The Fearless King (The Kings #2)(59)

“Consider it done.” He leaned forward and pressed a quick kiss to her lips. “I’ll text you when I have it. Good luck, Duchess.”

“Thanks.” She’d need all the luck she could get at this point. She grabbed her purse and opened the door. “Seriously, Frank—thanks. For everything.”

He leaned over so that he could see her better. “I’ll see you tonight, Duchess. Text when you’re leaving here and I’ll meet you at your place.”

By all rights, she should tell him to get the fuck out of there with that kind of talk, but the truth was that the thought of going back to her empty apartment with the events of the last week hanging over her head wasn’t a good one. If he was going to offer to stay over, she wasn’t going to tell him no. “I’d like that.” Journey shut the door before she could expose any more weaknesses than she already had.

She followed Bellamy’s directions to the waiting room outside the ICU. Journey loathed hospitals, from their dull color schemes to the faint smell of antiseptic cleaner that seemed to permeate every inch. And, underneath it all, suffering. She wasn’t sure if she believed in the supernatural, but if ghosts existed in any form, they haunted the walls of places like this, their energy affecting every single person who walked through the doors.

Both her brothers sat in the waiting room, and they looked up as she walked through the door. She tensed. “Elliott?”

Anderson grimaced. “Hasn’t seen fit to make an appearance.”

Thank fuck. Journey slung her purse onto the floor and took the seat between her brothers. “What happened?” Bellamy hadn’t conveyed more than the basics over the phone—Eliza was in a car crash and in serious condition, followed up by directions for when she arrived.

“Hit-and-run.” This from Bellamy. He dropped his head into his hands. “She was leaving Houston—going back to New York—and I tried to get her to stop.” He cursed. “I was on the phone with her when the accident happened.”

“Oh, Bellamy.” She started to reach for him but hesitated. They weren’t exactly a touchy-feely kind of family, and it might make it worse. Stop making excuses. Journey held her breath and gingerly rubbed her brother’s back. He shuddered, which was almost enough to make her snatch her hand back, but then he reached out and clasped her knee with a shaking hand.

She looked at Anderson. “How is she?”

“She got out of surgery right before you arrived.” He looked at his watch. “It took twice as long as it should have, and no one will tell us anything but that we need to wait for the surgeon. She’s alive. That’s all I know.”

“God,” she breathed, even as her mind raced. She’d known it was serious from Bellamy’s reaction, but if Eliza had been in surgery for hours…It was so much worse than she’d imagined.

Tension laced through her body as footsteps sounded in the hallway, approaching the waiting room. She reached out and touched Anderson’s shoulder. “Someone’s coming.”

No one relaxed as two uniformed officers stepped into the room. The men were cast from the same mold—fit and straight-backed, expressions wiped from their faces. The older one had silver coloring his temples, but otherwise they might have been related. The younger one took them in at a glance. “You’re Eliza King’s family?”

Journey glanced at her brothers in turn, but they just stared at the cops, as if their baby sister being in danger had broken something in them. She squeezed Anderson’s shoulder and kept her other hand on Bellamy’s back. “Yes, we’re her siblings.”

The cops exchanged a look, and the younger one took up a position just inside the door while the older one strode over and sank into the chair across from them. He leaned forward and braced his forearms on his thighs. “As I’m sure you’re aware by now, your sister was involved in a car accident late last night.”

Why are they telling us something we already know? Journey shook her head and tried to focus. “Did you find the other driver?”

A muscle jumped in his jaw, though his expression remained frustratingly bland. “It was a hit-and-run. The other car left the scene.”

Bellamy lifted his head at that. “You’ll have pulled the traffic cameras.”

Again, that twitch in his jaw. “There was nothing identifiable about the vehicle. It was a dark truck without plates, and the windows were tinted dark enough that the driver isn’t identifiable. We’re checking local repair shops, but I’m telling you right now that it’s not looking promising.”

Something isn’t right.

Bellamy practically growled. “Tinted windows and a missing plate don’t sound like an accident.”

“We have no evidence suggesting otherwise.”

She stared hard at the cop and then looked at his partner, taking in the way he kept his gaze pinned to the window in the waiting room—and the thin bead of sweat along his hairline.

“Last time I checked, a hit-and-run is a crime in the state of Texas,” she said. “There’s got to be something more you can do to catch whoever did this.”

The cop pulled a card out of his pocket. “If you have further questions, feel free to call my supervisor.”

This wasn’t how the police conducted investigations. Journey might not spend a lot of time up close and personal with the law, but even she knew that. A crime had been committed, and, as such, they should be investigating to the fullest extent of their abilities.