Blissful Surrender (3 page)

“Then it’s the ex? Because if so, you need to be off this case now. Any connection is too much.”

“Is that what happened when Kate needed you?” I retort bitchily, instantly regretting the words the moment they leave my mouth.

For a brief moment, he looks taken aback by my comment, but he cools his response immediately. “Sure, Sam, I hear you. But I don’t understand the weird vibe I’m getting from you or why you’d be uncomfortable in that club.” He jerks his head toward Throb without taking his eyes off me. “Since you know Ryan and we’re quiet right now, do you want to head over to Northwestern and check in on him?”

I shake my head from side to side. I don’t
need
to get involved in Ryan’s mess this time. It’s not my place. It’s never been my place. Just like his brother has no place in my head. It’s ancient history, and just an unfortunate coincidence that our lives have inadvertently collided twice in as many months. I’ll just rack it up to being bad luck and keep Sean out of my head.

Lucky for me, I’m yet to set eyes on the very man who marked me all those years ago. The man who has the power to bring me to my knees, in all ways possible.

Somehow I don’t think luck is going to be on my side for much longer after today.

Sean

After spending all afternoon in a deposition that went way over time, I’m finally back in my office looking at a stack of messages my secretary has left on my desk and contemplating another long night ahead of me. It’s already 4 p.m., but I’ve still got half a day’s work to catch up on.

I spin my silver watch on my wrist, a habit of mine when I’m frustrated. The engraving on the back of it is forever engrained in my memory.

To the best man I know and the only man I’ll love.

It was my mother’s last Christmas gift she gave my father before they died and it has taken pride of place on my left hand. My grandfather gave it to me when the movers were packing up our old house in New York. He said, “Boy, one day you’re going to grow up to be a man, and then you’ll meet the one woman who will cut you off at the knees and realize that you willingly let her every time. When that happens, I want you to remember the love your parents had. It was an enduring love, the everlasting, all-encompassing kind that I know all about. When you find that, Sean, you grab hold tight and never let go.”

I snap out of my walk down memory lane and undo the top button of my shirt, running my fingers under my tie and loosening the knot I’d made this morning. I may like suits, but ties are my downfall. I only wear them for as long as absolutely necessary.

Pulling my phone out of my pocket, I look at the screen and grimace. My phone has been vibrating in my pocket for the past hour, but unfortunately, this is the first chance I’ve had to check it. Three calls from the club, and at least four more from an unknown number. What the hell is going on? I shouldn’t be getting any calls from the club unless the place is burning down. If Ryan really needs me he calls me from his cell. I don’t feel like speaking to him anyway. I’d likely say something I’d regret and he’d go on a bender again.

And right now, that’s the last thing either of us needs.

I ring the club and Amy answers. “Throb, Amy Speaking.”

“Amy, It’s Sean. Do you know why I’ve had so many calls from—”

“Sean! Oh my god! Have you spoken to Ryan yet? Is he okay?” She’s talking a million miles an hour and isn’t making sense. 

“Okay Amy, slow down. Where’s Ryan?”

“Oh shit, you don’t know? Ryan was attacked in the club today during a robbery. He was knocked around a bit, then was taken to hospital about two hours ago.” I hear her take a deep breath, obviously trying to calm herself down.

“He what?” I’m in shock. I have to be. There is no way anyone would rob the club in the middle of the damn day. That’s ballsy and stupid, and simply fucked up.

“He was beat up by a robber. There were cops here when I arrived to start prepping for tonight.”

“What hospital, Amy?”

“Northwestern.”

“Okay. Do you need someone to cover?”

“Already sorted, boss. Isabel came in. She was happy to.”

“Good.” I take a deep breath and try to relax. Despite his faults, Ryan is the only family I have left. I’ll deal with the money bullshit later—when he’s not in the hospital and beat up. “Okay, Amy. I’m going to go to the hospital. I’ll call by and check in with you afterwards. Get Michael to watch upstairs, and I’ll sort everything else out when I come in.”

“Right, see you later then,” she replies before ending the call.

FUCK!

My mind is spinning as I call my car service and ask for an urgent pick-up before sitting back in my leather chair. With my head in my hands, and my fingers tugging my hair in frustrated concern, I wonder what the fuck Ryan has done this time. I may not know the details yet, but I’m automatically assuming the worst.

I grab my laptop bag, shoving in a few files that need my attention and walk out the door. As the elevator starts its descent, I’m hit with the reality that my brother is lying in a hospital bed having been beaten up in my club.

But this isn’t the first time something like this has happened.

I was twenty-five and working as a summer associate. I’d been working late one night on a white collar fraud case that had the potential to make my career in corporate law when my cell started ringing. Seeing Ryan’s name on the screen, I answered straight away.

“Hey, Ry.”

“Sean, I’m in deep shit.”

My breath stuttered as his words hit me. “Where are you?”

“Hiding in an alley behind a bar in Detroit.”

“Ry, what the fuck? You were in Chicago this morning when I left for work.” My voice was restrained as I tried to reel in my growing fury.

