Black Dagger Brotherhood 11 - Lover at Last (151 page)

commission.” V’s eyes glowed. “And you two know why.”

Ah, so he’d spoken with his sister.

“She’s not going to be able to work her magic,” the Brother continued, “and we’re a million miles

from everywhere.”

“Bottom line,” Qhuinn said grimly.

V stared him right in the eye. “He’s going to die in the next couple of—”

“V!” Rhage barked. “Get over here!”

Down on the floor, Luchas’s battered body was drawing up into itself, his broken hands curling

into his palms, his knees cranking in tight, his spine curling toward the cabin’s ceiling.

Qhuinn jacked over and fell to his knees by his brother’s head. “Stay with me, Luchas. Come on,

fight it—”

Those gray eyes relocked on Qhuinn’s, and the agony in them was so shattering, Qhuinn was

barely aware of V rushing over and taking the glove off of his glowing hand.

“Qhuinn!” the Brother shouted, like maybe he’d said Qhuinn’s name a couple of times.

He didn’t look away from his brother. “What?”

“This could kill him, but maybe it’ll get his heart beating right. It’s a bad shot—but it’s the only one he’s got.”

In the split second before he replied, he felt an overwhelming need for his brother to come

through this some way, somehow. Even though he barely knew the guy, and had resented him for years

—and then been beaten by him when Luchas had joined that Honor Guard—he hadn’t realized until

they were gone how rudderless you were on the planet when there was no blood of yours walking the

earth with you.

Then again, that void was exactly what had spurred him on during Layla’s needing. And what had

made him reach for Blay instinctively.

Love ’em or hate ’em, by blood or by heart, family was a kind of oxygen.

Necessary for the living.

“Do it,” he said once more.

“Wait,” Blay cut in, whipping his belt off and giving it to Qhuinn. “For his mouth.”

Just one more reason to love the guy. Although it wasn’t like he needed yet another.

Qhuinn angled the strap into his brother’s open mouth and held it in place as he nodded to V.

“Stay with me, Luchas. Come on, now—stay with…”

Out of the corner of his eye, he tracked that bright white light closing in on his brother’s

sternum….

Luchas’s chest jerked high, his whole body spasming off the floorboards as a brilliant glow shot

through him, funneling down his arms and his legs, radiating up to his head. The sound he made was

inhuman, a guttural moan that went straight into Qhuinn’s marrow.

When V yanked back his hand, that glowing palm raising high, Luchas dropped like the

deadweight he was, his body bouncing, his limbs flapping.

He blinked rapidly, as if a stiff breeze were blowing into his face.

“Hit him again,” Qhuinn demanded. When V didn’t respond, he glared. “One more time.”

“This is fucking nuts,” Rhage muttered.

V measured the male for a moment. Then brought that deadly hand back into range. “Once more—

that’s all you get,” he said to Luchas.

“Damn straight,” Rhage cut in. “Any more and you could make a s’more out of the son of a bitch.”

The second shot was just as bad—that battered body contorting wildly, Luchas making that god-

awful sound before landing back down in a clatter of bones.

But he took a deep breath. A big, powerful, deep breath that expanded his rib cage.

Qhuinn felt like praying, and he guessed he did as he started chanting, “Come on, come on….”

The mangled hand, the one with the ring, stretched out and grabbed onto Qhuinn’s shirt. The hold

was weak, but Qhuinn leaned in.

“What,” he said. “Talk slow….”

That hand skipped over his jacket.

“Talk to me.”

His brother’s hand locked on the grip of one of his daggers. “Kill…me….”

Qhuinn’s eyes peeled wide.

Luchas’s voice was nothing like it had been, nothing but a hoarse whisper. “Kill…me…brother…

mine….”

SIXTY-TWO

“How you holding up?” Blay asked.

Standing on the porch of the cabin, Qhuinn breathed in and caught a hint of smoke on the air.

