Total pages in book: 145
Estimated words: 138274 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 138274 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 691(@200wpm)___ 553(@250wpm)___ 461(@300wpm)
But he was also crushing the injured male beneath him.
Pitching himself off of Zsadist, Nate was breathing hard and bleeding badly, but adrenaline was a great thing, it really was.
“Holy… fuck,” the Brother wheezed. “That was some kinda timing.”
“Are you okay?”
“Yeah.”
No, not at all, Nate thought as he measured the male’s wounds.
The one in that arm was bleeding so badly, it had turned the white ground into a fucking cherry sno-cone.
As gunshots rang out, and his fucking truck—why couldn’t he have just owned a Kia, why?!—made wide swaths through the middle of the fighting, he knew if he was going to get Nalla’s father to safety, he had to move fast.
Shoving his arms under the Brother, he picked Zsadist up and started running across the field of combat. Dodging both friendly fire and lesser bullets, jumping over downed slayers—and staying out of the path of the monster truck that the love of his life insisted on weaponizing—Nate got Z into the cabin, over to the set of stairs, and down into the earth.
There was no time to lock things up.
He needed to get a tourniquet on that arm immediately. Putting the Brother on the bed, he turned away and grabbed his first aid kit from a shelf—
“Can I have my dagger back?”
Nate froze. Then looked over his shoulder. “I’m sorry, what?”
Zsadist’s half-mast eyes were yellow as he crooked his finger. “C’mere. No, don’t turn around, just lean back.”
As Nate did what he’d been told, there was a blaze of pain in his upper shoulder, and when he pivoted around again, the Brother had a black dagger in his palm.
“These things can’t be wasted. V gets cranky if you lose ’em.”
And then the male passed out.
“Fuck.” Nate ignored his own pain and started riffling through the white box with the red cross on the top. “Where is—got it.”
His hands were shaking, but he got the thing in place over the sleeve of the leather jacket because there was no time to strip the outerwear off: The red tide streaming out of the stab wound was like a garden hose running into a fucking flower bed.
As he cinched the tourniquet so tight it nearly amputated his own fingers, he knew it was a miracle the Brother was even still alive.
With shaking hands, he took out his phone and started making a call.
The answer was quick, thank Lassiter. “This is Manny—”
“It’s Nate on a burner. I’m here with Zsadist, out at my place. You need to get Bella here as soon as the fighting’s over. He’s lost a lot of blood.”
“Nate?”
“Yeah, it’s me.” He glanced over to the stairs and wished he’d closed them all the way down. “I’m going to give him synthetic units until she can get here, but let her know that she needs to be ready to come quick.”
“Okay, okay, all right. Good move—and I’ll send Jane out—”
“No, it’s too hot right now. And I’m not going to let him die. Tourniquet’s in place, just like he taught me.”
Hanging up, he reached under the bed and pulled out a sealed plastic bag of the synthetic stuff. Puncturing the top, he pushed the self-pack straw into the container, and put the business end to the male’s pale lips.
“Wake up, Z. Drink. You gotta drink. You can’t die on me, I’m in love with your daughter, and even though you hate me, she needs you, now more than ever—”
The sense that someone had come down the steps brought his head up, and at first, what he saw made no sense.
“Evan?” he blurted.
CHAPTER FORTY-NINE
As soon as Evan bottomed out at the stairwell, he had the satisfaction of being right. Across the way, the enforcer he’d come for was putting a straw into the mouth of an enormous vampire who had a tourniquet on one arm and a puddle of blood underneath him on the bed.
And what do you know, he recognized the injured male. It was the one with the facial scar he’d first seen in that office building, who’d later tracked him the other night to Bathe.
And then the enforcer looked up and did a double take. “Evan?”
Evan could understand the surprise. He’d felt it, too, when he’d put everything together.
“You’re one of the enemy,” he said to the enforcer. “I never suspected. Then again, until now, I had no idea vampires and lessers were real.”
“What the fuck, Evan.” The vampire straightened slowly. “What happened to you?”
I don’t know, he answered to himself.
“I have to kill you.” He shook his head. “It’s just where we are, where you and I ended up. Kinda strange, huh.”
And funny, this was so much less climactic than he’d thought it would be.
Then again, maybe it was because this male had known him from before—and he was suddenly thinking about his mother, instead of killing his uncle.