Liar (Madison Kate #2)(44)

I could be jumping to conclusions, but worry churned my stomach and I hurried down the hallway to his room. I knocked softly, but when he didn't answer, I tried the handle. Sure, he could be downstairs with Kody and Archer, but it was worth checking his room first... right?

Right.

I tentatively pushed his door open and frowned at the gloomy darkness inside. Was he already asleep? I guessed it was possible...

"Steele?" I whispered, feeling like a total creeper and already second-guessing myself. "Are you asleep?"

Obviously, the second I said that I did a mental facepalm. If he were asleep... he couldn't exactly reply "yes," now, could he?

I was about to creep out again and go look for him downstairs, but a movement in his bed startled me.

"Steele," I hissed, leaving his door open for light as I padded across his plush gray carpet to the bed. I didn't want to wake him up, but my gut told me something was wrong. I reached out a hand to touch his shoulder, then hissed a gasp when my fingers touched bandages.

He shifted in his sleep, and I bit my lip to keep from waking him up. But what the fuck had happened?

Covering my own mouth so as not to make a sound, I hurried back out of his room and along to Kody's. It was empty. So was Archer's. But I had a fair idea where I might find them both.

I ran so fast down to the gym I almost tripped on the stairs, but somehow I made it there without breaking my neck. Sure enough, they were in the gym wearing nothing but small shorts and fingerless MMA gloves and... wow. The mental image of Kody and Archer grappling on the padded gym floor while sweaty and panting was definitely getting filed in my spank bank. I didn't care how much of an asshole Archer was to me, he and Kody were goddamn walking orgasms.

"Hey," I said sharply, grabbing their attention and—hopefully—dragging mine away from the way they were all twisted up like a sexy pretzel. "What happened to Steele?"

Kody looked over at me, but Archer just used that distraction to his advantage. He flipped Kody over, twisting his huge, tattoo-covered body around, snaring Kody's arm and bending it up the length of his own body, hyperextending the joints.

I winced and tried really, really hard not to notice how Kody's shoulder was all squashed up in Archer's crotch. Fucking hell, I needed to get laid. Again.

"Ah, you fuck!" Kody yelled, but didn't tap out. Archer just grinned and leaned back further, to the point I thought for sure Kody's arm would break.

"Tap out, bro," Archer taunted him. "Madison Kate already knows you've lost this round."

I rolled my eyes but folded my arms under my breasts and glared.

"Someone answer my fucking question," I snapped at them both, ignoring their stupid pissing contest. "Why the hell has Steele got bandages all over him?"

Kody groaned in pain and finally tapped out. Archer released him, and the two of them rolled away from one another on the padded blue mats while Kody rubbed his shoulder.

"He's fine," Archer told me with one brow cocked. "He just needed a few painkillers, and they always knock him right the fuck out."

Fury and fear were building inside me to the point of painful, and my nails bit deeply into my palms. "Painkillers for what?" I demanded through clenched teeth.

Archer just stared back at me like he wasn't going to tell me simply to piss me off.

Thankfully, Kody had a few more brain cells to rub together and rolled to his feet.

"He just caught a bit of gravel rash," he told me, casual as all fuck. "It's really not much worse than a bad graze but needs bandaging and rest so he can heal without it scarring."

I blinked at him. "Bad grazes don't fucking scar, Kodiak!"

He grimaced. "Really bad ones do."

Archer scoffed. "Steele's fine, Princess. Quit your fretting. Besides, don't chicks dig scars or some shit?"

"Probably not that many scars, dude," Kody muttered under his breath, then turned back to me. "Look, he just didn't want to worry you until after our doc had cleaned it all up and bandaged his arm. But then we might have slipped a couple of sedatives into his scotch, and he passed out before he could come and explain to you himself."

I needed to blink a couple more times in sheer disbelief. "You... what the hell were you thinking? You don't mix sedatives with alcohol! Kody, what the fuck? You could have killed him!"

Furious and stunned at their stupidity, I threw my hands up and stalked out of the gym.

"Babe, wait up." Kody chased after me, catching my arm with one of his gloved hands. "It's not as bad as it sounds. Trust me. We would never put Steele in danger deliberately; he's more than a brother to both of us."

"He's right," Archer drawled, leaning one of his heavily muscled shoulders on the doorframe. "We only take risks with high-speed car chases and shootouts. Drugs and alcohol are strictly under doctors orders." His voice was heavy with sarcasm and his glare accusing.

Mother fucker. He blamed me for whatever had happened to Steele, no question in my mind.

"What happened this morning?" I asked, my voice catching on my own turbulent emotions. "You clearly found the guy." Otherwise how did he get my knife back?

Archer unstrapped his gloves, tossed them behind him into the gym, then ran a hand over his long, dark stubble. "We found him. And his backup."