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Sharon chuckled. “That, I can do.”
I ate my chocolate pudding while I watched daytime television. I kept glancing at the door every so often, hoping the nurse would return and tell me I could see Smoke.
At some point, I dozed off with the TV still on in the background. I came to as the door opened and an orderly with a wheelchair entered behind Sharon. “The police left and you can see Smoke now.”
They helped me out of bed and eased my abused body into a wheelchair. They wheeled me down the hallway and stopped in front of a door. Sharon opened it and the orderly pushed me through.
Smoke was laid up in bed, his face different shades of purple and blue, swollen almost beyond recognition.
“Oh my—” Tears welled in my eyes.
“Hey,” he said gently. “I’m okay.”
I reached for his hand but he was too far away. The orderly wheeled me closer and I grasped Smoke’s fingers, lacing them with mine.
“We’ll leave you both for a bit,” Sharon said. “Not too long, though. You both need to rest.”
“Thank you,” I said.
The door closed softly and we were alone.
I swallowed. “You talked to the police?”
“Yeah.” His one eye that wasn’t swollen shut was cloudy with pain medication, but he was alert. “They told me about your ex’s past.”
“I swear I didn’t know,” I said. Nausea brewed in my belly, threatening to send up the chocolate pudding. “If I’d known, I would’ve never—”
“His record was sealed,” he interrupted. “It’s not your fault. I know you didn’t know.”
At seventeen, Knox had been convicted of date-raping a freshman high school girl at a party. His parents had been able to keep the records sealed since he was a minor at the time of conviction, but the law in Texas allowed for them to be released during a criminal investigation after his death.
“There’s no charge against me, Logan. Not only was it self-defense, but with your statement about how he tried to…”
“Rape me,” I finished for him.
He nodded slowly. “There won’t be any charges. Raider assured me of that.”
“Vance was nice,” I said softly.
Smoke’s lips quirked into a tiny smile, but he winced when his lips split. “Damn.”
Without thought, I leaned over and gently brushed the bead of blood from his skin.
“What?” I demanded. “He is.”
“Vance isn’t nice. Vance is a motherfucking shark in a suit.”
“Well, he was nice to me.”
“Good.”
“Smoke, how did Knox find me? I got a new phone; I did everything I could to disappear.”
“The bakery.”
“What?”
“When you moved, you forgot to change the address on one of your credit cards. The police found a credit card statement with all your purchases in the rental car he was driving. Name of the bakery was right there. As soon as the statement arrived in the mail, he put two and two together. Logan, security cameras show him in the parking lot last night. He watched us both and waited until I left. He didn’t know I’d come back.”
