Page 30 of Redeemed
Someone holding a hypodermic needle that he’s jabbed into Trajan’s neck.
One long moment later, Trajan sags. Brodie catches him before he can hit the floor.
I sit back on my haunches, breathing hard. Connor comes over and kneels in front of me. He threads his fingers through my ruff and I swear there are tears in his eyes. “Thank you, David.”
I nod because that’s all I can do. When he stands, I shift. Connor and Brodie hoist Trajan onto the bed, and I supervise from my bare-assed perch on the floor.
“I would have texted you, but you got here too soon.” My voice holds onto the wolf’s growl.
“It’s okay,mo mhuirnin.If you hadn’t been here, things would have turned out a lot worse.”
Connor holds out his hand and I grasp it, letting him do most of the work involved with getting me to my feet. I’ve got bruises in places I didn’t know could bruise and there’s a patch on my shoulder where Trajan’s fingernails clawed me.
Trajan. I drop onto the edge of the bed, covering his cold hand with mine. “Someone stole the ward and they trashed the vampire room.”
“Damnú.”
Connor caresses my shoulder and I tilt my head so I can rub my cheek against his knuckles. Brodie’s got a black case open on the dresser. “Want me to give him another hit? I’m not sure how long that one will last.”
“Not yet,” Connor says. “Lemme see his room.”
He’s got his hand on the door to the vampire room when I bleat, “Connor, wait. There’s something in there, something he wouldn’t want us to see.”
Connor scowls and the flash of anger that washes over him makes me blink. Without another word, he heads into the vampire room.
A muttered curse tells me he’s found the photograph.
He comes through the door and heads straight for his laptop bag. He’s wearing all black, same as Brodie, and it accentuates the lines of his body.
And OMG did I really just have a lusty thought after shifting and fighting off my enraged vampire boyfriend? JFC, David Collins.
When Connor straightens, his expression is on the far side of grim, almost too angry. “We can assume from all this that Jacques knows where we’re staying.”
“Unless some rando decided to trash Tray’s room and take the one thing that gave him any peace.” Bitterness bleeds through my words.
Brodie picks up another syringe. “You sure?” he asks Connor.
“Nah, don’t worry about it.” Connor comes over and stands next to me. “You can take off. I’ve got it from here.”
Connor’s whiskey and leather scent comforts me, and so does the syringe Brodie leaves on the dresser. He gives Connor a semi-mocking salute, and then it’s just the two of us.
Well, the three of us if you count our unconscious boyfriend.
“Did you have any luck finding Jacques?”
“Yeah.” Connor puts his hands on my shoulders and starts to rub. When he finishes his story about the house in the hills over Malibu, I tell him about Delia Packard and the pact Trajan agreed to.
“Dia á sábháil. There’s no coming back from something like that.”
Trajan stirs, and I barely keep from flinching. “What are we going to do, Connor?”
“I don’t—”
“Let me go.” Trajan, his eyes bleary but human, struggles to prop himself up on his elbows. “Let me go,amore mio, before I hurt both of you.”
I leap up, ready to shift if I need to, every muscle in my body bitching to high hell over the idea. Connor reaches for Trajan but I block him, becauseno fucking wayare we going to invite catastrophe.
Trajan manages to sit and then, vampire quick, he’s standing. “I have to prepare myself for what Madame Packard has asked of me, and until then, it’s too dangerous for me to be around you. Please.” He closes his eyes, grimacing like he’s fighting down the worst pain. “Please let me go.”
