flashing back at me. "Like, on his own with barely a damn weapon."
Ben just laughed. "Not even remotely surprised."
The nurse arrived soon after that, and Ben stepped out of the room so she could do my check up, change the pad out from under me on the bed, help me to the bathroom, and all the fun stuff.
"Your bleeding has completely stopped?" she asked as she remade the bed.
I nodded. "It appears to have, at least the last few times I used the bathroom."
She smiled. "Great. I'll let your doctors know, and they'll no doubt check in on your pregnancy and make sure it's still viable."
Still viable. So cold and clinical, but I wasn't going to get mad at a poor nurse for doing her job. "Thank you."
When she left the room, Ben returned. "Dylan's lead didn't pan out," he said straight away. "He'll be back soon, so we’d better get all of our gossip about him out of the way ASAP."
I snorted out some laughter. "And what gossip could either of us have about that coldly walled up asshole? He's one of the worst communicators I've ever met."
Ben didn't laugh with me. "There's no denying that he could stand to work on his people skills a lot, but with the way his life was... it's not totally a surprise. I'd have been a total sociopath."
"What do you mean?" I tried to sound casual, but my desperation to know more about Dylan could not be contained.
"He grew up with a racist father who hated him but kept him around because he needed an heir and a stepmother that resented the child who would always be a reminder of her husband's infidelity. His biological mother, who was the family nanny, disappeared when he was a baby, and he has no idea what happened to her. I've always had the feeling he thinks his father just murdered her and dumped her ass in a river somewhere."
"Holy fuck," I whispered. I'd had no idea Dylan had lived like that. Why had I expected his family to be nicer than my own? I should have guessed. Rich people were notorious bastards, especially old-money rich.
"Oh yeah, it's fucked up, and I only know about ten percent of the shit he's been through."
If that. Dylan wasn't exactly the open-up-about-his-problems type.
"Wait." A thought occurred to me suddenly. "How was his mother the nanny if Dylan was kept around to be the heir? Who did she nanny? The pets?"
Ben shook his head. "You're clever. I like that about you." His expression sobered dramatically. "And... Dylan had an older sister. She died saving his life, and it really destroyed him."
My chest ached at the thought of him going through something like that on top of losing his mom.
"I had no idea," I whispered.
"Most people don't. But I've seen that guy change over the years, and even though he's a grumbly asshole around you, there's an energy inside of him that's been missing. I want it to stay, so... just be patient with him. He's a pretty damn loyal guy, and if he lets you into his world, he’ll never do you wrong."
I was starting to see that about Dylan already, and even though our relationship was probably going to end in a broken heart, I couldn't seem to walk away.
Ben started to say something else, but the door to my room burst open before he could. When two men stormed into the room, my blood literally went cold.
Dylan hadn't found Blake because he was right here. In my hospital room. Jonnie at his side.
25
Ben reacted in a split second, rolling off his chair into a fighting position. From what I could see, neither Blake nor Jonnie had visible weapons—no doubt they didn't want a gunshot to warn everyone in the hospital that they were here—so this was going to be an old-fashioned fight.
Ben dove right in, and he could fight. Nothing like Dylan, but more than enough to hold his own against two morons. I reached for the call button, hoping someone would get here in time to bring security in before anyone got hurt.
"She’s my sister," Blake snarled when he took a punch to the side of the head, and he looked more than a little pissed about it. "She belongs to me, and I'm here to collect her."
Ben snarled. "You're the reason she's in this fucking hospital bed, and I would hazard a guess it's not the first time."