I wake up and find myself lying in my bed at the mansion. I groan as I try to sit up. My face hurts and when I reach up to touch it, I can tell I’m going to be bruised and swollen for a while. My sides hurt and a searing pain shoots through me when I take a deep breath, must have broken a few ribs too. This is all tolerable and expected, but it hurts more knowing that Justin walked away and will not be coming back.

I do not know why I am shocked by this. I should be shocked he stayed around as long as he did. He does not belong in my world. He was only on vacation from his. He should have gone back, and I just helped. I did him and myself a favor because now everything can go back to normal again.

I continue to try to sit up, groaning the whole time. “You going to make it?” I hear James ask from where he sat beside my bed.

“I will. I’ve felt worse, mainly when I had six bullet holes in me.” I try to joke but I do not smile.

“I did not really mean with the physical pain. I have no doubt that you will make it through that. I meant about the boy.” James clarifies with a sneer.

“I’ll be fine. I’m a tough chick if you can’t remember. Plus, we were obviously not that close if he was able to leave so easily.” I say, trying to convince myself a little more than him, and James just nods. “Why am I hurting so bad?” I mumble holding my side.

“Apparently he didn’t miss you like you thought he had.” He answers. “The bullet grazed you pretty good and left a nice gash on your side. Doc stitched it up. He says the adrenaline pumping through you is what made you unaware of it all and probably why you blacked out in the vehicle on the way over here.” James explains to me as he moves over to sit beside me on the bed.

I sit there in silence. I am still trying to process all of the recent events. I see myself seeing Justin and James tied up, beaten and bloody. I see the evil smirk on Rich’s face. I see his cocky smile as he forces me to choose between them. Mostly though, I see the look on Justin’s face as he walks away, not wanting to see me ever again.

I shut my eyes tightly wanting the images to go away, but they will not. I made the choice and now I have to live with it. I lie back down and refuse to move. James moves closer and tries to comfort me as much as he can. What a softy he has become.

The remainder of the day, I choose to just lie in bed and stare at the wall. I have no desire to get up. I do not want to train in any way, take any phone calls (most of them from Tabbetha and Chase), go out and do anything. I do not even go out to talk to my men. I usually let them know how appreciated they are, especially after big events, but not today.

A couple of days pass and I still do not move. I get up to go to the bathroom, of course, and James brings me food and if he is lucky, I will eat a small bit of it. I do not have the energy or will to do anything. What the hell has happened to me?

JAMES

She’s a shell. I have not seen her so distant and so unresponsive since that fateful night in the alley. This boy has destroyed my Arianna. If only I could kill him. She refuses to move or acknowledge anything or anyone.

I leave the room to call her friends and dreading this the whole time. I use her office phone and hope they answer when they see this number. It rings a couple of times and is answered, “Arianna, are you okay? Are Justin and James okay? By that, I mean is Justin okay?” Tabbetha adds the end through a mumble.

“Thanks. That’s greatly appreciated,” I say as I roll my eyes.

Tabbetha demands to speak with Arianna, but obviously I do not let her. “I would let you, but your wonder boy that you are so worried about has left her in a state of nothing. She won’t respond to anything. We haven’t seen him either. By the way, you all were the last people we saw him with.” I inform her.

“Justin left and I assumed he would go see Arianna,” she says quietly.

“Obviously not.”

“Is she okay?” Tabbetha asks, extremely worried about her friend.

“She will be. She is bruised and cut up a bit, but it’s nothing she can’t handle. You’re boy leaving caused the most damage.” I answer her, showing my annoyance I have towards the boy.

We talk a little longer, surprisingly in a civil manner, and we hang up so I can go check on Arianna. I get back upstairs to see she still has not moved.

I kneel on the side she is facing. I reach up and push the hair out of her face. There are tear stains on her cheeks and her eyes are red from crying. She sniffles often, and it is practically killing me to see her like this.

“Please calm down over this. He clearly isn’t thinking straight. He’s not used to all of this direct contact with the ‘bad guys.’ He’ll be back. Just give him some time to think all of this through.” I try to soothe her as I stand up.

I move to sit on the edge of the bed and continue to rub her head and back – always calms and soothes her. I cannot believe I am trying to assure her of baby boy, but I know she is happy with him and that is what matter right now. If you tell anyone I said that, I’ll deny it then kill you.

“This is all my fault,” she says and quickly moves to wrap her arms tightly around my waist and sobs into my chest.

“No! You cannot blame yourself. Rich is or was a morbid bastard. You could not have stopped this.”

“Yes, I could have. Rich was my problem. I continuously pushed him and I had my chance to kill him and I didn’t. I could have pushed Justin away, but I didn’t. Rich wanted to hurt me, and he used Justin to do it. That’s not fair to him.” She is irrational.

“Rich was a problem in general that needed to be dealt with and now it has been. You didn’t push him anymore than he did you. You could have killed him, but you chose to save Jackson instead, who I believe is very grateful. Plus, no matter how hard you pushed, I believe Justin wouldn’t have gone anywhere. He’s attached to you and I understand him there. You’re quite irresistible. Don’t discredit him for that.” I tell her. Why am I defending him?!

This girl really will be the death of me. I go to say something else when she jumps up all of a sudden.

“I need my guns,” she declares as she starts to change her clothes and clean herself up.

“You can’t have them. Nobody is worth your life.” I tell her, standing up and following her around.

She starts laughing hard in return. “Don’t be stupid. I would never kill myself. I got plenty of people that’d be more than happy to do that for me.” She continues to laugh as she straps her guns on and looks over at me, who has a dumbfounded look on his face. “I’m going to go kill me somebody, wanna come?” She asks me with an evil grin.

This is my girl! She’s back!!

We quickly suit up and head out. We do not take any of our men with us. They have done enough for a while and this is for Arianna. She needs to blow off some steam and I am going to be there when she does.