"If you apologize one more time, I swear that I will kick you the hell out of this gang." Julius stood over me as Carmen fussed over me. I had to bite my tongue to keep from automatically apologizing once again. I had fully expected to be screamed at, maybe even hit when I had informed Julius of what had happened. He had taken in my disheveled appearance and not to mention smell and lead me to Carmen. She had checked me over and was currently shining a light in my eyes.

"She has a concussion but otherwise she's fine."

"You still dating Troy?" His question seemed a little random but I nodded anyhow. "I'll have one of the crew run you over to his place for the day, he'll keep an eye on you."

"But what about Johnny?"

"Don't worry about it. They ain't going to kill Gat, they would have wasted you both if that was the case. No, they going to turn him over to the police, it would hit us harder to have him locked up. Show everyone that the Vice Kings have power we don't." He clapped me on the shoulder, his nose wrinkling as the smell of rancid food floated up.

"I'll just go home. I don't need a babysitter."

"Yes you do, you'll need to be watched for the next few hours." Carmen interjected as she stared me down.

"Wouldn't Troy be more useful finding Johnny than taking care of me?"

"Playa, stop questioning me and do as you're told."

XXX

"Do as I'm told." I mocked Julius words as I banged on Troy's door with a vengeance. "What am I a fucking child?" Julio snickered besides me. I almost ended up punching Troy when he opened the door.

"What the fuck time is it?" He had obviously still been in bed, his hair was rumpled and he was only wearing boxers as he stood there with rubbing his eyes.

"Too gods be damned early." I took in his place as I pushed past him. His place was in, if possible, a worse neighborhood than mine and was more rundown. His place was a tiny one story, there was burnt remains of what use to be a fence and weeds that were fighting for control over the patches of dirt out front. "Where's your bathroom?"

"Down the hall and to the right. What the hell are you doing here?"

"Ask Julio." I down right snarled as I found it. I almost backtracked right out of the bathroom, it looked like he hadn't bothered cleaning it for over a month. The shower was full of soap scum, the sink had remains from grooming and toothpaste everywhere and I wasn't going to look at the toilet for every long. I stripped off my clothes, trying to ignore all the cleaning that needed to be done as I waited for the water to turn hot. His tiny shower was packed full of almost empty shampoo and liquid soap bottles, it was like he always forgot to finish before opening a new one. It wasn't like they were expensive toiletries either, these were all bottom shelf at a dollar store items. I would have to bathe in a tub of lotion afterwards to restore my skin's natural balance after using any of his skin destroying products. I let the hot water wash over me, wincing when it hit my head. My head was still pounding like crazy but at least my vision had cleared up as long as I didn't turn my head too fast. The curtain was pulled back suddenly making me squeal, flashbacks to Psycho playing in my head but fortunately it was only Troy.

"Move over." He pushed me further under the spray as he joined me in the shower. He ran his hands over my body, checking the bruises and cuts from my escape, they didn't bother me that much, just were mostly annoying. His touch was no-nonsense as he soaped up a washcloth and took it to my skin. I slapped his hands away taking the cloth away from him, proceeding to wash my own damn self. I had a concussion not an enfeebled brain."How's your head? Any dizziness or nausea?"

"Not as much as earlier. Did Julio fill you in?"

"Yeah, you okay?" I shook my head. I felt so damn disappointed and useless.

"I hate being treated like a child. I'm just a little dizzy, I don't need a babysitter." At his smirk, I whacked him with the washcloth.

"You can blame Dex for that. You're not supposed to make any major decisions while under the influence of a concussion, he didn't listen and somehow the gang colors ended up purple instead of green."

"Good thing he did, you'd be the resident leprechaun." Images of the whole gang dressed in green bounced through my head, causing me to snicker.

"You'd look lovely in green."

"I look good in very color."

"Or nothing." He leaned into me, dropping a kiss on my lips before raising his head to the water. I gingerly washed my own hair as he scrubbed at his with enough force I was surprised he didn't accidently rip it out. My hair was nice to me today as it decided not to turn into a mass of tangles and force me to cry from the pain radiating from my head. "Come one, let's get you in bed." He cut the water and handed me what I hoped was a clean towel. The cleanest part in his place was actually his bedroom, easy since all he had in it was the bed and a broken alarm clock on a nightstand. "Just get some sleep, I was up late."

"Aren't I suppose to be woken up every hour?" I asked when he climbed in the bed next to me.

"That causes more harm than good."He pulled me into his arms, the beat of his heart lured me into comfort and sleep.

