My stomach knots. Is he talking about walking away from me? Or continuing to fight? “What does that mean?”
“Dash!”
At the sound of Bella’s voice from somewhere nearby, Dash’s jaw clenches. “If we don’t go to her, she’ll come to us. We deal with her. Then we’ll deal with everyone else.”
Only I’m not sure we will. I’m not sure of much right now. I don’t know where Allison is. I don’t know who was in my house last night. I don’t know why Dash is punishing himself. I don’t know what to do about any of it.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The minute Bella's gaze lands on Dash she gasps, her hand covering her mouth, her eyes shutting. “God, no,” she whispers, and then when I expect her to lose it and freak out on Dash, she does just the opposite. She does what I don’t expect.
She rushes to Dash and wraps her arms around him, hugging him with all her might, her head pressed to his chest. For my part, my attention is on Dash’s tormented expression, and the slow fold of his arms as they close around her. The instant he hugs her, her chin tilts upward, her gaze seeking his. “Why?” she asks softly. “Why now? Things are so good for you, Dash.”
Pain stabs through me at Dash’s situation and without even thinking, I rush to his rescue. “Someone broke into my house last night. Dash saved me.”
“Oh my God,” Bella murmurs, pulling away from Dash, her attention sliding between us. “Broke in? While you were there?”
“Exactly,” I explain, leaving out the part where I was alone, and Dash was not there. “Thank God for Dash. He ended up fighting some big monster of a man, and all because of me,” I add because it’s how I honestly feel. He was fighting last night because I left him. And he did fight a monster of a man. That monster was in a fight club, not at my house, but Bella doesn’t need to know that.
I can feel Dash’s eyes on me but I stay focused on Bella as I continue with, “I don’t know who he was or how this happened.”
“Oh my God,” she gasps again, but this time it’s different, the complicated fear of Dash fighting again is gone. “This is so scary,” she continues. “What if Dash hadn’t shown up? Was it a break-in? Did they think the house was vacant?”
“I don’t know what it was,” I say. “The other Allison lived in that house not long ago. Maybe someone was looking for her. Maybe the man came with her and she didn’t know I’d taken over the house.”
She blinks. “Wait. What? You’re in the same house Allison was in? How is that possible?”
“I think I need coffee to tell this story,” I say, glancing at Dash. “And you need ice or heat or both on that eye.”
“Both,” Bella declares. “He needs to do both. I’ll get a pack of ice together and I already made coffee.” She wags a finger between us. “Both of you. Go sit at the bar. I brought bagels and cream cheese. You both need to eat. And I’ll pour you coffee.” She turns and rushes toward the island.
Dash catches my hand and pulls me in front of him, leaning down to press his lips to my ear. “Thank you. And you didn’t make me do anything, Allie. I own this. Just me.” He pulls back to look at me. “Understand?”
“It’s not that simple, now is it?”
“Come you two love birds. Coffee. Food. Me.”
At Bella’s teasing prod Dash’s lips press together, but he swings me around and under his arm as he guides me to do as commanded. Dash and I each claim a barstool and steamy cups of coffee are already in front of us. Bella then sets a bundle of ice next to Dash. “You look like you ran into my doorknob again.”
Dash laughs, and glances over at me. “I was chasing her when we were kids. She tried to slam the door in front of me. I managed to take the knob in my face. And yes, I was short, but not that short. Apparently, I bent over.” He grimaces at Bella. “And I was the one who got grounded.”
“Because you broke mom’s vase,” she objects, “not because you took a doorknob in the eye. And you were babysitting. Mom was fair on all things. You know that.”
He grunts and shoves the ice on his face. The toaster pops and she turns around and attends to the food. I glance over at Dash. “Don’t you need to work on your book today?”
“Don’t remind me. My head is pounding and it does me no good to write a bunch of garbage.”
It’s more than his head. He needs to be in a hot tub of water, soaking out the aches and pains, and he will be, as soon as Bella leaves. I’ll make sure of it.
Bella sets a plate in front of each of us, both with cream cheese-covered bagels on top. “I have Advil in my purse. I’ll get you some.” She pushes off the island and heads into the living area, where she obviously set her purse.
Dash sets the ice down and glances over at me, his lips pressed together. “You’re right. I have to get words on the page. My own stupidity is no excuse for not doing my job.”
“Your own stupidity?” Bella asks, reappearing way too quickly with a bottle in her hand. “What does that mean, Dash?” She’s scowling again, suspicion in her tone as she sets the Advil in front of him.
“It means, I thought I could actually make that early deadline you wanted. Now I went off and got the shit beat out of me like a little pussy, and I’m no longer in that same head space.”
Oh, he’s good. He just moved the conversation from her suspicion to what matters to her—him and his work-in-progress. And as he knew she would, she peps up. “You think you might make an earlier deadline?”
“If you stop drilling me and let me go sleep a couple of hours and get to work. Maybe.”
Correction, he’s not just good, he’s sensational. He didn’t just redirect her attention from his black eye, he gave her a reason to leave and stop drilling him.
“Don’t get my hopes up for nothing, Dash.”
“I’m not getting your hopes up at all,” he says, downing the Advil with a gulp of coffee. “I’m saying I’m trying. That’s more than I said before.” He motions to me. “And you can thank Allie for that. She made me read the book from the beginning. I decided it doesn’t suck as badly as I thought.”
“It doesn’t suck at all,” I chime in. “It’s brilliant.”
“Really?” she asks. “I mean, of course, it is. It’s Dash we’re talking about here.” She glances at him. “And you and your brilliance have a charity event signing in two weeks. Are you going to be ready?”
“If you go home and let me sleep this off.”
“Sleeping doesn’t heal black eyes.”
“Sleep heals,” he argues. “So does silence.” He grinds his teeth, but not because of Bella. “My damn head feels like a drank a bottle of tequila and didn’t have the fun that goes along with it,” he grumbles.
“Eat,” she orders. “You know you get headaches when you don’t eat.”
“That’s you not me,” he reminds her.
“Right. Well, you still need to eat. And I need coffee.” She turns around and grabs a cup from the cabinet and fills one for herself. I love how at home she is in Dash’s place. I love what that says about their relationship and about Dash as a man.