“Go,” Rafe snaps. Then he grabs my hand, tugging me down the sidewalk and through an alley that cuts between the club and the adjacent building.
“What are you doing!” I pull at his grip only for him to tighten it, dragging me closer to him.
“Do you really want your boyfriend to see you here?” he hisses without turning around. “Dressed like that?”
My gaze falls to my borrowed dress, its neckline plunging unattended, and I don’t say anything. Together, we move so quickly the streets become a dizzying maze, and his grip is the only thing guiding me forward. We eventually reach a part of the city bustling with nightlife where the foot traffic becomes too thick to run. Forced to slow, he pulls me beside him, throwing his arm around my shoulders.
My initial impulse is to resist, but then I realize how heavily he’s leaning against me. I look up to find him gritting his teeth, his forehead glistening in the glow of a passing streetlamp.
“Rafe…” My nostrils flare, catching a distinct, coppery scent that makes my steps falter. Blood. “You’re hurt.”
“Not here,” he says near my ear. “I’d rather not get arrested, bunny.” He inclines his head in the general direction of his shop, but I doubt he can even make it that far.
With every step, he seems to slow, and I find myself having to support more of him. As we round a corner, a familiar street sign draws my notice, and I realize that one other destination is within just a few blocks. My heart pounds as I wrestle with indecision. Taking him home would be a bridge too far, with or without Branden’s paranoia to contend with.
I shake off the idea, letting him pull me along, but as we descend a curb to cross the road, he groans. “Fuck…”
And something in me breaks. I hook my arm around him, pivoting on my heel. “This way.”
It’s his turn to resist. “You wouldn’t be leading me toward your boyfriend, would you, bunny?”
I brush off the suspicion. “Trust me.”
My initial impulse was right, and not even ten minutes later, we reach my apartment building.
Rafe eyes the front of it warily, not that he’s in any shape to argue. He sags against me with every step until my knees are buckling beneath his weight, and I have to pry open the heavy front door one-handed. The moment we cross the threshold, my stomach drops through the soles of my borrowed heels. I can’t shake the overwhelming sense that I’ve made a mistake.
Chapter Nine
He doesn’t belong here. Too tall in this narrow space, he’s too imposing, even while bleeding. Thankfully, the hall is nearly deserted, though the sounds of the other tenants drift through the walls like some surreal reminder of what normalcy should be. I can smell food being cooked in the next unit over as we ascend to the third floor. The faint notes of a radio playing echo from up above as does laughter and murmured conversations.
Beneath those deceptively normal sounds, I also hear drops of moisture striking the floor. Ragged, unsteady breathing. The squeak of rubber grating against metal as the figure behind me struggles to keep his balance on the next step of the staircase. I snatch at his clothing, but he shrugs me off.
“Keep going,” he grunts.
There isn’t time to think. I simply inhale as I power myself up the final flight of stairs to my floor and then hurry down the hall to my apartment. He stays upright until we reach my door. Then he grunts, slumping against my back while I fit my key in the lock.
Our combined weight sends the door flying open, and we both stagger in. Cold air tickles the back of my neck as he brushes past me for my gray armchair and collapses onto it.
“Fuck.” His voice is gruff with pain, reinforcing just how much of his blood is all over my floor. I can’t stop staring at the various scarlet puddles. It seems impossible that one person could lose so much blood and still be coherent.
I don’t know what to do. My vision blurs, and the room starts to spin.
Focus, Hannah.
I race into my kitchen for a rag and throw it down. My heels catch on the terry cloth as I use my foot to drag the fabric across the worst of the blood. But there’s too much of it. It’s everywhere. Dripping over the threshold of my apartment. Leading down the hall…