“I am telling you she will not agree to taking drugs,” Matias warned, following him out of the building and pausing to lock the door.
“I’m no’ going to ask her,” Scotty responded coldly as he led the way back toward the house.
“Ah . . .” Matias murmured, falling into step behind him. “Well then, this ought to be interesting.”
Scotty frowned at the words, but didn’t slow or stop, even when Matias halted at the kennel to release the Dobermans, who had started barking excitedly at their approach. Scotty’s one thought was to get back to Beth and end her pain. She’d gone through enough in her life, and would not suffer ever again if he could help it.
Apparently he couldn’t help it, because Scotty entered the living room with Matias on his heels to find it empty.
“What—?” Turning sharply, he hurried back past Matias and the dogs and into the hall leading to the bedrooms. It was the only place he could think she might be. Perhaps she had wanted to lie down.
Spotting Donny outside the bathroom door, Scotty hurried to his side.
“Is she in there?” he asked as he reached the younger immortal.
Donny nodded. “She said she had to go to the bathroom.”
Scotty listened to the sound of rushing water coming muffled through the door, and frowned. “That does no’ sound like the toilet flushin’, or the sink tap runnin’.”
“I think it’s the shower,” Donny admitted reluctantly.
“She should no’ be in the shower. She could faint and hit her head and just do herself more damage,” Scotty said with concern, and knocked at the door.
“She is fine,” Matias assured him mildly. “She has had four bags of blood. She will not faint.”
“She’s in pain,” Scotty said grimly.
“She would tell you that life is pain,” the Spaniard said with a shrug. “Let her be. She will come out when she is ready.”
Scotty shook his head and knocked at the door again. “Beth, open up.”
“No! Go away!”
“If ye do no’ open the door, I’ll break it down,” he threatened.
“Try that and I’ll shoot you with my dart gun . . . again!” she threatened right back.
That gave him pause. The damned woman had already shot him once. He wouldn’t put it past her to do it again. Turning to Donny, he asked, “Does she have her dart gun with her?”
Donny shrugged helplessly. “I saw one of her bags in there before she closed the door, but I don’t know if her weapons are in it.”
Scotty peered at the door, debating the issue, and then glanced around with surprise when the doorbell rang.
“That will be the pizza,” Matias said, turning to head back up the hall. “If you are going to break down the door, please do not do it until I return. I should like to see it when she shoots you.”
Scotty stared after him with disbelief and then shook his head and peered at the door once more. He had no doubt that Beth would shoot him if she had her dart gun. Knowing her, she probably did, Scotty decided with displeasure and thought that rather than hunting down painkillers for her, he should have just pulled out his own dart gun and shot her.
“Really?”
Scotty glanced around to see Matias returning up the hall, carrying four medium-size pizza boxes and shaking his head with something between disbelief and amusement. He didn’t understand why until the man said, “Your earlier concern has now turned into wishing you had shot her? Really?”
Scotty scowled. The younger man was obviously reading his thoughts. That was the most annoying part of being an immortal who had found their life mate. He was now easy to read, and had been since meeting Beth over a century ago, which was why he had offered to help Donny control his thoughts. He knew how hard it was.
Rather than tell Matias to shut up, Scotty simply asked, “Is one o’ those fer me?”
The Spaniard raised an eyebrow. “Do you wish to have it here or at the table in the kitchen, or in the living room?”
“Here.”
Shrugging, Matias examined the labels on each box, shifted them to lie on one flat hand and pulled out the second one from the top.
“Thanks.” Scotty took the box and slid down the wall to sit on the hardwood floor.
“You?” Matias asked Donny.
“The living room,” the young man said firmly, and the pair left Scotty alone to wait.
Beth turned off the shower, but didn’t immediately step out of the tub. Instead, she reached back to unzip her sodden dress and then peeled it off her shoulders. She hadn’t been able to manage the feat earlier, so had simply kicked off her shoes and stepped under the water spray. Now the dress dropped to the tub floor with a heavy splat.
Grimacing, she stepped out of the circle of wet cloth and toed it aside, then stripped off her panties and bra as well before tugging the shower curtain aside and grabbing a towel off the rack. Beth quickly dried her hair first, and then wrapped the towel around herself sarong-style before stepping out onto the floor mat. She didn’t know how much time had passed, but the worst of the healing was over, the throbbing reduced to a mild ache, so she’d guess a couple of hours.
Usually Beth would have lain down and tried to rest while she healed, but there were no locks on the bedroom doors and she hadn’t trusted Scotty not to come in and try to force a shot of painkiller on her. So she’d stayed in the shower, and actually, the water had helped somewhat, distracting her from the pain enough to make it more bearable. Especially when the hot water had run out and she’d been left with cold water pouring down over her. That had been extremely distracting.
A check of the bag she’d left in the room earlier proved what Beth had already known—there were a pair of clean jeans, a couple of T-shirts, but no bras or panties. One of the T-shirts was an overlarge one she wore to sleep in, so she tugged it on over her head. The hem fell to midthigh, covering the important bits.
“Good enough,” Beth muttered and turned to scoop up her wet clothes. She quickly squeezed as much water out of them as she could and then hung them over the shower rod. Leaving her bag there for now, she told herself she’d collect it on the way to bed and finally unlocked the bathroom door. She pulled it open to find Scotty outside, sitting on the hall floor. He was leaning against the wall opposite the bathroom door with his legs stretched out and crossed at the ankles. His arms were folded over his chest, his head down, eyes closed and an open, empty pizza box rested on the floor next to him.
After a hesitation, Beth started to ease past him in the direction of the kitchen. The sight of the pizza box was enough to make her search out food. She didn’t think she made any noise, but with the first step Scotty lifted his head and his eyes opened, making her freeze like a guilty burglar caught in the act. The two of them stared at each other for a moment, and then Scotty got quickly to his feet.
“How’re ye feeling?” he asked, his voice rough with sleep as his eyes slid to her arm.
“Better,” Beth murmured, and then, shifting self-consciously, added, “You didn’t have to wait out here.”