"Just another filthy whore, just like your mother." My father grabbed me by my hair as he dragged me out of the bed that had been occupied by myself and Troy who didn't seem to be bothered by the noise as I thumped on the floor. "Just like your good for nothing sister." He threw me against the door to my room, which gave way under my weight. "I raised you better than to mix with a dirty Mick." He hated the Irish, he hated his and mine red hair the mark of our ancestry plain to the world against his wishes.

"And you're just a drunkard. A good for nothing drunkard who wallows in the past like the coward he is!" I screamed at him. There was a gun in his hand and he glared at me as he leveled it at me.

"Yes and you can pay for it, whore." He put the gun in his mouth and I watched as the back of his head exploded, his ginger hair becoming a true red as bone and blood coated it; blood sprayed over my walls and filled my room. Waves of blood lapped at me as it continued to gush out, his body floating on top of the crimson flood. Blood poured into my mouth, sickly sweet copper coating everything as I drowned.

There was someone clinging to me when the dream broke and I panicked, expecting my father to come out of the darkness and repeat what just happened again. I pushed him away from me, hearing a thud as I scrambled out of the bed in an effort to make it to the bathroom before I vomited again. The bathroom wasn't where it should have been and had to make do with the kitchen sink instead. After a while, I felt a hand on the back of my neck rubbing out that spot of tension I always seemed to have there.

"What does je ne suis pas unepute mean?" He asked after my stomach had finally settled, his pronunciation was enough to make my stomach turn.

"Bad dreams that's all."

"You're going to make me have to carry around a French to English dictionary, aren't you?" He chuckled.

"Oui. I don't think I can sleep anymore today." I relaxed against him, letting him to his living room. "You are to never speak ill of my place again." I grumbled at the sight of it. Take-away containers were piled in one corner while in another was a pile of laundry; fortunately both piles were out of reach of the couch he sat me down on before walking away, giving me a chance to look place was pretty much bare of anything personal, there were no photos on the walls or really anything that looked like a personal touch. He didn't have a movie collection from what I could see. He didn't have a movie collection from what I could see. From what I understood he had been living here for years but it still looked like he really wasn't living here, like it was all temporary for him.

"I just sleep here, it's not really home." He had put on some sweatpants and handed me one of his jerseys. I pulled it on, the material plucking at my dry itchy skin.

"Where's home then?" He just shrugged as he sat down next to me. He pressed his palm to my forehead and then to my cheek.

"You're not running a fever. You still feeling nauseous?" I shook my head before pressing my head against his chest. He clicked on the TV tuning it to some sports game, a tactic that was sure to put me to bore me to death. I snuggled against him, running a hand over his stomach enjoying the feel of his muscles tensing under my fingers.

"Oh look they scored a goal."

"Wrong game."

"How many quarters does this have again?"

"Still the wrong game." He snickered.

"Gods this is boring as hell. Why do you even watch, even I know they're going to lose. They hadn't haven't want the series. Ever."

"They've won twice Angel." He stroked his hand through my hair pulling my face up so he could stare at my eyes for a moment. I knew he was checking to see how my pupils were doing.

"I'm bored." I said when he went back to watching his game.

"If you have any other ideas, I'm willing to listen." I sat up and straddled his lap, pressing my body against his as I pressed kisses along his neck. "Have something in mind, do you?"

"I have several things in mind actually." His hands wandered up my legs to cup my ass, fingers dipping between my cheeks until he was teasing the barest edge of me. "Thing I like about you is how wet you get. Give it a few minutes and you'll be soaking my pants right through." His breath was hot in my ear, his teeth nipped at my lobe. "You know what I'd like to do? I'd like to push you down here and spread you. I'd bet you taste god and I'd lick you 'til I had my fill." My mind provided graphic details as he captured my lips, biting my lower lip until I had to pull away to catch my breath. "I'd make you work for it too sweetheart, I'd make you beg to come." He squeezed my ass. "Then I'd bend you over the back of this couch and I'd fuck you. I'd fuck you until neither of us could stand." He whispered the words against my lips before pushing me off his lap and taking a swig of his beer. "But I'm not because instead of asking like I wanted you to, you slapped me yesterday. If you had asked, I would have fucked you right then and there as hot as you looked in that dress." He glared at me. I pulled down the jersey as much as possible and sat down with a huff, glaring back with arms crossed over my chest to hide how hard my nipples were at the moment.

"Yeah well, I'm starting to think you need the power play bullshit to even get hard. You probably have functional problems."

"Don't try that game Angel." He said with a laugh.

"What game?"

"Agitating me until I do something. That's my job in the gang, you can't play me."

"Well, you're fucking perfect at it then. Ass."

"Coward." He lifted his arm and I cuddled back against him, ignoring his smile as I subjugated myself to death by baseball.