Black Dagger Brotherhood 11 - Lover at Last (38 page)

coordination, he unleashed knuckles in rapid succesion, working that gut, turning the guy’s cirrhotic liver into a living, breathing punching bag—until the BF was doubled over, and listing heavily to

port.

Trez finished things off by kicking that moaning deadweight onto the ground.

Whereupon he outted his gun and shoved the muzzle right in tight to the guy’s carotid.

“You have one shot at walking away from this,” Trez said calmly. “And here’s how it’s going to

go. You’re going to get up and you’re not going to look at her or talk to her. You’re going to go out around to the front of the club and get the fuck into a cab and go the fuck home.”

Unlike Trez, the man didn’t have a well-developed and maintained cardio system—he was

breathing like a freight train. And yet, given the way his bloodshot, watery eyes were staring upward in alarm, he’d managed to focus in spite of the hypoxia, and had gotten the goddamn message.

“If you aggress on her in any way, if she’s got so much as a split end thanks to you, if any of her property is compromised by anyone?” Trez leaned in close. “I’m going to come at you from behind.

You won’t know I’m there, and you won’t live through what I’m going to do to you. I
promise
you this.”

Yup, Shadows had special ways of disposing of their enemies, and though he preferred low-fat

meat like chicken or fish, he was willing to make exceptions.

The thing was, in both his personal and his professional lives, he’d seen how domestic violence

escalated. In a lot of cases, something big had to intervene in order to break the cycle—and what do you know? He fit that bill.

“Nod if you understand the terms.” When the nod came, he jabbed the weapon even harder into

that fleshy neck. “Now look into my eyes and know I speak the truth.”

As Trez stared down, he inserted a thought directly into that cerebral cortex, implanting it as

surely as if it were a microchip he’d installed in and among the curling lobes. Its trigger would be any kind of bright idea about the woman; its effect would be the absolute conviction that the man’s own death would be inevitable and quick if he followed through.

Best kind of cognitive behavioral therapy there was.

One hundred percent success rate.

Trez jumped off and gave the fatty a chance to be a good little boy. And yup, the SOB dragged

himself off the pavement, and then shook like a dog with his legs planted far apart and his loose shirt flapping around.

When he left, it was with a limp.

And that was when the sniffling registered.

Trez turned around. The woman was shivering in the cold, her look-at-me clothes offering no

barrier to the December night, her skin pale, her high apparently drained—as if his putting a forty to her boyfriend’s throat had been a sobering influence.

Her mascara was running down her face as she watched Prince Chow Hound’s departure.

Trez stared up at the sky and did the internal-argument thing.

In the end, he couldn’t leave her out here in the parking lot by herself—especially looking as

shaky as she was.

“Where do you live, baby girl?” Even he heard the exhaustion in his own voice. “Baby girl?”

The woman glanced his way, and instantly her expression changed. “I never had someone take up

for me like that before.”

Okay, now he wanted to put his head through a brick wall. And gee, there was one right next to

him.

“Lemme drive you home. Where do you live?”

As she closed in, Trez had to tell his feet to stay where they were—and sure enough, she

burrowed in tight against his body. “I love you.”

Trez squeezed his eyes shut.

“Come on,” he said, disengaging her and leading her to his car. “You’re going to be all right.”

THIRTY-FIVE

As Layla was led into the clinic, her heart was pounding and her legs were shaking.

Fortunately, Phury and Qhuinn had no problem supporting her weight.

However, her experience was completely different this time through—thanks to the

Primale’s presence. When the facility’s exterior entry panel slid aside, one of the nurses was

there to meet them, and they were immediately rushed back to a different part of the clinic from where she had been the night before.

As they were let into an examination room, Layla glanced around and hesitated. What…was this?

The walls were covered in pale silk, and paintings in gold frames hung at regular intervals. No

clinical examination table, such as the one she had been on the night before—here, there was a bed

that was covered with an elegant duvet and layered with stacks of fat pillows. And then, instead of a stainless-steel sink and plain white cabinets, a painted screen obscured one whole corner of the room

—behind which, she had to assume, the clinical tools of Havers’s trade were kept.

Unless their group had been sent to the physician’s personal quarters?

“He’ll be right with you,” the nurse said, smiling up at Phury and bowing. “May I get you

anything? Coffee or tea?”

“Just the doctor,” the Primale answered.

“Right away, Your Excellency.”

She bowed again and rushed off.

“Let’s get you up on this, okay?” Phury said over by the bed.

Layla shook her head. “Are you sure we’re in the right place?”

“Yup.” The Primale came and helped her walk across the room. “This is one of their VIP suites.”

Layla looked over her shoulder. Qhuinn had settled into the corner opposite the screen, his black-

clad body like a shadow thrown by a menace. He stayed preternaturally still, his eyes focused on the floor, his breathing steady, his hands behind his back. Yet he was not at ease. No, he appeared ready and able to kill, and for a moment, a spear of fear went through her. She had never been frightened of him before, but then again, she’d never seen him in such a potentially aggressive state.

But at least the banked violence didn’t seem directed toward her, or even the Primale. Certainly

not at Doc Jane as the female sat down in a silk-covered chair.

“Come on,” Phury said gently. “Up you go.”

Layla tried to lift herself, but the mattress was too far off the floor and her upper body was as

weak as her legs.

“I’ve got you.” Phury carefully slipped his arms around her back and ran them under her knees;

then he lifted with care. “Here we go.”

Settling on the bed, she grunted, a sharp cramp gripping her pelvic area. As every eye in the room

locked on her, she tried to cover her grimace up with a smile. No succeeding there: although the

bleeding remained steady, the waves of pain were intensifying, the duration of their grip growing

longer, the spaces between them getting shorter.

At this point, it was soon going to be one steady agony.

