Pack Dynamics (26 page)

The door opened, and Kincaid came in first, hands in the air, gibbering and terrified. Ostheim followed with Kincaid’s collar bunched in his fist and his handgun beside Kincaid’s ear, and the two thugs entered right behind him.

“You’re outgunned, Ostheim,” Alex said. His voice was remarkably calm. “Let Brandon go and we can talk about this.”

“I have nothing to say to you,” Ostheim snarled. “You were drunk and you killed my Idna.” His gaze flicked over to Ben. “And you killed Deiter. I’m glad you’re both here together. It will make it easier for me.” He dug his gun into Kincaid’s face. “Drop your weapons.”

“Yeah, no,” Ben said, bringing his M4 up. “I think you should drop yours.”

“I wasn’t drunk—” Alex started.

“Shut up, Jarrett, we all know how you are. I’ll kill him unless you drop your weapons
now
.”

“And then we’ll kill you.” Ben bared his fangs, letting the wolf off the chain a tiny bit. “I’d rather no one else died, but if you insist …”

“I slaughtered you like a steer once, boy.” Ostheim’s own teeth came out. “Don’t think I’ll be shy about finishing the job this time.”

“I’m not strapped to a table and down three pints of blood. You’ll find it a little tougher.” Ben still wasn’t a hundred percent better from the illness that Idna had considerately transmitted to him—not even close, in fact—but Ostheim didn’t need to know that. The M4 was a pretty good equalizer. And with Janni upstairs, the wolf was on high alert, snapping and snarling and wanting to just attack with no regard for the tactical situation. Ben sympathized but pushed it back.

“You will all drop your weapons and Lockwood and Jarrett will come with me.” Ostheim’s voice was ragged, his expression wild. “Do you think I won’t shoot this man right in the head?”

Ben stepped forward, his finger tightening on the trigger. “I’m pretty sure you would. Which is why this needs to stop, here and now.”

“Drop your weapons!”

“Not. Happening,” Alex said.

A gun roared, and for the barest second Ben didn’t know who’d fired. Then Kincaid fell bonelessly to the floor in a spray of blood and brains, and the room dissolved into chaos.

Ostheim should have known better than to mess with a pissed-off combat veteran with PTSD, Ben had time to think grimly, while he reacted on pure instinct, reverting to training. He squeezed the trigger twice, and Ostheim staggered backwards and fell with six rounds to his ten-ring. The two bodyguards dropped beside him, drilled through their foreheads once each and not by Ben’s gun.

Ben turned to see Alex on the floor, wheezing. “Shit, that hurt,” the billionaire managed. “You guys are good, I didn’t even get one off—watch it!”

Something hit Ben’s shoulder blade with punishing force, driving his breath from his lungs, ramming him to the floor. He rolled with it and spun, bringing the M4 back up and firing a burst that caught Ostheim in the gun arm and sent his pistol flying backwards out the still-open door. He shifted aim—

And Chambliss was standing next to Ostheim with the barrel of his H&K resting inside the man’s ear, smoke still curling out of the barrel. Ben hadn’t even seen him move. “Stop,” the butler said. “The killing stops, now.”

Ostheim grasped his bleeding arm with his good hand, swearing. The odor of burning flesh from the silver filled the air.

Ben stared, his hackles still raised. “I hit you in the chest six damn times. How…?”

“I’m wearing body armor under my clothes,” Ostheim snapped. “I am not an utter fool. Well played,” he said to Chambliss. “Not many people are confident enough in their marksmanship to go for head shots.”

Chambliss’s eyes were flat and hard. He gestured with his rifle at an office chair. “Up and into that seat. Twitch so much as a muscle wrong and the next one goes into your leg and possibly your femoral artery, which would be quite unpleasant for you.”

Ben set his rifle on a desk and helped Alex onto the couch. He bared a fang at Ostheim before collapsing beside their resident genius with a grunt of discomfort.

Alex pulled the vest off, then his shirt, and rubbed at the two round red spots to the left of his sternum. “I think I have a broken rib. If we hadn’t …” He was shaking from reaction.

Ben didn’t blame him. He felt pretty shaky himself. “Bastard shot me in the back.”

“Let me have a look,” Alex said. He waited for Ben to strip off his armor and the tee, and peered at his back. “Yep, that left a mark. Chambliss, remind me to give you a raise and a bonus for saving my life literally instead of just figuratively this time.”

