No, no, no, no. This couldn't be happening. Not again. Not like this. The blood that covered Talia had my gorge rising as I tried to apply pressure to her unconscious body. They'd fired too early. Not everyone had been in position. We'd lost two men, two more were injured, and Talia was dying. Black anger slid over my mind. They should have listened to me. Should have waited. I told them not to go. I told them not to start. "Move, Fancy Pants." Someone shoved me to the side. I elbowed them back. They caught me in the face with the butt of their gun. "If you're not going to help her, move the fuck back," Roger said in his calm voice. "I'll take you down before I let her bleed out." There was no anger, no emotion. Just the simple statement of fact. I leaned forward, brushed him out of the way. "There's too much blood.""Then it's good Dr. House just arrived at the new location. Get your ass up, Fancy Pants." He knocked me out of the way again. Pulled Talia up and into
With everything going on around me, I was about to push to my feet and stumble after the man who'd run off with Talia. Smashing against walls, I tripped and slid down the halls in their wake. "Wait," I called out. I was pretty sure the knife had either nicked a lung or fractured a rib, because breathing was becoming more and more strenuous. Someone stepped out of a connecting hall. A gun in his hand. I sucked in a breath. "DOWN!" I screamed as loud as I could. The guy holding Talia dropped to his knees immediately. With the last of my strength, I gathered myself and launched myself between the shooter and Talia. I felt the bullet graze my temple as I fell against her rescuer. "You've got to get her out of here," I said as I felt him move under me. "I will." He pushed me off him. Turned and used my body as a tripod to steady his shot. Within moments, gunshots filled the space. "He's down. If you can get up, you can go with me," the man said. I nodded. He pu
"What?" I growled low as I stabbed at the keyboard again. "She made it to Jessa," Nik said in my ear. "She's lost a lot of blood, but Jessa thinks she should be fine."I blew out a breath, felt the band around my chest relax slightly. I didn't make it go away completely. Nothing would do that, but holding her in my arms. And I was fucking stuck in this stupid hellhole trying to read Cyrillic so I could give Nik direct access to the computer. I wasn't even in on the fun of questioning Karine. Or Svetlana, or whatever else she wanted to call herself. "Last line of code, FP. I promise," Nik said in my ear. I pushed everything else aside, focused on the problem at hand. If I could get Nik what she needed, then I'd be able to get out of here. Go smash some heads in. Well, maybe not smash them in. Turns out Interpol agents still adhere to the Geneva Convention over here. More's the pity. "YES! That's it," Nik crowed in my ear. "You can run along now. As long as no one shu
I blinked, couldn't see past my lashes. Groaning, I lifted my hand. Or tried to. Something was stabbing the back of my hand. Trying my left hand, I let out a soft sigh at getting it to move the way I wanted it to. I rubbed my eyes. Blinked some more. Finally. Low light brightened the space, but it wasn't familiar. I looked all around, tried to find something in the weirdness that was recognizable. There. In the far corner was a man I knew. "Ark," I said. My voice was so quiet, I wasn't sure it even made it out of my mouth. But he heard it. He jolted awake, grabbed his belly with a groan. "You're awake."I nodded. Probably more of a chin wiggle than anything else, but it worked. "Yeah." He bolted up from his chair, his arm cradled his belly. "Let me get the doctor. Hang on." He tapped the end of my bed as he raced by. Ripping the door open, he stuck his head out. "SHE'S AWAKE!"He pulled his head back in and made his way back to my side. "You've just come out of su
I stood watch at the monitors in my old room. Something was bothering me. Nik still hadn't been able to find some of the files that should have been on the system. I had no idea what files in particular she was looking for, but I was more than willing to help find them. "I'm at my terminal, Nik," I said over the phone. "Good. Now, open up a window and type this." She gave me an executable command. As soon as I hit enter, I watched the screens flicker and shake. Then they went to some kind of gray screen. I told her what had happened. "Yes! Okay, pull up a new window."Following her directions, I watched as the screens all came back up. But something was different. "Do you see it?" she asked. I nodded. "Out loud, Weber, I can't see you."I snorted. "Yes, Nikanya." I picked up the phone. "Let me route you in. You can guide me through."She sent me the next line of code so she could hook into the security system feeds in the estate. "You're golden.""I'm leaving
I sat on the hospital bed. Mentally whining at the knowledge that I'd given up a premium king size bed for a lumpy twin size. What the hell had I been thinking? Kill Barrikad. That's what I'd been thinking. That man was going to die by my hand. We just had to wait for him to show up. That fucker better show up. "Lay down, T. I need to get some blood from you, and you're practically vibrating," Jessa said again as she brought in the tray for the specimen collection. "How did you get privileges here?" I asked as I pulled my feet up and stretched out on the bed. She laughed. "Are you kidding me? This is an overworked urban hospital. They practically shoved me into a room for you. You came into a hospital with your own doctor. Why wouldn't they say yes?""Um, because laws and stuff." I pressed the button to bring the head of the bed up just a little. I hated lying flat when I was awake. Unless I was getting my world rocked. That was the single exception that I could think
I paced the small room again. The sun had set hours ago. This section of the hospital was quiet except for the soft bustling of the night shift nurses. The feeling in my belly told me we were about to meet face first with some danger. "Stop thinking so loud," Talia complained from her bed. "You're giving me a headache."I walked over to her side. Brushed my hands down her face. "I can give you some more meds. Jessa said the thallium treatment can make you nauseous."She shook her head. "I don't want anything else inside me that the goddess didn't put there."I snorted softly. She smiled, peeked up at me through her lashes. "Except you. I think she meant for you to be there.""Damn right she did, Hellcat." I leaned down, kissed her cheekbone. Even though her lips were still healing, the bruises fading from her face, her skin was so fucking soft. I felt like an addict. Like I had this need inside me to have as much of her against as much of me as possible at all times durin
I walked into the safe house under my own steam. It took about a week, but I was finally free of all restrictions except lifting. I had to wait for my abdominal wound to completely heal for that to be lifted. "Honeybunses, I'm home!" I crowed into the empty foyer of the house. The thunder of stampeding feet rushed towards me. Jessa got to me first. "What the hell, babe? We were supposed to come get you." She pulled me into her arms, looked me over with her medically trained eye. She smiled when she finished, looked me in the eye. "You're feeling much better."I nodded, pulled her in for a hug. "In large part thanks to you."She poo-pooed my words. "Queen, you've been kicking ass this whole time. I think Fate is scared of you right now."Foster pulled me from her arms and caught me up in his.I grabbed his head, smacked my healed lips to his. He made a sound low in his throat as he changed the angle. I wrapped my legs around his waist, met him thrust for thrust. "Ahe