Brick Brick (Knights Corruption MC - Next Generation, #4) - S. Nelson Page 0,1

my face away and dropping my head back to the pillow.

I wanted to thank her, to ask her so many questions, but I couldn’t find the strength. All I wanted to do was fall back into sleep, but something told me that wasn’t gonna happen anytime soon. There was a reason Addy was here, and our club’s VP, and I doubted it was because of a routine checkup on the status of my wounds. The air in the room thickened and I prepared myself for news I didn’t want to hear, watching Addy’s every step as she moved to my bedside. Stone stayed put, his attention on his wife. If I could muster the strength to do so, I would’ve laughed at the way the corner of his top lip arrowed up, or when he removed his hands from his pockets only to clench them into fists, his sole focus on watching his woman as she reached down and touched my bare chest. Or to be more accurate, touched the bandage covering the wound. And when she felt my cheeks and neck, I thought the man was gonna have a coronary.

Addy followed my line of sight and looked back at Stone, only to shake her head before turning away from him. “Don’t pay him any mind.” She smiled, her expression working to ease the bit of anxiety that reared its ugly head. “I’m sure you’re wondering why I’m here.” I gave her a curt nod, wincing from the gesture. “Zoe called and asked if I could come and check on you. I was here last night, and everything looked okay, but you’ve since spiked a fever and she couldn’t get it down.” She flipped the washcloth, and again, I welcomed the cool against my forehead. “She also told me your chest wound didn’t look right. So, that’s what I’m gonna look at now. Okay?” Another hesitant nod from me. “Good.”

Zoe’s hand clasped mine and my eyes glided to hers. “You’re gonna be fine.” Her full lips collapsed into a thin line, her tentative grin contradicting her words.

When Addy peeled back the edge of the covering, she made a noise with her throat, released a long breath, then peeked up at me, not once saying a word. Several strands of her blonde hair fell forward over her eye and she quickly tucked them behind her ear before continuing.

“Your wound got infected.” She looked to Zoe. “Do you see these red marks zigzagging away from the sutures?” She didn’t wait for her to answer before she continued. “Not a good sign, but luckily I can give him something to help.” I closed my eyes, allowing Addy to do what she did best.

“I bet you wish you had my condition right now, don’t you?” the VP asked. Fucker was lucky. He had some weird issue where he couldn’t feel an ounce of pain, no matter what happened to him. I once heard Addy refer to it as congenital insensitivity to pain. He’d been shot several times and was even run off the road many years back while on his bike, all instances happening before I joined the club. Stone often brought up his mishaps, as he referred to them, when some of the guys compared battle scars.

And now, it looked like I had some of my own, unfortunately. One on my chest, and sure to be a smaller one on the outside of my right thigh. I believed that one only required four stitches.

Addy’s fingers skillfully glided over my flesh, peeling away the bandage. The bullet that hit me just beneath my collarbone, had been dangerously close to my heart. And to top it off, it got stuck on its way out of my body, but she’d been able to retrieve it, saving me from having to walk around with a piece of copper inside me.

She set about cleaning the reddened area. “The stitches are holding nicely, and once I give you the shot of penicillin, you should start to feel better soon.”

“What shot?” My eyes popped wide. I didn’t like the sound of this.

Addy never took her eyes away from what she was doing. “Of penicillin. It’ll work faster than the pills for this infection.”

“With a needle?” My question was asinine, but I asked anyway.

“Don’t tell me you’re afraid of needles.” Stone laughed, grinning like a fool when I glared at him for making fun of me. Wasn’t it enough that I was in the state I was? He had to make