“Yes, sir. Now, if you’re done commiserating over your bruises, could you tie this gentleman up, please?” He stepped back from a quick, professional frisking. His gun pointed, steady as a rock, at Ostheim’s grimacing and blood-spattered face.

Alex pulled his shirt back on and started rummaging through his desk drawers, muttering, “Zip-ties, zip-ties, where do I keep my zip-ties …”

Ben tugged his own shirt on and walked over to stand in front of the chair. He stared down at Ostheim, fists clenching and unclenching, vision sharp through eyes he was sure had turned amber as his fangs pushed through.

Ostheim sneered up at him. “Every time you thwart me, pup, you make me that much more determined.”

“You’re oh for three now in trying to kill me,” Ben said tightly. “Give it up.”

“All it takes is one success. One time when you’re not as alert as you should be. And I’ll be there, waiting.” Ostheim bared his teeth in an expression that wasn’t a smile. “I only hope your young lady is there as well.”

Ben couldn’t help it; he lunged forward with naked fangs, and was only halted by Chambliss’s firmer-than-expected hand on his arm. “You’re better than he is, Master Ben, and don’t forget it.”

“Am I?” Ben took a step back, breathing heavily through his nose. “He’d better hope so.”

“Mr. Ostheim, perhaps taunting someone who has a real reason to wish you dead and has you at his mercy isn’t a prudent course of action,” Chambliss pointed out. Ben had a moment to wonder if Alex’s butler might not be entirely human, although nothing in his scent gave him away. His calm in the face of this was unnatural.

“Put the gun away and let me out of this chair, and we’ll see how much mercy he has me at,” Ostheim growled.

“How about no?” Alex said, coming out of the third drawer he tried with a canister of multicolored zip-ties. He set to work securing their unwanted guest to the chair. Ostheim flexed his hands and winced when Alex tightened the plastic over his wounded arm. Alex didn’t appear very sympathetic.

Ben watched with some concern. “You sure about the zip ties? Werewolf strength …”

“Still requires leverage,” Alex said. “I haven’t left him much.” He stood back and crossed his arms. “Now I guess we get to decide what to do with him.” He hit the intercom button. “Miss Graham? How’re you doing up there?”

“We heard shots. Everyone okay?”

Alex eyed the three bodies. “Yes and no. Could use you down here.”

“On our way.”

Janni raced down first. She ran across the floor and hugged Ben fiercely, burying her face in his chest while he rubbed circles on her back.

“Piece of cake,” he managed.

“Liar.” She glared at Ostheim. “You bastard. I should tear your face off.”

Ben squeezed her. “Put your claws back, Hermia.”

“What
are
we going to do with him?” Janni asked, subsiding with ill grace.

“That’s a real good question, Alex,” Ben said. “Calling the police is even more problematic now, considering all the highly illegal firepower and the dead bodies. I’m not sure donations to the Widows and Orphans Fund can smooth something like this over.”

“We can’t let him go, either,” Janni pointed out, “since he wants at least two of us dead and probably won’t stop until we are.”

Ostheim didn’t contradict that statement, but sat in his chair, snarling, with his claws retracting and extending.

“I can’t keep him in my basement for the rest of his life,” Alex said.

“Not that I mind you all talking about me like I’m not in the room—” Ostheim started.

“Shut up,” said several people, and Ostheim snapped his mouth closed, fuming.

“I could make him disappear for you, sir,” Chambliss offered. “You wouldn’t have to know how.”

“What?” Alex’s eyebrows crawled up his forehead. “Chambliss, you’ve gone out on a limb enough for several lifetimes this week. It’s one thing to hide a body. It’s quite another to make one.”

“Nevertheless, sir,” Chambliss said, unruffled.

“What if we—” They never got to find out what Jeremy was going to suggest.

Ostheim roared and exploded from the chair, which shattered into several pieces, clanging off the walls and taking out a couple of computer monitors. The armrests dangled from his wrists by the zip ties. Moving with inhuman speed, he lunged over to the desk where Ben had set his M4, snatched the weapon up, and grabbed Janni by the hair close to her scalp in the same motion, bringing the muzzle to her face and leaving everyone frozen.

