Page 8 of My All American Girl

4

DEAN

She looked off, like she’d had a rough night. Graduation celebrations could get pretty rowdy, so it wasn’t a total surprise. When she sat down in the car, I caught a glimpse of her red knuckles.

Anger rolled through me, along with a feeling of protectiveness. “What the hell happened?”

“I’m walking to my dorm,” she replied.

“You’re bleeding,” I pointed out. “Your hand and you’ve got a cut on your cheek. I’m going to ask you again, what the fuck happened to you?”

I was ready to go to war for her. For any woman that looked like she’d been beat up.

“Look, I’m drunk and I really want to go home and pass out. Cool? If not, I’ll walk.”

My knuckles whitened as my grip on the wheel tightened. She had tussled with someone and I wanted to know what happened. Mo had put me in charge of her. Technically babysitting duties didn’t start until she got to Columbus, but I took my job seriously.

I didn’t take her to the dorms. Instead, we parked in front of the medical building.

“What are you doing?” she asked. “It’s closed.”

“Not for me.”

We got out of the car and I opened the door for us. Most of the lights were off and no one else was around.

“We’re not supposed to be here,” she said when I wiped away the blood on her face with an alcohol pad.

“Do you know who I am?” I quipped.

“Oh, yes, Ryker, the God of the skies,” she joked.

“Hey, I’m the guy taking care of you.”

She rolled her eyes at me and looked away as I carefully tended to her wounds.

“You need stitches,” I said after a moment.

“No, it’s fine. Just bandage it up,” she protested.

“And let you walk around with gaping wounds? No way.”

“I don’t have gaping wounds,” she said. “It’s a scratch.”

She was probably right, but I didn’t like the idea of her not getting real medical help. “Does your father know about this?”

“What do you think?” she asked. Her split lip and bruised cheek didn’t seem to bother her much as she grinned up at me.

She was going to be trouble.

“What happened?” I asked. “Either you tell me, or I go straight to your father.”

“A bar fight,” she admitted proudly.

“A bar fight?” I repeated.

She nodded. “Yep.”

“What happened?”