Chapter 16
Chapter Sixteen
Brooks
The hours after I bit Laz are a blur of sirens, flashing lights, and antiseptic.
One minute I was sitting on the floor of that hotel room, and the next I was sitting by his bedside in the hospital.
There have been many doctors and many more nurses running in and out of this room.
I haven't seen any of them. All I can see is Laz.
He looks bad. There are so many tubes and monitors, and his skin has taken on a grayish quality that reminds me of corpses.
He's obviously not dead, but everyone with a badge has cautioned me that that could change at any moment.
They say that the only thing keeping him tethered to this Earth is the bond I created when I bit him.
It shouldn't have taken so firmly, but it has.
It has been heavily impressed upon me that I will need to mark him again once he's well enough to handle the full claiming.
I wonder what he's going to think of that when he wakes up.There isn't another claim on him.
I would feel it. All I can feel is the flicker at the other end of our bond.
I don't see any other actual bites on any of the pieces of him that aren't covered by his gown and blankets.
I've been asked a few times how many marks he carries.
He was completely naked when I got to him at the hotel, so they assumed I would know.
It just didn't occur to me to notice any of that when he was fucking dying in my arms.
They're ruling it an overdose. I call bullshit. Laz was trying to get out. He was trying to get away. I know he was. If he overdosed, he had help doing it.
I am going to kill so many people.
I've started a list. Kris, his supposed Alpha, is at the top.
Then her immediate associates. Then every single client Laz can remember.
By the time I'm done with them, they'll all be more than willing to give me names, addresses, and someone's firstborn child.
These people are disgusting, and they will all pay the price for what's been done to him.
I need to get him home first. Fuck this entire place.
Grady and Shane sent flowers. They were both ready to help me paint the city with blood when they found out what happened.
I might take them up on it. Probably not.
Shane's nose is clean. Grady's is questionable, but he's got decades of this city's decay under his nails.
And then there's the fact that I want to end each and every one of them with my own hands. I want to watch their blood—
“Brooks.” Laz says my name softly, like it hurts him to say anything. I'm sure it does. He was briefly intubated before his medical team determined it was unnecessary.
I stand up and lean into his line of vision so he doesn't have to turn his head or strain to see me. “Hey. I'm here. Don't try to move or talk too much. I need to call the doctor in.”
“Wait,” he croaks.
“What's wrong?” What a stupid question. The list of wrong things is miles long.
“Kris?”
My stomach sinks. “Do you need her? I'll get her if you need her.” I'll do it, too. He can see her for half a minute before I permanently and thoroughly remove her from him.
His eyes widen, and he shakes his head. “No. Don't let her—“
That's all he needs to say.
“Don't worry, baby,” I say gently. “I won't.”
He nods. “How long?”
“Have you been unconscious?”
He nods again.
“A week and a day. So, simultaneously not very long and far too long for my comfort. Are you in any pain?” Another stupid question.
A look of relief softens his sharp features. “I'm out of the hole.”
“The hole?”
“R. Most should be gone now.” His voice is pure gravel.
“That's what the doctors said. They also told me that you would have to deal with symptoms for a while, but you don't need to worry about that right now. Right now, you just need to concentrate on getting well.”
He scoffs, but it sounds more like a cough. “I have plenty to worry about. Where is she?”
“Honestly? I have no idea. I don't want to know. Not yet. Not till I get you home.”
“Home? Where's that?”
“My home, Laz. With me. You're coming home with me.”
Tears well in his eyes, but he looks away from me. “I can't.”
“You can.”
“You can't,” he argues.
“Don't tell me what I can't do, Lazarus. You're coming home with me as soon as you're released, and I will take care of you.”
He blinks but doesn't look at me. “Why?”
“Because you're mine,” I declare. “You're fucking mine. From now on, I take care of you. I protect you. I love you. You are fucking mine.”
His wide, watery eyes pin me, then he reaches up to touch his shoulder. “You...”
“I did what I needed to do to save you. And before you get all pissy about it, I should have done it a long time ago. If I had, you wouldn't be in a goddamned hospital bed right now, and I wouldn't have spent the past decade in hell.”