Blay had lit up again, and much as Qhuinn hated the habit, he didn’t blame the guy. Hell, if he were into that kind of thing, he’d have busted out the coffin nails, too.

He glanced over. Blay was staring at him patiently, clearly prepared to wait for a response to the

question even if it took what was left of the night.

Qhuinn checked his watch. One a.m.

How long was it going to take the rest of Brotherhood to get here? And was this evac plan they

were all rocking really going to work—

“I feel like I’m losing my fucking mind,” he replied.

“I’m with you.” Blay exhaled in the opposite direction. “I can’t believe that he’s…”

Qhuinn stared at the trees ahead of them. “I never asked you about that night.”

“No. And frankly, I don’t blame you.”

Behind them, in the cabin, Rhage, V, and John were with Luchas. Everyone had taken their jackets

off and wrapped them around the male in hopes of keeping him warm.

Standing in his muscle shirt and his weapons, Qhuinn didn’t feel the cold.

He cleared his throat. “Did you see him.”

Blay had been the one to go back to the mansion after the raids. Qhuinn simply hadn’t had the sac

to ID the bodies.

“Yes, I did.”

“Was he dead then?”

“As far as I knew, yes. He was…yeah, I didn’t think there was any chance he was alive.”

“You know, I never sold the house.”

“So I’d heard.”

Technically, as a disavowed member of the family, he had had no rights to the property. But there

had been so many killed that no one made any claims to the estate, and it had, according to the Old Laws, reverted to the king’s ownership—whereupon Wrath had promptly given it in fee simple to

Qhuinn.

Whatever the hell that meant.

“I didn’t know what to think when I was told they’d gotten slaughtered.” Qhuinn looked up to the

sky. The forecast was for more snow, so no stars were to be seen. “They hated me. I guess I hated

them. And then they were gone.”

Beside him, Blay went very still.

Qhuinn knew why and a sudden awkwardness had him shoving his hands into his pockets. Yes, he

absolutely despised talking about emotions and crap, but there was no keeping the shit down. Not out here. In private. With Blay.

Clearing his throat, he kept going. “I was relieved more than anything, to be honest. I can’t tell you what it was like growing up in that house. All those people looking at me like I was a walking, talking curse on them.” He shook his head. “I used to avoid them as much as possible, using the servants’

stairs, staying in that part of the house. But then the
doggen
threatened to quit. Actually, the biggest bene of my getting through the transition was that I could dematerialize out the window of my room.

Then none of them had to deal with me.”

Even when Blay cursed softly, Qhuinn still didn’t feel like shutting up. “And you know what the

real head fuck was? I saw that love was possible when my father looked at my brother. It would have been one thing if the bastard had just hated all of us—but he didn’t. And that just made me realize how locked out I was.” Qhuinn glanced over. Shuffled his shitkickers. “Why are you looking at me

like that.”

“Sorry. Yeah, sorry. You just…you’ve never talked about them. Ever.”

Qhuinn frowned and measured the sky again, picturing the twinkling lights of the stars even though

he couldn’t see them. “I wanted to. With you, that is. Not with anyone else.”

“Why didn’t you?” As if this was something the guy had wondered for a while.

In the silence that followed, Qhuinn sifted through memories he had never dwelled on, seeing

himself. Seeing his family. Seeing…Blay. “I loved going to your house. I can’t tell you what it meant to me—I remember the first time you invited me over. I was convinced your parents were going to

kick me out. I was ready for it. Hell, I dealt with that shit at my own house all the time, so why

wouldn’t complete strangers do the same? But your mom…” Qhuinn cleared his throat again. “Your

mom sat me down at your kitchen table and fed me.”

“She was mortified that she made you sick. Right afterward, you ran into the bathroom and threw

up for an hour.”

“I wasn’t throwing up in there.”

Blay’s head whipped around. “But you said—”

“I was crying.”