“Can we talk about this later? Right now, I need help. I was in the back room when the place was raided. I escaped out the back door and started running. Now, I’m in an alley, in downtown Detroit with my phone and twenty bucks to my name.” He was breathing hard and his voice was shaky.

My mind was racing. “Fuck, Ry. You seriously need to start sorting your shit out. I can’t keep bailing you out. This will seriously fuck up my work on this case.”

“I wouldn’t call unless I were desperate. I’m stuck, brother.” He knew what he was doing.

Our grandfather had died three months earlier, seven months after our grandmother had passed away in her sleep following a long illness. He had never gotten over her death and literally started withering away right in front of our eyes until the day he had a heart attack in the living room. Unfortunately, it was Ryan who came home and found him, and he’s struggled ever since. It just exacerbated the problems that started when our parents were killed. Overnight he’d become a thrill seeker; an adrenaline junkie always looking for a rush, wanting to prove to himself that he was still alive.

He decided that he was going to live every day as if it was his last. In all parts of his life. He lived and loved plentifully. Every woman who caught his eye was a potential soul mate. He loved easily and he loved hard. He also played hard … and often, which is exactly what got him into the trouble in Detroit.

“Ry, I’m a four hour drive away. Even if I tried to get a flight, I wouldn’t get there for a few hours.”

“Sean, I’m in deep this time. If the cops get wind I was there, I’ll go down for this.”

“For what?”

“Don’t worry about it, it won’t happen again. I just need some money or a car or something to get back home.”

I remember my stomach tightening and feeling a prickle on my scalp at his sudden evasiveness.

“Shit.”

“What, Ryan?” I asked, my voice getting louder and attracting attention from other people around me.

“Bro, track my cell or something. Do whatever you have to do.”

“What the fuck, Ryan? What’s going on? You’re making no sense.”

“I’m walking south, two blocks away from the bar.”

A moving target. Fucking fantastic. “Ryan, I don’t have time for this bullshit.”

“Shit,” he muttered under his breath, but I heard it clear as day and slid immediately into my default protector mode. The same mode I’d been in for twenty years.

“Ryan, what’s the name of the bar?”

“What?”

“The bar where you were …”

He started panting loudly into my ear. “Big Rob’s Bar,” he replied breathlessly. I heard him start running, his footsteps against the pavement loudly echoing down the phone.

“Really, Ry? Big Rob’s Bar?”

“Listen, Sean, can you help me?” He sounded desperate.

“Why are you running?”

My jaw was starting to ache from the constant tension. Five minutes of phone conversation and all I’d found out was that he was in Detroit, running from a potential crime scene, and had gone from being worried but relaxed, to being on high alert, anxious and desperate in a matter of seconds.

I needed a vacation.

“Five of them just crossed the street behind me. Coming up fast. Check the hospitals first,” he spat out before I heard a yell in the distance and the phone being dropped. I jumped to my feet, shouting down the phone in desperation. “Ry? Ryan? Fuck! Ryan!”

All I could hear was footsteps and car noise, then Ryan shouting. “No, please! I have nothing. I’m just walking. Shit!” More footsteps, car horns, then what I found out later were three guys laying into my kid brother as he lay in the gutter on the street.

Two of my co-workers had tried to calm me down, but I shook my head at them. I looked at my watch. 1 a.m. “Ryan!” I’d shouted one last time and with no response I made the split second decision to hang up and call 911.

Seven hours later, I landed in Detroit and jumped into a cab which took me straight to the hospital where Ryan was being treated for a concussion and four broken ribs. We returned home the same day via a rental car.

That was the day I discovered my brother had a gambling addiction that led him to a dodgy bar late one night for an illegal back room poker game in which he lost five thousand dollars just before the cops arrived.

It was the first of many brushes with the law Ryan Miller was to have, and the first of many bailouts that I’d give him.

Thirty minutes in my town car and I was now in the ER of Northwestern Memorial Hospital trying to find my brother, again. Yes, it’s nine years later, but this routine is starting to get old. Even if he was attacked by an alleged robber and is completely innocent in this situation, I’m sick of visiting my kid brother in the fucking hospital. I wait for two hours, which gives me time to boot up my laptop and go through my emails and messages. By the time I’m taken to Ryan, it has been four hours since he was allegedly attacked and I’m told by his nurse that he’s very sore and drowsy from the pain meds, so I can’t stay long.

I walk into his twin room and see his temporary roommate for the night—an old man who’s snoring his head off and drooling on his pillow. To be honest, this man looks like he’s in God’s waiting room awaiting his call-up. I walk toward the closed curtain beside him and pull it back to see a somewhat battered, younger version of myself lying in the hospital bed in front of me. 

His eyes are closed and I can see an impressive bruise forming over his right eye as well as a cut on his cheek. He’s wearing what looks like the most unattractive hospital gown I’ve ever seen, and he’s hooked up to a blood pressure/heart monitor which is beeping quietly in the corner. There’s an oxygen mask covering his mouth and he’s got a wide white bandage wrapped around his head. I chuckle when I get an image of Humpty Dumpty in my head which is exactly who he looks like right now. Then I realize that it’s the first time I’ve laughed in a long time which fucking sucks.