Petrified, unable to breathe, Ben put a hand up. “Don’t. Ostheim, please …”

Ostheim’s face contorted into a mask of hate. “I think it’s time for you to find out what it’s like to lose the woman you love, boy.” His finger tightened on the trigger.

Ben had nicknamed Janni “Hermia” for a reason, and she slammed her elbow into Ostheim’s gut at the same moment he fired Ben’s gun.
Fuck
, that was
Ben’s gun
, still set on a three-round burst. He hadn’t engaged the safety when he’d put it down, which was a newbie mistake; his Sarge would have reamed him a new one for that—

Janni fell to the floor, blood pouring from the side of her head.

A bullet burned through Ben’s shoulder as well, but he barely felt it. He didn’t even think. His wolf tore free, shredding the clothes from his back and leaping before he’d half shaken them off.

Ostheim swung the gun around, but Ben was already inside the arc of his arm. His fangs met in Ostheim’s throat, and he felt Ostheim try to Change under his jaws, too late, although front talons gashed at Ben’s shoulders and ribs. He wrenched his neck muscles and ripped and drove in again, riding Ostheim to the floor and worrying at his face like a beast possessed, which, a far distant part of his mind realized, he was.

A shoe went flying, and back claws slashed at Ben’s belly before he jerked aside so he wasn’t astride his enemy anymore. Ostheim rolled them, but Ben used the momentum to roll them again, knocking a desk over and pinning Ostheim against it, yanking his teeth loose, slashing. Ostheim’s struggles weakened rapidly, the blood gushing from his body in rivers, and he lay still a few moments later.

Ben didn’t care; he kept tearing at him long after it ceased being necessary or logical to do so, his heartbeat roaring in his ears so he wasn’t aware of anything but the taste of blood and the sound of rending flesh and his own madness.

Gradually, other noises impinged on his hearing. People shouting. Shouting his name. He looked up in time to see McFoucher toss the pole syringe to Hasgrave, who sprang at him, stabbed the needle into the meat of his hind leg, and pushed the button before pulling the pole free and leaping away.

Ben’s gaze jumped around the room. Pack. Pack. Dead enemy. Pack. Mate …

Dead mate.

His breath deserted his lungs at the sight of Janni bleeding on the floor, and then he drove in on Ostheim’s body again and ripped his arm off before more shouting got his attention.

Alex had grabbed his Beretta from the waistband of his jeans and pointed it shakily in Ben’s direction, while Megan held onto her boss’s free arm from behind him, where he’d obviously shoved her.
Alex is going to put me down
, Ben thought, and so he should, because
my mistake cost Janni her life
. She lay face down in a widening pool of red.

Ben tore his eyes away from her body, picked his M4 up in his jaws, and ran out the door into the darkness, with Megan’s shout of “Ben, wait!” fading into the night behind him.

O O O

Alex snatched Megan’s arm as she turned to follow him. “Where the hell do you think you’re going?” he demanded.

She looked at him like he was an idiot. He didn’t care. “After Ben,” she answered, as if it was obvious.

“Wait, what, whoa! No way. Are you crazy?” Alex was adamant. “He’s out of control and he took an automatic weapon with him, Megan. Who knows what he’d do under these circumstances?”

“Exactly.
She’s dead
. What do you think he’s going to do with the gun?”

His grip on her elbow tightened. “He might hurt you—”

She scoffed. “He won’t hurt me. But the longer you fight me about this, the longer he has to hurt
himself
.” She twitched her arm, but he refused to release it. “Dammit, Alex, if he dies because you stood here arguing with me instead of letting me go, I will by-god quit. We don’t have time for this.”

Alex searched her face and saw nothing but determination there. He’d never been able to stop Megan from doing the right thing, and now was the wrong time to start. He dropped his hand and his gaze. “Just … be careful. I’d—” He swallowed. “—hate to have to hunt for another PA.” And that was more stuff he wasn’t saying.

“I brought him back once. I can do it again.” And she sprinted out the door before anyone else could say anything.

Doc Allen looked up from where he knelt beside Janni. “She’s not dead.”

Alex stared. “What?”

“It’s a graze. A serious one, but I think she’s going to be okay.” He sat back on his heels. “Head wounds bleed a hell of a lot, but I think when she elbowed Ostheim right before he fired, she knocked his aim off just enough.”

Alex closed his eyes and sank into his chair with his face in his hand. “Well, shit. I bet that would have been good for Megan to know before she went after Ben.”

