I hang around just outside the stairwell, waiting for one of them to notice me. Sure enough, within about three seconds, the shortest of the three heavily tattooed guys makes a beeline for me, his bald head shining under the artificial light.

I smile gratefully as he approaches me. “Hi.”

He smirks. “What are you doin’ here, darlin? Prez is still out cold.”

I nod, squeezing a tear out for effect. “I don’t know what to do,” I say desperately. “I’m so worried about him.”

The dude thinks on something for a moment and then glances at the room he’s just come from.

“Look,” he says. “It’s meant to be family only.”

“I know,” I say dejectedly. “I just—if he wakes up … I don’t want him to think I wasn’t here, worried about him, you know? But I don’t want to upset his family.” I put my hands to my face, acting upset. “Can you help me?”

I bat my fucking eyelashes for all I’m worth, and the guy buys it. Men are idiots sometimes. In this case, it’s to his detriment.

“Stay here, doll. I’ll let you know when his old lady leaves.”

I smile gratefully, watching him as he heads back to the room to stand sentry with the other two bikers. They’re all about Dornan’s age—all would have been in the club with my father when he died.

Traitorous bastards, the lot of them. If it were up to me, if I had the energy and the resources, they’d all be dead as well.

My patience pays off. About thirty minutes later, I see Dornan’s wife head back to the elevator and disappear inside. Moments after that, Baldy crooks a finger, beckoning me.

He gestures for me to enter the room, but as I pass him, he lays a hand on my shoulder. It takes everything within me not to throw it off and punch him in the face.

“He’s messed up pretty bad,” he says to me in a loud whisper. “You sure you wanna go in?”

I nod. I’m fucking gagging to see what’s become of him.

“Okay,” the guy says, taking his hand back. “Don’t say you weren’t warned.”

I nod, squeezing past him and entering the private room. Even here, in a coma, Dornan’s been afforded every luxury: a private suite that overlooks the Hollywood Hills and a band of merry men to guard him from further attack.

I should’ve brought some kind of poison with me and finished off the job. Silly me for not thinking ahead.

I approach the bed at the far end of the large room quietly and with caution. I don’t know what to expect, only that it’s bad.

As I get closer, my eyes take in every detail of the horrors that have marred Dornan’s face, neck, arms, and hands. I assume the rest of him is similarly injured, but I’m not about to lift the sheets and find out. Not yet, anyway.

A few more steps and I’m close enough to reach out and take his hand, gently avoiding the deep cuts that litter his skin and the drip tube that’s embedded in the top of his hand.

I can’t help it. A satisfied smile spreads across my face as I see the damage the shrapnel from Elliot’s crudely fashioned bombs have wreaked upon the man I want to destroy. It’s not as good as if he were dead, but it’s pretty fucking great.

He’s hooked up to a morphine drip, the same kind as the one I had when I woke up from death six years ago. They’re impossible to overdose, which is unfortunate, with only a measured amount delivered intravenously every fifteen minutes.

Well, if I can’t kill him, I’ll make sure he feels every goddamn thing that’s happening to him. That works for me, too. I locate the needle underneath his skin and push back on it firmly, just enough that it stays underneath his skin, but out of his vein. With any luck, he’ll not only be in pain from the morphine not reaching his bloodstream, but the fluid will also collect under his skin, causing more discomfort.

I lift the sheets back and tuck him hand underneath, patting the blankets back over.

Before I leave, I plant a lingering kiss on his bruised lips.

Karma’s a fucking bitch sometimes.

“Why?” Jase asks me.

It’s late. He just walked in the front door of his apartment, hours after I got back from the hospital. I’ve been sitting at the counter, waiting for him to get back, knowing he’s probably going to be pissed.

“Why what?” I respond to his question, making him frown.

“You know what I mean,” Jase growls. “Why’d you go to the fucking hospital today?”

I shrug, avoiding his eyes. “I wanted to see the bastard laid up in a coma.”

Jase snorts, shaking his head. “Nice move on his hand, too. Really subtle.”

I actually laugh, which is totally inappropriate given the serious look Jase is leveling at me.

“Oh, come on,” I say to him. “He deserves every bit of pain I can give him.”

“Of course he does,” Jase says angrily. “But Julz—you’re getting a bit fucking careless. A bit fucking obvious.”

My face falls as I realize he’s right.

“Jesus,” I whisper. “That was pretty stupid, huh?”

Jase spreads his hands out, a gesture of surrender. “Yeah, well,” he says. “You’re lucky I was there a few hours later and took the goddamn blame for it.”

I hang my head. “Thanks,” I mumble.

He does something totally unexpected then. He comes over, smiles devilishly, and pulls me from my stool into a massive bear hug, squeezing the breath out of me.

“Whoa,” I say when he releases his grip. “What was that for?”

He brushes a stray hair from my face, a cheeky glint in his eye. “You’re crazy, you know that? You’ve got no fear.”

Something about those words stab into my chest painfully. “Believe me, I’ve got plenty of fear,” I reply glumly.

“Are you still afraid of heights?” Jase asks.

“Why?” I ask slowly. “Want to take me base jumping or something?”

“Not quite,” he says. “Remember when we used to go up on the Ferris wheel?”

“Yeah,” I say, flashing back to when we were teenage sweethearts at Santa Monica Pier.

“Grab a jacket,” he says.

I frown, looking at the digital clock display mounted on the front of the oven. “It’s almost ten at night,” I protest.

Jase shrugs. “There’s got to be some upside to being a Gypsy Brother, right?”

Sure enough, the security guard in charge of looking over the Pier waves us in without hesitation. I’m still reeling from the abrupt change of mood Jase showed when he got home, and I’m afraid to say, a little suspicious that there’s something he isn’t telling me.

“I thought you’d be angry with me,” I whisper as Jase hurries me along the wooden pier.

He stops, and I almost collide with him as I continue striding. He turns and catches me by my shoulders, steadying me.

“I’m not angry with you,” he says, squeezing my hands in his. “I’m scared out of my fucking mind for you. For both of us.”

“Everything will be fine,” I whisper, but a little voice inside of me is screaming for attention. Demanding answers to those questions that keep plaguing me.

Why are you still here?

Why didn’t you kill them years ago?

I block them out, because who knows how much time we have left together? I don’t really want to ask those questions of him, because I don’t know if I can bear the answers.

I don’t know what answers would satisfy me, anyway.

He gives me a weird look, takes one of my hands, and continues dragging me along. A moment later, he’s lifting me up into one of the passenger cabins before clambering in himself.

“It’s not going anywhere,” I point out.

Jase shrugs, wrapping his arm around my shoulders as we sit side by side in the darkness of the empty pier, the only noise the waves crashing onto the sand below us.

I can’t help it. I have to ask.

“What … happened to you afterward?” I ask him in a voice barely above a whisper. After I died.

He immediately stiffens, his arm around me rigid. “Nothing,” he says quickly.