Page 148 of A Storm in Every Heart
KASTIAN, PRESENT
“He’s in here!”A distant female voice shouts.“Quickly, before someone sees us!”
There’s pounding footsteps, the creak of a door, and then a man swears.“Fuck! Kas? Kas, can you hear me?”
I hear the question, but it slips through my brain like water over sand.
“We're too late!”the woman hisses.
“No, we’re not,”the man replies.“He’s still breathing. Kas, come on, wake up.”
“I’m sorry, mate,”chimes in another man.“If he’s not dead yet, he’s most of the way there. I don’t think?—”
“Don’t you fucking finish that thought,”the first man snaps.His voice is more familiar than the others, but I can’t place it.
My sluggish brain struggles and fails to give meaning to all the yelling; to connect names to these vaguely familiar voices. I want to open my eyes, but I can’t. I’m trapped in some strangeplace between sleeping and waking; between life and death. It feels as if a thousand tons of water is pressing down on me, and I’m not sure if I’m drowning or burning.
“What the fuck did they do to him?”the familiar man asks.
“Not they,he. My father did this,”the woman says grimly.
Her father did this?…who?
And then, it comes back to me. All at once, I remember where I am—whoI am—and the realization causes an avalanche of emotions.
I’m overjoyed and relieved that I now recognize the voices around me. Lyra is back, and she brought Jett with her. The other man must be Connell.
At the same time, all the pain in my body returns at once. It’s as if it was suppressed while I was floating half out of my mind, but now it’s returned with a vengeance.
I don’t care—I can tolerate it for just a bit longer now that help has arrived.
“If Kastian isn’t dead yet, he’s heavily sedated,” Lyra says. “The problem is that those drugs build up, and after a while he’ll be too paralyzed to breathe.”
“You say that like you’ve seen this before,” Jett says dangerously.
“I have,” Lyra replies flatly.
I immediately try to take a deep breath and discover that Lyra is right. I can’t move an inch, not just because of the restraints on my arms and legs, but it’s as if my muscles have fused together. I feel my shallow breathing beneath a chest that refuses to rise, and a fresh wave of panic grips me.
“Someone needs to tell Odessa,” Lyra says.
“Are you out of your mind? I’m not telling Dessa anything until there’s absolutely no choice left.”
If I could, I would shout in agreement. They can’t tell Odessa that I’m dying, because I’m not. I won’t. I’m going to get off this table and go find her.
“We’re there, mate—thereisno choice left,” Connell says grimly. “I’m telling you, he’s bloody?—”
“What the fuck did I just say?” Jett barks. “Do not finish that sentence!”
“Stop yelling,” the woman says. “Odessa thinks she’s marrying my father so he’ll set Kastian free, but if he’s already dead, someone needs to stop her.”
A lead weight lands on my already strangled chest. She’s going through with the wedding willingly? For me?
I both love and hate her for that, and I can’t decide which emotion is stronger.
“Go,” Jett says. “We’ll stay here and wake him up.”
Lyra mumbles something I can’t catch, but I hear the door close and assume she's left. A hand lands on my shoulder, and someone leans over me. “Fucking hell,” Jett breathes. “Pull that damn knife out of his arm.”
