I’m groggy as hell when I come to. I’m in a fog and it feels like there are a herd of elephants running in my head. I do my best to shake it off, however. I know Linda is here and I need to be alert.

The first thing I notice is I’m in the kitchen still… and I’m alone. The second thing I notice is that there is entirely too much noise going on in the dining room. The last thing I notice is that I’m bleeding.

I reach up to touch the side of my head and moan, because even that small movement hurts. When I pull my hand away there’s blood on my fingers. My blood. I shake my head slowly. I can’t give in to the pain. There’s a bitch in the front room I need to contain.

I can’t believe she just left me in here alone and not tied up. She probably thought she killed me the way she hit me with the bat. I guess I should send up a thanks to my guardian angel she didn’t. My thought is that putting my arms up must have lessened the blow. God knows my arms sure are sore.

I get up slowly—mostly because I don’t have a choice. I hold onto the counter to help pull myself up and once I do, I go light-headed and dizzy. If I give into the urge, I would sink back on the floor. The noise in the dining area is getting louder though and I don’t see the bat anywhere, so I know Linda is out there destroying my restaurant. That pisses me off, because so many of us have put in money and hard work. It’s not just me at this point. Black has insisted on naming the place Adelle’s but he hasn’t seen the tweak I made on the sign we’re unveiling in a few days.

That’s if there’s anything left to unveil…

I look around the room for a weapon of any kind—something to defend myself. There are knives, but I’m not sure Linda would respond to a weapon in the first place and in the second, I’m not sure I could stab anyone. There’s a gun in the safe upstairs that Black keeps, but I doubt I could bring myself to shoot another person, even Linda. I’m running out of options and time, so with a whispered, “What the hell,” I grab the largest knife in my kitchen and take off toward the dining room.

I wasn’t prepared. I really should have taken time to prepare myself. Black is right. Linda is crazy and we’re talking ‘One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest,’ crazy. Actually, since I’m on the Jack Nicholson theme, I think ‘The Shining,’ might fit better. She smashed a few things—like all of my table centerpieces—but, it looks like she dropped her bat in favor of some bright pink paint that she obviously brought with her.

Seriously! What is it with this woman and pink?

She’s currently spray painting the word whore all over my walls. Not the most original word, but at least Linda is consistent.

“You thought you could steal my man, my life. He would have come back to me! You whore!” she screams as she writes the word on the wall again… Shit! Right over that picture of the French countryside that I paid five hundred bucks for! Now, I could probably shoot her—too bad I don’t have time to go and get the gun.

“I followed you and made you pay! You even lost your damn hair and you couldn’t leave! I hate you!” she screams.

I sneak over—although, she’s so crazed with her spray painting I doubt she could hear me—to the baseball bat and grab it. I hide the knife on one of the booth’s chairs. I might not be able to use it, but I have no doubt she would against me if I give her the chance.

“Yo!” I yell out channeling my inner Dwayne Johnson, because I’m pretty sure if the Rock was here right now he could handle Linda pretty damn easily.”

“You whore!” she screams, coming at me with a still spraying, paint can.

Damn it! I didn’t think this through and Linda seriously needs another word to use. I duck, to avoid having my face painted. I’ve just gotten used to having blonde hair again and I have no urge whatsoever to go back to pink—at least hot pink.

I hold onto the bat and choke up on it like I’ve seen the big leaguers do. It’s not that easy and I’d like to think it’s because I’m keeping my head down, but it’s probably because I’m not that athletic. But, right before the screaming-banshee-ex-girlfriend-from-hell gets to me, I swing hard. It connects with a loud thud and she doubles over. A second later she falls to the ground and I think I’ve won. I should have known better.

“You whore! I warned you to stay away! You refused to listen! I thought once your precious father’s place burned to the ground and you lost all your stuff you’d leave, but you didn’t!” she screams and I feel sick to my stomach. “You ruined everything! Black would have eventually come back to me if you had just stayed away!” she yells and then she grabs a serving tray she apparently tried to destroy earlier and throws it at me. I move so that it misses me and my stomach protests. I’m dizzy and breaking out in a sweat, but I fight to keep focused. Realistically I figure I have a concussion and I hope that’s all. I don’t have time to give into it right now, though.

“He wouldn’t come back to you,” I tell her. “He hates you.”

“He loves me! He craves what only I can give him! That’s why he keeps coming back to me!”

Coming back to her? Maybe Black and I should talk more about Linda after all!

“You nearly destroyed him,” I tell her. “You took his dog from him!”

“That freaking dog! I hated the bastard. I drove him all the way to Oklahoma to a kill shelter and I laughed all the way home!” she laughs hysterically now and she tries to get up.

Yeah… I could shoot her.

“It’s safer for you if you stay on the ground. That’s the only warning you’re going to get,” I tell her, huffing. It’s hard to catch my breath for some reason.

Linda ignores me, probably because she’s dumb as a bucket of rocks. So, I do the only thing I can. I swing the bat again and it hits much harder than before and this time against her knees. She goes down instantly. That skater chick—I forget her name—would be proud of me.

“You—”

“Whore,” I interrupt with a sigh. “I’ve heard you the first million times. If you’re lucky the state prison has courses you can enroll in to help your vocabulary, because you really need to broaden your horizons,” I huff out.

“Addie!” Black screams, opening the door all at once and so hard that it springs back against the outside of the building. With my luck the door will need to be replaced now, too.

“About time you got here, honey,” I tell him, trying to smile, but now with Black here and Linda curled up crying and holding her knees, I feel myself fading.

Black is running to me. I don’t know why. Maybe he can see that I’m about to go under. He catches me about the time my knees give out. At least this time when the blackness pulls me under, it’s Black’s face I see last. I like that better—even if he does look scared to death.