“You marked me,” he says wistfully. “You marked me, Brooks. Do you know what this means?”
“Yes,” I say bluntly, cupping his jaw.
He shakes his head but leans into my touch. “You don't understand. She'll come for me. She said she would. She'll send people. You're not safe. She'll—“
I lift my other hand to frame his face, putting just a touch of warm pressure. “Stop. She won't do anything. Not to me and not to you. I won't allow it.”
“You can't protect me from everything, Brooks.”
“Try me,” I snarl, trying desperately to scale back the sudden aggression surging through me at the pure and frantic terror pouring through our bond. “I will protect you, Laz. Never doubt that.”
“Who will protect you?”
I smile and hope the warmth reaches my eyes. “You will, of course.”
“You're crazy.”
“Absolutely.”
***
They let Laz go home four days later. He's getting better little by little every day.
He's still sick, but that's to be expected.
There was a two-day debate on whether it would be better to fly him home or to drive him back.
Both have significant risk. A flight would be shorter, but when Laz gets sick, he gets sick.
He's nauseous to the point of vomiting and weak to the point of fainting, and he shakes constantly.
I know there are other, more private, symptoms that he is experiencing due to his body learning to exist without the presence of the chemicals he's put into it for years, but I'm only focusing on the things I can see and help him with right now.
If something terrible were to happen when we're in the air, I would have no choice but to sit and watch it happen until we could land.
And then there would be a drive to the nearest hospital. That's unacceptable.
On the other hand, the drive is long. Very long.
Several days of travel without stopping at hotels along the way.
Laz has mentioned and demonstrated an intense aversion to ever stepping foot into another hotel again.
I tried to make a joke about what we'll do when we go on vacations, but it fell flat with both Laz and the nurse who was there for the conversation.
I've left it up to Laz, and he's going to choose the flight.
I've already tasked Mrs. Richards with hiring a complete medical staff to be at our mercy, so paying a couple of nurses who know their business to fly with us is nothing.
Mrs. Richards also has the authority to sign off on whatever medical equipment he might need, which isn't really anything.
What Laz needs more than anything is time and rest. We'll have medications for when he gets too sick to handle it on his own, but that should be short-lived. He just needs time to heal.
The sun is shining hot and bright the day he's released, and the trip from the hospital to the airport is spent with Laz's head in my lap. He couldn't bear the glaring sunshine or watching the city pass by the window while I ran my fingers through his hair and purred for him the whole way.
After we get boarded and we're waiting for takeoff, Laz grabs my hand. At first I think it's because he's nervous about flying, but that isn't it.
“You're angry,” he says quietly. “I can feel it.”
I nod. I am angry. I might not be acting on it right now, but I am incredibly angry. “Yes.”
“I'm sorry. I don't want to be a burden. I don't want you to feel like you have to take me. We can have it removed. It's okay.”
I turn to him, giving him the full scope of my reaction to what he just had the nerve to say to me.
“I would hope that you think more of me than that, Lazarus.
I am angry, but if you so much as breathe a word suggesting the removal of my mark ever again, I will handle it poorly.
Very poorly. You are not a burden, and even if you were, you are my burden.
I will take care of you because you are mine to take care of. My anger isn't for you.”
“If it isn't about me, then what? Because I don't know how to navigate this feeling. All of these feelings. Mine, yours, a mixture of both. It's too much, and I don't know what to do. How can I help you?”
I take a breath and link our hands together on the armrest. “You're doing it.”
He spends the majority of the flight sleeping, and I spend the whole of it thinking. I will learn to control my emotions a little better. Laz doesn't need my rage complicating his recovery. But I can't stop the anger. I can control it for him, but one thing is absolute.
I am going to kill Kris. That is a truth.
He has no bond with her, and even if he did, I am a Valla.
My claim would cancel out any previous claim made on him.
Any mark he might have had previously is null because I will it so.
He is mine, and that woman tried to kill him.
She would have succeeded if I had been a minute too late.
It was intentional and cruel, and she will suffer for it. And I will enjoy her suffering.