The Game Plan (Neighbor from Hell #5)(16)

“Oh, well, ummmm, alright then. Just, umm, don’t make a habit out of this,” his uncle said, stumbling over his words and sounding relieved instead of pissed, which only confirmed his suspicion that his family was still terrified that something bad was going to happen to him.

“I won’t,” he promised, because if there was one thing that he knew for certain, it was that he would never have the chance to hold a woman like Tinkerbelle in his arms again.

*-*-*-*

“This is not f*cking happening,” Danny said, grabbing the pillow off his head and throwing it against the wall as the pounding on his apartment door continued. He looked at his alarm clock and muttered a dark curse.

Only an hour had passed since he’d called his uncle. He’d thought he’d have more time before he was forced to deal with one of his well-meaning relatives. Apparently he’d underestimated their level of concern as well as his ability to bullshit his uncle. That belief was confirmed less than thirty seconds later when the pounding suddenly stopped. He didn’t bother rolling out of bed. There was no point.

“You lying bastard,” Uncle Jared muttered, sighing heavily as he stepped in the room and leaned back against the wall, his worried gaze moving over him, pausing on his shoulder and hand before his uncle shot him a questioning look.

Danny returned his sigh as he threw his arm across his eyes. “What gave me away?”

“The fact that you’re a recluse,” the annoyingly familiar voice announced, forcing Danny to move his arm and open his eyes in time to see his brother walk into the room.

His gaze shifted from Aidan’s face, noting the poorly concealed concern to the black backpack thrown over his shoulder and muttered a curse. “I don’t need your help, Aidan,” he snapped, wishing that he’d just sucked it up like all those other times and went to work to avoid bullshit like this.

“You want to tell me what happened to that shoulder and your hand?” Aidan said, sitting on the bed next to him as he placed his bag carefully on the floor by his feet.

“Not really, no,” Danny said, grinding his teeth against the sharp pain as his brother reached over and gently traced his fingers around the grotesque hive marring his shoulder and part of his upper arm.

After a minute of probing, Aidan sighed heavily and reached for his bag. “Zoe’s cooking?”

He looked up in time to catch his uncle’s wince. Somewhat horrified that his brother was able to identify the source of the hive or whatever it was with just a look, he nodded mutely.

With a grumbled curse and a sigh, Aidan opened his bag and pulled out a small vile holding a shimmering gold liquid and a hypodermic needle. “Her cooking usually isn’t dangerous unless it’s been exposed to air for more than two hours. Then,” Aidan shrugged, gesturing towards Danny’s shoulder with a tilt of his chin, “this happens.”

“What exactly is ‘this’?” he asked, looking down at the hive-like thing covering his shoulder.

“It’s a cross between a bacterial infection and an allergic reaction,” Aidan absently explained as he carefully measured out the medicine. “We’ve tried to hit this from both sides, but we’ve found that it takes a combination of antihistamines, penicillin and a vaccination or two to kill it.”

He felt his brows arch as he asked, “Vaccinations?”

Aidan shook his head sadly as he cleaned a spot with alcohol just above the hive. “Trust me, you don’t want to know.”

No, he supposed he really didn’t.

“The good news is,” Aidan said, pausing as he injected the medicine into Danny’s shoulder, “that you should be immune to Zoe’s cooking now.”

“I wouldn’t chance it though,” his uncle said, sounding thoughtful.

“Neither would I,” Aidan murmured as he pulled the needle free. “But if it accidentally comes in contact with your skin again, your body should be able to fight the infection on its own the next time.”

Deciding that informing them that this time hadn’t been an accident would only bite him in the ass later, he opened his mouth to….to……he couldn’t remember what he’d meant to say when a loud yawn broke free and his eyelids suddenly felt like they weighed a hundred pounds.

“Did anyone else come in contact with the substance?” Aidan asked, as Danny struggled against the waves of exhaustion pulling him down.

“Tink…..Tinkerbelle……,” he managed to get out before everything slipped away, leaving him to dream about beautiful green eyes that would no doubt haunt him for the rest of his life.

*-*-*-*

“Who the hell is Tinkerbelle?” Aidan asked with a frown as he checked Danny’s pulse.

“My guess would be the cute little neighbor loving across the hall that he’s been tormenting for the past two months,” Jared said with a satisfied sigh and a grin as he pushed away from the wall.

Aidan shook his head with a good natured laugh as he stood and pulled the covers up, tucking his older brother in and reminding Jared of all those times he’d seen Danny look after his younger brothers and sister. Before Danny had run off to join the Marines he’d been a great big brother, kind and loyal, but he’d also been……

Conceited and arrogant.

He loved Danny, had always had a soft spot for the kid, but he’d never been blind to the kid’s faults. Things had always come easily to Danny, too easily, girls, grades, friends…life and it had led him to believe that it would always be that way. Danny had never had to work at anything in his life, never had to try. Things had come too easily to him, until that fateful night when he’d raided his father’s fridge and drank himself into oblivion.