Page 67 of Manix
None of that shit made sense to me. None of it.
He sucked in another deep breath, and for the first time an emotion entered his eyes. Anguish. “I should start again. My name is Courtland.” He paused for a moment. “I am your half-brother. I failed you, failed your mother. The children—your siblings—were penance for my failure.”
A high-pitched sound started quietly in my ear, and grew until it was all I could hear. “You’re my brother? I don’t understand. Are you…?”
It was Finlo who answered my question. “He is Manix.”
It was too fucking much. This whole thing was too fucking much. Blackness curtained my vision, and I heard Finlo’s yelp of alarm just before I went lights out.
44
Raiden
If I’d died and gone to hell, it was soft and smelled really good. I pried open an eye and reached out a hand, searching through the softness for something, anything. When I hit the warm hip of a person, my eyes shot open. Seven lay beside me and he looked rough. His pallor was grey, and his lips were dry. I’d have thought he was dead if it wasn’t for the rough wheeze of his breath.
I sat up, wincing as wounds on my chest pulled and tugged.
“Easy, Omega.” Finlo was there, pushing me back down onto the pillows gently. On the other side of Seven, I’d seen a sleeping Naja, and something in my chest loosened.
“Gatlin? Ellar and Luisa?”
Finlo’s big hand stroked over my head. “All perfectly fine. Ellar had Luisa halfway back to Maxton by the time we found him. He did such a great job.”
I let myself relax, letting go of the tension that had held my body in a vice. “Tell me the rest.”
I remembered too much of the night. The pain. The helplessness. But the last thing I remembered was Naja looking down at me, tears streaming down her cheeks.
Finlo hesitated. “You should rest, Rai. We can talk about this later.”
I shook my head. “Tell me.”
He sighed, and I could tell he wanted to be in bed with me, holding me in his arms but there wasn’t enough room. Instead, I felt a soft hand on my chest and realized that we’d woken Naja. I gripped her hand in mine, lifting it to my lips to kiss her knuckles.
Finlo let out another long sigh. “Turns out that Iago, Naja’s uncle, was already on the radar of some very powerful people. Gatlin and I muscled our way into their rescue attempt. You were unconscious and looked like you’d gone ten rounds with a fucking gorilla shifter. We brought you back here and you’ve been out for forty-eight hours. Doc said your vitals were all fine but your body needed time to heal.”
The strain on his face, the desperation in his tone, all tugged at my heart. I reached down and smoothed a hand over my swollen abdomen. “The cubs?”
Finally, Finlo smiled. “Healthy, happy, and wildly oblivious to the turmoil.”
A relieved breath whooshed out of me. We were all okay, or almost all okay. I turned on my side, facing Seven. He hadn’t woken up even with all the chatter.
“What happened to Sev?” I ran my hand over his chest, pausing when I hit the gauze covering half of his stomach.
Finlo stood, coming closer to kneel beside Naja, so he could put a hand on our Beta himself. “Got hit by an armor-piercing bullet. It took a long time for them to fish out all the pieces, and his body has shut down until it finishes healing. Doc says he’ll be fine and should wake up anytime now. I’ve never wanted to kiss the surly bastard as much as I do right now.”
So much anguish. So much pain.
I looked over at Finlo and Naja, their heads close together as they watched me intently. “It’s over, right?”
Naja nodded. “I put our tormentor in his grave myself. No one hurts what's mine.”
I blinked, looking at Finlo for confirmation. Naja had killed her uncle? My sweet, soft Naja? No—she was sweet and soft with us, but I’d seen the steel beneath the surface.
I wanted to ask more questions and fill in the gaps that were missing from my memory, but exhaustion was dragging me down again. My eyes fluttered closed but this time, my body could actually rest.
The next timeI woke up it was to the piercing blue of Seven’s eyes. “Hey,” he whispered, and I leaned forward, kissing him.
He kissed me back, his lips dry but soft now. I pressed myself against him, though it was hard given his gunshot wound and my stomach. Finally, he drew away, and I rested my head against his arm. “How are you doing?” His voice was always rough, like he’d smoked a cigar a day, and I loved it.