Chapter Twenty-one

Following Ben wasn’t difficult; he’d made no effort to hide his tracks. The stink of gunpowder from the fired rifle hung in the air like a flaming neon sign that said “This way!” along with his blood trail. Megan listened for the sound of a shot, terrified she’d be too late. She stripped behind a handy bush and Changed so she could go faster, because trying to run through the scrub in heels sucked.

Ten minutes that felt like an eternity later, she found Ben huddled next to a pile of rocks, still in wolf form, one paw on the gun. She stopped and approached him carefully, step by step, until she was close enough to nose his shoulder, which was still bleeding, along with other parts of him. Ostheim had torn him terribly in his death throes—she wondered if Ben had even noticed. He turned his face away and heaved a massive, shuddering sigh.

She wuffled at him, and he flicked his ear but had no other response. Every line of his body screamed despair, loss, and anguish; she could smell his distress, and her heart cried for everything he’d been through. She Changed back to human and sat down beside him, petting his bloodstained head.

She found herself with a lap full of wolf, and he shoved his face into her stomach and wailed, a pitiful, animal sound that wrenched at her soul. She wrapped her arms around his neck, aching for him. “Oh, Ben, I’m so sorry.”

He whimpered for a few moments, before slumping and going still momentarily. Taking a deep breath, he rolled away from her, Changed, and scooped up the rifle. His eyes were blue pits of grief-stricken exhaustion.

“What are you doing?” she asked, dreading the answer, remembering the gun he’d had the night Janni had met him after the veteran’s dinner.

“I can’t—” He choked. “She’s dead. And I can’t, Megan. I can’t do this without her.”

What could she say to that?

O O O

Ben knelt there, wracked with guilt. He wanted to die. Literally.

And he had the means.

“Ben, please.” Megan held up a hand. “Don’t do something irreversible.”

“He shot her. In the head. With silver bullets. From my gun. This gun.” The barrel of the rifle moved, seemingly of its own volition, up under his chin, but he managed to keep his finger alongside the trigger instead of on it. It was an effort. The sedative from the pole syringe, while meant for the bunnies, had made his head fuzzy, and he was having a hard time thinking. “Which I was criminally careless with.” He knew that much, though, and the knowledge ripped a hole in his chest that would never be filled again.

It was Megan’s turn to choke. “Ben—”

“Go back to the mansion, Megan. Tell them you couldn’t find me.”

“I can’t do that.”

“I reached off the end of my rope a long time ago. Janni caught me, but now I’m in free fall, and I’m not—” His finger had apparently curled around the trigger by itself, because he didn’t remember doing it. “I’ve had
enough
. She was the only thing holding me here. Supposed to protect her and keep her safe. She’s dead. My fault.” He couldn’t look at Megan, because whatever expression she was wearing would destroy him further, and he was running on the fumes of fumes. Bad enough that he could smell her stress hormones, caused by him. “You shouldn’t have followed me.”

“She told me about the veterans’ dinner.” Megan’s breathing was loud in the stillness of the night. “You had a gun then, too.”

He wheezed out a pained huff of air as a realization hit him, and that hole in his chest enlarged. “Should’ve just sent her off that night and then used the gun. None of this would have happened.”

Megan swallowed hard. “And she’d have felt horrible for the rest of her life, reading about it in the news the next morning.” The implication was clear that Megan would feel the same.

He didn’t have enough left to worry about that. All he could do was what he should have done with Janni two years ago, and make her go away. “She’d still be alive. You ought to leave, Megan. Seriously.” His voice was low. “It’ll be … messy.”

“You’ve taken more crap just this week than anyone should have to in a dozen lifetimes, Ben. I know, okay?” No, she really didn’t. Then again, no one did. “But Janni wouldn’t want you to do this. Did she waste all that time she spent putting you back together?”

Ben closed his eyes. The gun didn’t move. “Unfair tactic, Megan. Wouldn’t have thought that of you.”

“If it keeps you from killing yourself for no good reason, I don’t care how unfair you think I’m being.”

“No good reason?” He laughed, a bitter, angry bark he hardly recognized as coming from his own throat. “He targeted her because of me and used my gun. My fault. Reason enough. Go. Please.” He was breathing in ragged gasps, but his hand on the gun was rock-steady. He didn’t want to pull the trigger in front of Megan, didn’t want to burden her with witnessing that as his last act on Earth, but he damn well would if she refused to leave. His chest felt as if his heart had been scooped out and replaced with a hunk of ice. He was
done
, and she needed to understand that.

