Page 174 of This Blood that Bonds Us
“Not so strong now, huh, Calem?”
I tried to dodge but even with the blood loss, they were too fast. Zach shoved me out of the way to take every hit and keep them from me. Any attempt to move ended the same way.
Sirius got Zach by the neck and tore a chunk of his shoulder out with his teeth. It was agonizing watching him wither from Sirius’s grasp, but Sirius had lost a lot of blood and the use of an arm—it wasn’t enough alone.
Sirius charged again while Henderson came up behind. Zach didn’t see it while all his attention was on me. He would not dodge both.
It was kinda like the movies. My body moved without thinking.
“No!” I fell in front of him, and excruciating pain tore through my chest. A sickening wet tearing noise filled my ears. When he pulled his arm away, there was a hole clean through my chest and shoulder.
“What the fuck did you just do?” Zach’s eyes went wide, then completely dark.
I always said I wanted to be there when my brother went off like a nuclear bomb, but not like this. As I crumbled to the ground in a pool of my own blood, Zach held Henderson down before crushing his head with his foot. There wasn’t a lot of fun about any of it. He wasn’t ever going to stop. I wondered what would have made it more fun. Less blood? Less death?
Sirius tried to retreat.
“Stop him!” Zach snarled.
Luke’s head snapped up. His large frame towered over Sirius, who was barely on his feet.
“Times up,” Luke said, lunging. He won the brief struggle, snapping his neck and ripping it from his body.Good riddance.
Zach was drenched when he was finished with his rampage, and my limbs were heavy when he pulled me to his lap.
“Come on. I’m going to get you blood.” His voice broke, and his eyes, once dark, were back to the brown I knew.
“No, you gotta stay. You have to finish this. You gotta make sure She’s dead.”
“I can’t, Pres.”
“Why?”
“Because it doesn’t matter! None of this fucking matters if you’re dead. And Aaron . . . I can’t.”
“You’re such an idiot.”
“What?”
“You’re just as important as I am.” It was so obvious, but he still didn’t get it.
“Stop talking, you’re making it worse.” He worked to patch my wound with his shirt, but my blood was everywhere. It clung to my shirt, and now I was cold too.
The room blurred, and I remembered I was close to Aaron. I reached for him. Maybe I couldn’t save him, but at least we’d die together. That wasn’tsobad.
“No. Fuck. No.”
“It’s true, dude. Sorry I had to die for you to see it.”
“Fuck you,” Zach said with a choked sob.
I smiled for what had to be the first real smile in months. “I love you too.”
I did it. I helped.I smiled at the thought, then the world went dark.
Seventy-Eight
Kimberly
