a mess of pain and exhaustion.
“I didn’t want to go home,” he mutters. “Wanted to come here.”