“I’m fine—”

The knock on the door cut her off. “May I come in?”

The mere sound of Havers’s voice was enough to make her want to bolt. “Oh, dearest Virgin

Scribe,” she said as she gathered her strength.

“Yeah,” Phury said darkly. “Enter—”

What happened next was so fast and furious, the only way of describing it was with a

colloquialism she had learned from Qhuinn.

All hell broke loose.

Havers opened the door, stepped inside—and Qhuinn attacked the doctor, springing forward from

that corner, leading with a dagger.

Layla shouted in alarm—but he didn’t kill the male.

He did, however, close that door with the physician’s body—or mayhap it was the male’s face.

And it was hard to know whether the clap that resounded was the portal meeting the jambs, or the

impact of the healer getting thrown against the panels. Probably a combination of both.

The terrifyingly sharp blade was pressed against a pale throat. “Guess what you’re going to do

first, asshole?” Qhuinn growled. “You’re going to apologize for treating her like a goddamn

incubator.”

Qhuinn yanked the male around. Havers’s tortoiseshell glasses were shattered, one lens

spiderwebbed with cracks, the earpiece on the other side sticking out at a wonky angle.

Layla shot a look at Phury. The Primale didn’t seem particularly bothered: He just crossed his

arms over his huge chest and leaned back against the wall beside her, evidently completely at ease

with this playing out as it did. Over in the chair across the way, Doc Jane was the same, her forest green stare calm as she regarded the drama.

“Look her in the eye,” Qhuinn spat, “and apologize.”

When the fighter jangled the healer as if Havers were naught but a rag doll, some jumble of words

came out of the doctor.

Shoot. Layla supposed she should be a lady and not enjoy this, but there was satisfaction to be had at the vengeance.

Sadness, too, however, because it should never have come to this.

“Do you accept his apology,” Qhuinn demanded in an evil tone. “Or would you like him to

grovel? I’m perfectly fucking happy to turn him into a rug at your feet.”

“That was sufficient. Thank you.”

“Now you’re going to tell her”—Qhuinn pulled that shake move again, Havers’s arms flopping in

their sockets, his loose white coat waving like a flag—“and
only
her, what the fuck is going on with her body.”

“I need…the chart—”

Qhuinn bared his fangs and put them right against Havers’s ear—as if he were considering biting

the thing off. “Bullshit. And if you are telling the truth? That lapse of memory is going to cause you to lose your life. Right now.”

Havers was already pale, but that made him go completely white.

“Start talking, Doctor. And if the Primale, who you’re so fucking impressed by, would be kind

enough to tell me if you look away from her, that would be great.”

“My pleasure,” Phury said.

“I’m not hearing anything, Doc. And I’m really not a patient guy.”

“You are…” From behind those broken glasses, the male’s eyes met her own. “Your young is…”

She almost wished Qhuinn would stop forcing the contact. This was hard enough to hear without

having to face the doctor who’d treated her so badly.

Then again, Havers was the one who had to look, not her.

Qhuinn’s eyes were what she stared into as Havers said, “You’re losing the pregnancy.”

Things got wavy at that point, which she took to mean she had teared up. She couldn’t feel

anything, though. It was as if her soul had been flushed out of her body, everything that had animated her and connected her to the world gone as if it had never been.

Qhuinn showed no reaction at all. He didn’t blink. Didn’t alter his stance or his dagger hand.

“Is there anything that can be done medically?” Doc Jane asked.

Havers went to shake his head, but froze as the sharp point of the knife cut into the skin of his

neck. As blood leaked out and ran into the starched collar of his formal shirt, the red matched his bow tie.

“Nothing of which I am aware,” the physician said roughly. “Not on the earth, at any rate.”

“Tell her it’s not her fault,” Qhuinn demanded. “Tell her she did nothing wrong.”

Layla closed her eyes. “Assuming that’s true—”

“In humans that’s usually the case, provided there’s no trauma,” Doc Jane interjected.

“Tell her,” Qhuinn snapped, his arm starting to vibrate ever so slightly, as if he were a heartbeat away from dispatching his own violence.

“’Tis true,” Havers croaked.

Layla looked at the doctor, searching out the stare behind the ruined glasses. “Nothing?”

Havers spoke quickly. “The incidence of spontaneous miscarriage is presented in approximately

one in three pregnancies. I believe, as with humans, it is caused by a self-regulation system that

ensures defects of various kinds are not carried to term.”

“But I am definitely pregnant,” she said in a hollow tone.

“Yes. Your blood tests proved that.”

“Is there any risk to her health,” Qhuinn asked, “as this continues?”

“Are you her
whard
?” Havers blurted.

Phury interjected. “He’s the father of her child. So you treat him with the same respect you would

me.”

That had the physician’s eyes bulging, those brows surfacing above the busted tortoiseshell

frames. And it was funny; that was when Qhuinn showed a modicum of reaction—just a flicker in his

face before the fierce features resettled into aggression.

“Answer me,” Qhuinn snapped. “Is she in any danger?”

“I-I—” Havers swallowed hard. “There are no guarantees in medicine. Generally speaking, I

would say no—she is healthy on all other accounts, and the miscarriage appears to be following the

generic course. Further…”

As the doctor continued to speak, his educated, refined tone so much more uneven than it had been

the night before, Layla checked out.

Everything receded, her hearing disappearing, along with any sense of the temperature in the

room, the bed beneath her, the other bodies standing around. The only thing she saw was Qhuinn’s

mismatched eyes.

Her sole thought as he held that knife against the other male’s throat?

Even though they were not in love, he was exactly what she would have wanted as a father for her

young. Ever since she had made the decision to participate in the real world, she had learned how

rough life was, how others could conspire against you—and how sometimes principled force was all