He stopped at the desk, leaned toward her and thundered, “Where’s Justice Lonesome?”
Her face registered shock and alarm, her hand inching toward her sidearm, but he didn’t give a fuck about that either.
He felt her and his eyes sliced that way.
She was racing out of the hall at the back wearing the most ridiculous pajamas he’d ever seen, top to bottom. Pants and camisole in a busy print that was mind-scrambling. She also had on a Carnal Police windbreaker. She had nothing on her feet. Her hair was down.
And the left side of her face was beat to shit and there were angry, ugly, purple bruises spanning her beautiful throat.
He saw it all but he checked it all as he moved her way and he didn’t stop even when he heard the officer say, “Deke, I gotta ask—”
He kept moving and Jussy kept moving so when they hit, they slammed into each other.
He curled his arms around her and she wrapped hers around him, pushing…no, fucking burrowing into his body.
He lifted a hand and cupped her head, pressing her good cheek to his chest when she shoved out a fractured, “Deke.”
“I’m here. Right here, baby.”
He felt her body start trembling.
Fuck, all he’d lived through, all he’d done, all he’d seen, all that had been done to him, his ma.
He’d made it through all that with delivering just a few deserved ass-kickings in the process.
Now he was going to fucking kill somebody.
“Deke.”
That was not Jussy.
He lifted his eyes from the top of her gorgeous hair to see Chace was there, not close, not far.
“What fucking happened?” he demanded to know.
He felt pressure on his hand as Jus’s head went back and he looked down at her when she started, “I—”
“Not you, gypsy,” he whispered gently and again lifted eyes to Chace Keaton, friend and Carnal detective. “You,” he bit out.
Chace glanced from Deke to Justice and back to Deke.
“I take it you two are close,” he remarked.
“Talk to me!” Deke boomed.
Jussy’s body jerked in his arms.
Deke instantly curled into her, saying into the top of her hair. “It’s good, baby. I’m good, Jussy. Just hang on.”
“You stay good, we’ll take this to a room,” Chace said.
Deke turned his attention to Chace and jerked up his chin.
“You good?” Chace asked.
“Good,” Deke grunted.
Chace took him and Jussy in another beat before he said, “Let’s go.”
And that was when Deke bent at the knees and gathered Jus in his arms like she was a wounded foal who was on her last two breaths.
She pressed into him when he had her up and she stayed pressed deep as he followed Chace into a hall and watched Chace throw open a door and stand outside it.
Deke prowled through, went right to a table in the middle of the room, turned his ass to it and hefted himself up on it.
He arranged Jussy in his lap so she was close and tight in his hold. She had her hands fisted in his tee, her good cheek to his chest and her eyes closed.
All he could see was the swollen, bruised, fucked-up side of her face.
He checked that too and looked to Keaton who’d entered the room behind them and closed the door.
“Now, talk to me,” he ordered, his voice low and shaking with the fury he was restraining.
Chace talked.
“Someone broke into her house. Justice said she heard glass shattering. He got to her, assaulted her, held a knife to her throat, strangled her and—”
Chace said no more when each word lashed through Deke with the understanding she’d endured them all and Deke bent his lips to the top of Jussy’s head and whispered, “Christ almighty. Christ almighty.” His arms got tight. “Christ almighty, baby.”
“Had emergency come ’round,” Chace stated, voice now lower, calming. “Checked her out. They reckon she’s good, physically. No lasting damage, Deke. She’s got a sprained wrist she needs to be careful of and keep wrapped for a week or so. But mostly she’ll just need rest and lots of aspirin and she’ll heal.”
Deke looked back to Keaton.
Keaton’s body went on visible alert and his mouth said, “Keep your shit, Deke.”
Deke kept his shit.
Barely.
“She give you a full statement?” he asked.
“We were finishing up. She needs to make some phone calls and I was about to call Krys or Lauren to come in and—”
“She’s gonna be with me.”
He felt Jussy’s head tip back and her eyes on the underside of his jaw but he didn’t take his from Keaton.
Chace gave him a long look and gave away nothing through it when he said, “Okay, then let’s finish this up ’cause we’ve had ice on her face and she needs rest but before that she needs to make some calls. This guy who did this to her was using her to send a message to someone else. Boys are gonna bring down her phone since it was her phone he used to send that message.” He paused and then went on warningly, “Now gonna say this and you need to keep keepin’ your shit, Deke.”
“I’m good, Keaton, just say it,” Deke bit out his lie, bracing for the worst.
Chace gave him another look before he nodded and said, “It was while he was strangling her that he made the call. Put the phone to her while he was choking her so they could hear. Threatened her and someone else. Boys got her phone. She gave us her password and we know he called a female friend of hers that’s had some trouble.”