Page 77 of Hostile Saint

Without looking at his cell, Lynx pulled it to his ear. “Make it quick.” His expression softened. “Hey, babe… No. Not so much… Not eating… Dunno… Yeah. Hold on.” He handed me the phone.

Shyly, I said, “Hello?”

“You okay?”

There was something so soothing about her voice. My tense shoulders relaxed a hair. “My stomach feels all twisty.”

“Aww. Okay, well, don’t put food on an upset stomach.” I stared down at the heaping plate. “Can you drink some of that hot tea I sent you?”

I took a gander at the two overbearing bikers staring at me, not sure how to explain it was ‘teatime’. “Uh, yeah, sure—”

“Yo!” Vice knocked on the dining table. “He’s bringing her in.”

“I gotta go!” I didn’t even say goodbye to Elle. I just handed over the phone to Lynx while leaping off the stool, needing to be with Lace any way I could.

By the time I got to the dining table, Vice was removing the earphones. Dagger and Lynx were following me as Lynx told Elle ‘club business’ had just come up and he’d call her back.

After Vice tapped on his laptop keyboard, I heard a man’s voice, “Good morning, Vera. Did you get any rest last night?”

Taking a seat at the dining table, I thought about how I had almost expected Doctor Landon to sound old and creepy, but his voice was actually very stable with no hint of hidden agendas, unlike how I had imagined. That brought me relief and made me wonder why I had been so apprehensive about this hypnosis session.

The relief was short-lived.

Up to this point, I had only heard Lacey how she sounded with me. That is why I was almost appalled to hear a timid side of her as she barely whispered, “Yes.”

She sounded so petrified I imagined her arms holding her upper body, nervously playing with long hair that no longer existed.

Doctor Landon sounded compassionate. “Vera, don’t forget, you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. You can have a seat and we can just talk. Nothing more.”

She was barely audible. “The couch?”

“Of course!” His elation at the suggestion was questionable until I heard a creak and him lightly chuckling. “You love that chair.”

It sounded as if she was curling up in the chair as she explained, ever so quietly, “The arms. I like arms around me.”

Remembering how she melted to me the night before as I held her, my eyes slid shut. My poor Pretty Girl.

Doctor Landon asked, “Do you think that maybe you miss being held?”

Silence had my eyes reopening. Did she ever speak of me?

Faintly, she replied, “No.”

Three sets of shoulders drooped as if they had worried about Lace telling the doc about me.

“Vera, does it make you sad to be missing out on such an act as being held?”

“No,” her voice came through the laptop speaker.

“Why is there a slight smile on your face, Vera?”

Lynx, Dagger, and Vice smirked at me, knowing my girl was thinking of me as she sweetly answered, “Pretty Girl dreams, that’s all.”

“I am pleased to hear you are having nice dreams.”

“Me too,” she whispered.

“Do you have any questions about what we planned on trying today?”