“Didn’t you
not
shoot yourself once because of her? Are you going to violate her memory that way?” Tears were streaming down her face, shit, he’d made her cry, and he stared at the ground instead.

Ben was beyond crying, himself—wrung Sahara-dry and gritty with sorrow that weighed his shoulders so heavily he could barely move. “Ostheim wanted me dead. Well, he’s killed me, all right. I can’t …”

“You can. I know you can.” Megan reached out to him, palm up. “You didn’t let the insurgents win, when they killed Prissy, right? Don’t let this guy win, Ben. You’re stronger than you think you are. Janni made you stronger than you think you are, and you can survive this, too.”

His gun arm relaxed, just a little, and he rubbed his forehead with his free hand as his eyes slid shut again. “Not sure I want to.”

“I’m your alpha. I’m supposed to take care of you. Is it enough that I want you to?” Her voice was filled with longing and loneliness.

He breathed for a few moments. “I don’t know.” A light tremor shook his body. “Maybe.” He needed to
think
instead of just react, he dimly realized. And Megan was right. “Probably.” He moved the gun barrel away, so it pointed at the sky.

“Then if there’s a doubt, you shouldn’t do it until you’re positive.”

The reek of blood and fear filled the air around them the same time a shout sounded through the scrub. “Ben!”

And that was Janni’s voice, which couldn’t be because he’d seen her die. Ben’s head jerked up in time to see his mate stagger onto the scene, blood streaming from her head. She stopped short, and her fingers flew up to her mouth. “Ben?”

“You have got to be fucking kidding me,” he said. His hand steadied like a switch had been thrown, and just like that, the gun was back under his chin. Hair sprouted on his back as the wolf growled in confusion. Clearly he was experiencing a psychotic break here, because this was impossible. Wish fulfillment.

“I have to admit that this is the most realistic hallucination I’ve ever had,” he deadpanned. “The PTSD is working overtime today. Bravo.”

“Janni?” Megan said. Her eyes were huge. “Aren’t you dead?”

“Bullets just grazed me, I think,” Janni gasped.

“Wish fulfillment,” Ben said decisively. “Yeah.”

“Sweetie, no,” Janni said. Wasn’t it funny that this apparition was shaking, and he could see that even in the dark from twenty feet away? What a wonderful thing the human brain was. “Put the gun down. I’m right here, and I’m real.”

The rifle still didn’t move. “I watched Janni die. Therefore, you’re either a ghost or an illusion, I don’t know which—but you’re not real.”

“We can’t both be hallucinating the same thing, Ben.” Megan’s voice cracked. “You’re scaring her.”

“Makes a nice change from my other hallucinations. Most of the time they’re scaring me.” Ben shook his head. “No, really, if she’s popping up randomly like this, it’s not a matter of ‘don’t want to’ anymore. It’s a matter of ‘can’t, under any circumstances.’ Period.”

“Oh, screw this,” Janni said. She marched up to him and dropped down to straddle his lap. Usually his head phantoms weren’t quite this solid, and he froze with his mouth half-open, dropping the gun from fingers that refused to work anymore.

Megan dove for it and whisked it away before he could react, and he was peripherally aware of the safety engaging. But most of his attention was on the vision in his lap.

Janni grabbed him by the face and kissed him, hard. “I’d like to see a friggin’ hallucination do that.”

His white-knuckled hands grasped Janni by the upper arms so tightly that he might have been leaving bruises. “Megan? Tell me what you just saw.”

“Janni just kissed the hell out of you,” Megan said frankly.

He crushed Janni to his chest, making her squeak. “That’s what I thought,” he said. He dropped his face to her shoulder. “You took an awful chance, honey.”

She wrapped around him, stroking his back. “Oh,
Ben
.”

The shakes started in earnest. “I thought you were dead,” he said into Janni’s hair, rocking her, drinking in her scent, her warmth. “There was so much blood and the silver and it was point-blank and you just dropped and it was my fault …”

“And you ran without checking,” she chided, rapping him gently on the forehead with her knuckles. “Then nearly—”

Ben kissed her, stopping the awful words before they escaped from her mouth. “Sorry,” he gasped. He hadn’t even realized how difficult breathing had gotten until the knot in his chest eased and he could do it again. “Sorry.”

