I nodded and a thin thread of pain rippled through my neck.

“I can help you get to my bed,” she said. “It’ll be more comfortable than the couch.”

“No, I’m fine,” I said. “I should go.”

“Go?  Where?  How?”

“Home.”

I pushed myself up. The floor slid out from underneath me and I toppled back into the couch.

Bella hurried over and helped me sit back upright.

“You aren’t going anywhere,” she said. “You’re a mess. You need to rest. And this couch isn’t big enough to hold you. I’m worried you’ll fall off. So I’ll help you get to my bed. I’m going to sleep in Jackson’s room.”

I wanted to argue because I just wanted to go, but the fact that I couldn’t even get to my feet made that a pointless wish. My head pounded, my face felt like it had been driven over and my legs couldn’t hold my weight. Even my stubbornness wasn’t going to get me out the door.

“Okay,” I said.

“I’m going to get under your arm and help you stand up,” she said, pressing up next to me.

“You can’t hold me up.”

“How the hell do you think you got here?” she asked, taking my arm and putting it around her shoulders. “In my car and into the living room?”

“I don’t know.”

“Well, it wasn’t Jackson,” she said. “On three, push up. Lean against me if you need to.”

She counted to three and we stood. My legs were rubbery and I did lean against her. She held me up, far stronger than I expected and we moved slowly out of the living room, down the hallway and into her bedroom.

The sheets and comforter were pulled back on the queen bed and we sat down together on the edge. She got out from under my arm and helped lift my legs onto the bed. She scooted me away from the edge.

“You alright?” She pulled the covers over me.

“I’m thirsty.”

“I’ll be right back,” she said and left.

I lay there, exhausted from the short walk down the hall. I looked around me, trying not to think about the pain still throbbing in my temples. Bella’s bedroom was small, with light blue walls and white furnishings. Small photos of Jackson in silver frames lined the top of the dresser. A short pile of books was stacked neatly on the nightstand. The faint aroma of lavender permeated the bedding and I breathed it in.

Bella returned with a plastic bottle of water. She unscrewed the cap and handed it to me. The frigid water hurt my teeth, but tasted as good as any water I’d ever had.

I handed it back to her, half-empty. “Thanks.”

She set it down on the night stand, next to the books. “Welcome. You should sleep some more.”

“I think I’ve slept all day.”

“You have. But you got the crap beat out of you.”

I wondered what happened with the chairs and umbrellas on the beach. It was the first time since I’d arrived in Florida that I hadn’t finished the day. I needed to apologize to Ike as soon as I could get up and move.

“Tell me,” I said.

“Tell you what?”

“Who they are.”

Anxiety settled on her face. “We don’t need to do that now.”

“I’ve slept all day,” I said. “I need to stay awake so I can get my bearings. And you said you’d tell me.”

She sighed, clearly torn between whether or not she was going to tell me. I was prepared to leverage my injury, if necessary. I was now in this far. I needed to know exactly what I was into.

She sat down on the foot of the bed, her legs folded up Indian-style. She played with her fingers for a moment, studying them, avoiding my eyes.

“They’re friends of Evan’s,” she said.  “David’s last name is Hanson.  I don’t know Colin’s.”

It took me a moment to remember that Evan was Jackson’s father. “Friends?”

She shrugged, rolled her eyes. “Friends. Colleagues. Assholes. Whatever. They all worked together.”

“Together?  Or they worked for Evan?”

An irritated smile turned into a smirk. “Truthfully, I have no idea. Evan was great at keeping secrets and those two are no different. When he was killed, David took over. I don’t know if that’s because he was next in line, or they were partners, or what. Colin, he’s just a dickhead who thinks he’s the enforcer. Wants to be bigger than he is.”

“But that was in Tampa, right?”

She shifted on the bed, pulling her knees to her chest. “David decided to expand the business.”

“To here.”

She hesitated, then nodded. “Yeah. To here.”

I had yet to meet a dealer who wasn’t ambitious. It was inherent in their business. Once they got a taste of the money involved, they wanted more. But the problem with expansion was that they were always infringing on someone else’s territory. And that usually led to bloody problems.

“So what?” I asked. “Did Evan die owing them money?  They want it from you?”

She shook her head slowly. “No. At least not that I know of.”

“So why are they bothering you?”

She ran a hand through her hair and rubbed at the back of her neck. “Because I’m stupid.”

TWENTY-ONE

I reached for the bottle of water and moved around a bit under the covers, trying to shake the stiffness from my joints and limbs, waiting for Bella to explain.

“Before Jackson was born,” she said. “I thought Evan was…fantastic. Like, could do no wrong. Even though I knew everything he was doing was wrong.”

I drained the rest of the bottle and replaced it on the nightstand.

“So when he wanted me to do something, I did it,” she continued. “Without thinking very much. If he smiled at me, whispered in my ear, I was his.”  She smiled, shook her head. “I was incredibly dumb.”

“Doesn’t sound dumb. Sounds like you loved him.”

She shrugged. “Maybe. But I was dumb. I promise.”

“How?”

She squeezed her knees tighter to her body. “You should sleep.”

“You should answer the questions.”

She made a face and sighed. “Right. Evan would have me…do things for him.”

The way she said it, I had no clue what “things” meant. About twenty came to mind, none of them good.

“I ran for him,” Bella said. “Made deliveries for him.”

“Ah.”

“Like I said,” she continued. “He could get me to do just about anything. And I don’t want you to think he was forcing me. He wasn’t. I was happy to do anything to make him happy, you know?”

She unfolded her legs and stretched them out next to me over the blankets. “But when I got pregnant, I started saying no. Evan wasn’t pleased.”

“Why not?” I asked, irritated at the idea of a guy who would send his pregnant girlfriend on drug runs.

“Because I was the perfect delivery girl,” she said. “No one suspected me and no one was going to mess with Evan’s girlfriend. And I wasn’t going to rip him off. I was no risk.”

I could see that. It made sense. It didn’t make me dislike him any less.

“But eventually, he got over me saying no,” she said. “And he was cool with it. Particularly as I got bigger and my pregnancy was pretty obvious. There was no push-back from him.”

Something passed through her expression that I couldn’t identify.

“Then I decided to leave him,” she said. “And he wasn’t happy about that.”  She laughed. “At all.”

“But you said he didn’t want to be a father.”

She smirked. “He didn’t. But he wasn’t happy about two things. The fact that I was the one making the decision to leave and the fact that he was losing his delivery girl.”

I tried to push myself up on the pillows, but pain rocketed through my head as soon as I moved. I settled back into them.

“So he cut me off,” she said. “Cold. No money, no nothing. Because he knew I’d need him.”

“What’d you do?”

“At first, I resisted,” she said. “I tried to find a job, but it was impossible. I was about to have a baby. And then I knew I’d have the baby and would need to take care of him. My options were limited.”

I thought for a moment. “So you went back to work for him.”