As Blay recoiled, Qhuinn shrugged. “Come on, what was I going to say. That I pussied out and

wept next to the sink on the floor? I ran the water so no one heard and flushed the toilet every once in a while.”

“I never knew.”

“That was the plan.” Qhuinn glanced over. “That was always the plan. I didn’t want you to know

how bad it was at my house, because I didn’t want you to feel sorry for me. I didn’t want you or your parents to feel like you had to take me in. I wanted you to be my friend—and you were. You always

have been.”

Blay looked away fast. Then rubbed his face with the hand he didn’t have the cigarette in.

“You guys were what got me through it,” Qhuinn heard himself say. “I lived for the night, because

I could go over to your house. It was the only thing that kept me going. You were the only thing,

actually. It was…you.”

As Blay’s eyes returned to his own, he had the sense the guy was searching for words.

And God help them both, if it hadn’t been for Saxton, Qhuinn would have dropped the l-word

right then and there, even though the timing was stupid.

“You can, you know,” Blay said finally. “Talk to me.”

Qhuinn stamped his feet and bunched up his shoulders, stretching the muscles of his back. “Be

careful. I might take you up on that.”

“It would help.” As Qhuinn glanced over again, Blay was the one shaking his head. “I don’t know

what I’m saying.”

Bullshit, Qhuinn thought—

Without warning, V emerged from the cabin, lighting up a hand-rolled as he came out. As Qhuinn

fell silent, he wasn’t sure whether he was relieved the conversation had been forced to an end or not.

On the exhale, Vishous said, “I need to make sure you understand the consequences.”

Qhuinn nodded. “I already know what you’re going to say.”

Those diamond eyes locked on his own. “Well, let’s just open air it anyway, shall we? I don’t

sense any of the Omega in him, but if it comes out, or if I’ve missed something, I’m going to have to take care of him.”

Kill me, brother mine. Kill me.

“You do what you have to.”

“He can’t go into the mansion.”

“Agreed.”

V put out his nonlethal hand. “Swear to it.”

It felt strange to clasp the Brother’s palm and bind his word on the contact—because that was

what next of kin had to do in situations like this, and shit knew he hadn’t been next to anything for anybody ever: Even before the disavowal by his family, he’d have been the last person to vouch for

the bloodline.

Times had changed though, hadn’t they.

“One other thing.” V tapped the tip of the hand-rolled. “It’s going to be a long, hard recovery for him. And I’m not just talking about the physical shit. You need to prepare yourself.”

What, like they’d had a relationship before this or something? He might share some DNA with the

guy, but other than that, Luchas was a stranger. “I know.”

“Okay. Fair enough.”

In the distance, a pair of high-pitched whines cut through the darkness.

“Thank fuck,” Qhuinn bit out as he went back into the cabin.

Over in the corner, next to the drum that had been overturned, his brother was nothing but a pile of jackets, his twisted body covered by the makeshift blankets.

Qhuinn stalked across the floorboards, nodding to John Matthew and Rhage.

Kneeling down next to his brother, he felt like he was in a dreamscape, not reality. “Luchas?

Listen, here’s what’s going to happen. They’re going to take you out on a sled. You’re going to our clinic for treatment. Luchas? Can you hear me?”

As the pair of snowmobiles tore up to the cabin, Blay tracked their progress from the porch, watching their headlights get bigger and brighter, the pair of engines dimming into steady purrs as they reached their destination. Oh…this was good: Behind one of them, there was a covered sled, the kind of thing he’d seen on TV during the Olympics when some skier had crashed through the ropes and been evac’d

down a mountain.

Perfect.

Manny and Butch dismounted and jogged over.

“They’re right in there,” Blay said, getting out of the doctor’s way.

“Luchas? You with me?” he heard Qhuinn murmur.

Peering in, Blay wathced as Manny bent over Luchas’s body. Man, what a fucking night. And he’d

thought the air show from a couple of evenings ago had been full of drama?