Page 126 of Shattered Hearts

And not a moment too soon.

“Jesus.” Darren takes stock of the carnage formerly known as my right arm. “This is going to hurt.”

He gets me out of the restraints. Even freeing my mangled arm has my body wailing. I clamp my jaw shut to keep from making a sound.

From my core, a cooling, numbing sensation starts to bloom.

Damn, those pills work fast.

Riley and Darren help me out of the chair. My right arm hangs motionless and broken at my side, leaving me with only a working left arm and two sleepy legs with which to escape.

The cool bloom expands inside me. The same sensation unfurls in my brain, like ice cubes being dropped into tepid water. I already know the strength of this sensation will, in a matter of seconds, dull my suffering. As the potency of the pill spreads over me, I realize I might have taken a one too many and am probably about to be as high as a kite.

There’s a very good chance we’ll all die trying to escape this place. Being high on black market painkillers isn’t the worst way to go. Especially since I’m with my best friends in the world and the only woman on Planet Earth who’s ever loved and accepted me exactly for who I am.

Around me, Riley and the others stay on high alert. We emerge from my torture chamber into a narrow hallway that lets out into a long corridor on both ends. We all glance both ways.

Cian nods right, and we follow him, discreet, steady, and swift. Rory brings up the rear, gun pointing behind our group in case trouble runs up on us.

Everyone wears earpieces. Cian presses his fingers to his and, under his breath, says, “Approaching Alpha One.”

This is the moment I realize my friends brought more reinforcements than I thought. Just how big a rescue operation did they mount in the several hours I’ve been in De Luca captivity?

Questions backstroke through the lazy river of my mind. Fuck, these pills hit faster than snake venom.

“Come in, Alpha One.” Cian’s eyes squint with suspicion.

Something’s wrong. He whips a walkie-talkie off his belt and turns the volume up ever so slightly. Without warning, a familiar voice lurches from the speaker.

“Abort, Alpha One has been compromi—” The unmistakable trill of machine gunfire follows the unfinished sentence.

A short stillness falls over us. Cian’s expression darkens. “They got Declan.”

He spits a curse and gestures left. “Let’s go to Plan B.”

Knowing Cian, he probably memorized the entire layout of this building…

We round a corner into a long, wide hallway. Weightlessness suffuses through me, slightly impairing my balance. If not for Riley’s hand squeezing mine, I might float up to the ceiling like a balloon.

My broken, dangling right arm feels like a bag on my shoulder, not an appendage. Thoughts fracture and separate. This drug is a spoon stirring through the foam of my mind, mixing everything into swirls.

Riley’s hand steadies me.

The high doesn’t fully hit until the five of us are moving down the next dark corridor, navigating to a different exit.

“I love you guyyss. But just so you know, this is the worst game of hide-and-seek ever. Can’t we all just take a group nap?”

“Is it me, or do drugs make Finn funnier?” Darren peers around a corner, holding his gun upright.

“It’s not you.” Rory snickers as he and I stand back-to-back. “How many Excaliburs did you give him, Riley?”

“Three,” she whispers.

My head lolls in her direction. “Hi, wifey. I’m mad at you for coming, but I’m also not mad. You’re so pretty.”

Darren snorts. “Finn’s going to be funny until July.”

Rory whistles. “We need to get him out of here before he collapses.”

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