She swallowed tightly. “They won’t let you.”
He stared fiercely into her eyes. “I’ll be right behind you, Kia.”
She stared at him, and she didn’t trust him. Hell, he couldn’t blame her, but he’d show her. He’d be there, no matter who stood in his way, no matter what.
He moved aside as the ambulance pulled to a stop and he watched them rush her away.
“Chase!” Timothy Rutherford was out the door as Ian’s limo pulled to a stop. “Is she okay?”
“She’s coherent.” He turned to Ian. “I had a call put in to Sanjer.”
Ian nodded. “I called him from the car and talked to him personally. He should be here waiting on her. What happened?”
“Techs said it was a mugging.” The hairs at the back of his neck lifted, a primal warning, a premonition he couldn’t seem to shake.
“Mugging?” Timothy snapped. “That apartment building is supposed to be one of the most secure in the city.”
“It is,” Ian snapped. “It’s one of mine. I called the manager for all security disks, and the detective in charge of the investigation will be contacting me. He should be at her apartment when she returns there.”
“She won’t be there.” Chase turned toward the hospital doors as his brother, Jaci, Ian, Courtney, and Kia’s parents watched in shock. “She’ll be at my place.”
He didn’t see the shock on the faces of those who watched him disappear into the hospital. He wouldn’t have cared if he had seen it. He’d promised Kia he would be right behind her. And he meant to keep that promise.
The headache was killing her. Kia had endured the exam, biting back a curse, and suffered in silence as the doctor stitched her head. When the nurse handed her two pills, she had taken them eagerly. It had felt as though gremlins were digging her brain out with their dull-assed fingernails.
She had flashed on a nightmare from her childhood. When she was a little girl and got horrible headaches, her doctor would always have her placed in the hospital. There they would run tests, poke and prod at her, and she would beg her parents to let her go home.
And they never would. Her mother would cry. Her father would get that miserable look on his face, and they would promise to let her go home. But they always made her stay.
Now her parents were in the room they had taken her to from the emergency room. They sat side by side near her bed. Chase stood silently at the foot of the bed, and Ian Sinclair and his wife and Cameron Falladay and Jaci were waiting outside.
Kia just wanted to go home. She wanted to curl up on the couch in front of the fire and just sleep.
“There’s no sign of a concussion,” Dr. Sanjer announced.
Portly and rugged, the middle-aged doctor smiled way too much.
“I’d like her to stay overnight, though,” he continued.
“No.” Kia didn’t bother to stare up at him, just snapped the word out.
The effort caused her to wince and rub at her temple. If she could just get to her apartment, close her eyes and sleep, then everything would be just fine. She was certain of it.
“Now, Kia, leaving is a bad idea,” her mother started, her voice worried.
“That’s what you said when I was a child,” she muttered. “I’m not staying.” She looked at Chase. “You promised.”
He stared back at her, his green eyes brooding, his expression so hard it was granite. But she saw his decision as he glanced at the doctor, and nearly breathed a sigh of relief.
“Dr. Sanjer, I have an extra room at my apartment,” he told the doctor. “You’ll be spending the night there.”
That she didn’t expect. Evidently, the doctor hadn’t either. He was Ian’s personal physician, but a friend of Chase and Cam as well.
Sanjer sighed. “It’s a good thing I like you, Chase. That order doesn’t sit well.”
“Please.” His tone of voice was hard, his expression remorseless.
The doctor grunted.
“I’ll let her leave then. I’ll get what I need and be at your apartment within the hour. I want her to stay in bed tonight and tomorrow.”
“I have a job,” she bit out.
“You won’t have one long if you don’t listen to the doctor,” Timothy snapped furiously. “For God’s sake, Kia, when did you get so damned stubborn?”
“While you weren’t looking.” She felt as querulous as she sounded.
“No doubt in my mind, because if I had been looking we might have had to discuss it, little girl,” he informed her, obviously covering his fear with his anger.
She glared back at him. “Are you staying at Chase’s, too?” She looked at Chase. “You didn’t mention staying with you.”
Her head was splitting. She knew she really needed to protest this, but she just couldn’t find the energy.
“You don’t have a spare room for the doctor,” he told her.
Of course, he had a reason. She sighed and stared at her hands. It wasn’t because he wanted her there.
“Well, hell,” she said. “I guess your couch is just as good as mine.”
Chase flinched. He wasn’t about to tell her exactly where she was going to be sleeping. In his bed. Right beside him.
He glanced at Rutherford, and knew her father knew. He was glaring at Chase. His expression promising retribution if Kia ended up with a broken heart.
“Sweetheart, you can come home with us,” Cecilia told her.
She looked at Chase and he saw panic in her eyes. Oh Lord, no. Her mother would flutter around her and weep and worry all night long. She couldn’t handle that.
“She’ll go home with me,” he told them. “Sanjer will be fine at the apartment, and both of you can come in the morning and stay as long as you like. Hell, follow us back if you want.”
He didn’t care a bit to bail her out of this one. He had no intention of allowing her to be anywhere but with him.
“Since when do you decide how she should be taken care of?” Timothy barked.
“If you don’t stop arguing over me like two dogs with a bone, then I’m going to go home by myself,” she informed them, pressing her hands to her temples. “God. I don’t care where I go, I just want to sleep.”
She was unaware of the concern that filled the air. Timothy had never seen his daughter bloody; Celia knew she’d have nightmares for years to come over it. And Chase. Chase felt as though rage was going to destroy his sanity. So help him God, if he found out who did this, he was going to kill.
“I’ll get her signed out of here,” Sanjer promised. “I’ll be there in an hour, Chase. Have my room ready. And some food if no one minds. My dinner was interrupted tonight.”
Chase moved around the bed, holding Kia’s attention, seeing in her eyes the vulnerability there, the almost hidden fears and desires. He didn’t bother to hide his. He wouldn’t make the same mistake he had made earlier tonight. He had dared to take his eyes off her when everything inside him had screamed at him to go with her, to chase after her.
She was stuck with him now, and he wondered if that might ultimately end up destroying both of them. Chase had never been one to let go of anything that belonged to him. And he was starting to feel as though Kia… belonged.
He picked her up in his arms, feeling how light she was, how fragile. He held her gaze.
“I told you,” he whispered then. “It doesn’t change. Only the circumstances do.”
“And I told you,” she whispered back. “Bet me!”
17
Dr. Sanjer checked Kia again after Chase took her to his apartment and put her to bed. She knew it was his bed. The monstrous four-poster had to be his. Only he was tall enough to climb into it easily.
Now she lay silent, staring at the ceiling, counting off the hours as she tried to figure out exactly how she had ended up in his bed. With him in it.
She was dressed in one of Chase’s T-shirts and her bronze panties. A sheet and a finely sewn heirloom quilt covered her, and beside her Chase lay, his arm thrown over her stomach as he slept.
She was lying there wishing she could roll away from him, wishing she could get enough distance between them to make sense of the feelings that kept moving through her.