He couldn’t get enough of her taste, and he kissed her cheeks and eyelids and throat and pulled the tail of her button-up out of her jeans because he couldn’t get enough of her beautiful dark skin either. He needed to be closer to her than this …

“It’s okay. We’re okay,” she said, kissing him as fervently as he was kissing her. “But if you ever scare me like that again, Ben, it’s
on
. You don’t get to kill yourself if I die, got me?”

“Yes, ma’am,” he mumbled against her collarbone, still working at her top, which was bunched up under her armpits now.

Her eyes fluttered shut, and Megan’s discreet cough brought Ben back to himself before he could pull the shirt off over Janni’s head.

“And maybe we’re not all the way okay,” Janni continued, “because you’re bleeding and I ran out here with a concussion and I’m really really dizzy right now …”

“We need to get you back to the house.” He rose, cradling her in his arms, and realized that he was naked and covered in blood that was and wasn’t his. Some of it was Janni’s, and he growled ferociously before getting himself back under control. “You didn’t happen to bring me a pair of pants, did you?”

Janni smiled, but her words slurred. “So tired.”

“No. No falling asleep with a concussion. Stay with me, honey.” Ben strode toward the mansion, his fatigue forgotten with the need to get her back to Doc Allen.

“Megan?” he said over his shoulder, as she scrambled to keep up with him. “Thanks for coming after me. Again.”

“Pack.” She shrugged, but he could smell her stress as she followed him, carrying the M4 gingerly by the strap. “I’d like it if you’d ease up on the almost-dying, though. It’s getting old.”

“I’ll keep that in mind.”

“One big happy,” Janni said sleepily.

Ben’s arms tightened around her. “Stay awake, honey. You’ve been hit in the head three times this week. That can’t be good for you.”

“Starting to get used to being dizzy.”

“We’ll have Doc Allen check you over when we get back. I don’t like the smell of that wound.”

“It’s okay. We’ll be okay,” she assured him sleepily. Again.

And he finally thought, as he carried her to the house, that they might be.

O O O

Back in the lab, Megan allowed herself to collapse into an office chair with her hand over her face and the M4 in her lap. “Holy cow.”

Alex approached her carefully, like she was a skittish horse. “Megan?”

“I’m fine, Alex.” She refrained from throwing the gun across the room and took several deep breaths. She realized that the smell of blood had nearly disappeared, no bodies decorated the floor, and three of their number were missing. “Where are the others?”

“Michelle went home. And apparently Chambliss’s job description now includes ‘getting rid of dead people.’ I don’t know, and I was afraid to ask. Jeremy went with him.”

Alex put his hand on her hair, and she not only let him, but she leaned her head into his hip as he continued, “He won’t tell me how he knows how to do that. What about you? Got any deep, dark secrets you’re hiding from me? Hell, nothing would shock me right now.”

Megan pushed her alarm back—he hadn’t twigged to the wolf; this was just his way of coping. “Other than the love child we have together that the tabloids keep accusing us of hiding in a posh French boarding school, there’s nothing, Mr. Jarrett.”

“Oh, her. That’s not a secret.”

Amazing herself, she managed a tired laugh.

Alex gave her a look of exasperated fondness. “Go to bed, Miss Graham.”

She hauled herself off the couch with visible effort. “Yes, sir. You should go to bed too. When was the last time you sle—” She slapped her forehead. “Oh, hell, I nearly forgot. I talked with Clarke this morning while you were doing your thing with Ostheim at the office. You have to have a teleconference with the Board tomorrow. No excuses.”

He opened his mouth to object, but she didn’t let him start. “Clarke has gone to bat for you on the no confidence thing. For now. You dodged them three times last week and skipped today’s meeting too. You can’t put it off forever.”

“Feh,” he growled, “sometimes I think I’d rather stay interred in my lab and let someone else do all that boring crap.”

“And then something would happen the very first week to piss you off, and you’d want your company back. Forget it.” She pointed a determined finger at him. “Teleconference. I’m setting one up tomorrow. Be there.”

“Yes, ma’am. Now, are you going to bed, or do I need to toss you over my shoulder and carry you up the stairs?”

“Why don’t we both go?”