Chapter 13 #2
But I shook my head. “They shot me with a sedative,” I informed him. “I don’t know what kind and it’s not out of my system yet.”
Tommy glanced between my wound and the needle in his hand. “Fuck. Are you sure?”
“Is that safe?” Lu demanded of Tommy.
He shrugged, putting the syringe down. “Relatively, but,” he looked me in the eye, “you can’t move. Especially this close to your kidney.”
I turned to Lu. “Bring your pussy over here. I’ll eat you out to distract both of us.”
Her jaw dropped. “What? No! This is, like, the least sexiest situation I can think of!”
I waggled my eyebrows. “Bet I can make you change your mind.”
Lu’s nostrils flared and her jaw ticked as she looked at me. Then she turned to Tommy and said, “Do what you have to do, but make it hurt.”
Tommy chuckled. “Want to help?”
Intrigue crossed her face. “How?”
“Here, put these on,” he handed her a pair of gloves too. “As soon as I pull the shard out, I need you to pack the wound. He’s not bleeding excessively, which is good, but we can’t risk him losing any more blood, especially with everything we have to do on his back.”
Lu let go of my hand and reached for the gloves.
I’d let her have her moment, even if it was at my expense.
I sure as fuck wished for another dose of that sedative when Tommy finally pulled the shard from my side.
Other than the initial jolt, though, I was able to hold myself stiff as white hot flames burst from my side.
I felt Lu immediately start to pack the wound as Tommy had instructed. However, when my ears registered a gagging sound, my eyes shot open to look at her. She was applying pressure to my side with her head turned away from me and clearly trying not to throw up.
“Tommy,” I snapped, seconds away from moving regardless of his instructions.
“Lu, sweetheart.” He moved to replace her hands on my side with his. “I’ve got this. Why don’t you go check on Pua?”
Lu, though, shook her head. “No, I—” She gagged. “I’m fine. I can help.”
“You’re not going to help me at all if you throw up on or near me,” I told her. “Because I will get off of this couch to comfort you.” When she met my eyes, I saw tears lining hers. “I’m good,” I assured her, my voice softer this time. “I promise. You’re not going to lose me.”
She nodded stiffly. Taking off the bloody gloves, she dropped them to the floor by the first aid duffel. “I know I said to make it hurt,” she said to Tommy, “but not too much, okay?”
Tommy chuckled. “I’ll do my best. Promise.” As Lu walked away towards where Tangaloa and Pua were by the bottom of the stairs, Tommy turned back to me. “Got yourself a hell of a woman there, Prez.”
My smile was smug. “I know.”
Tommy just shook his head at my audacity and then went back to work. I held as still as I could as he worked to remove the glass and wood splinters from my back before stitching me up. He also hooked me up to an IV line to help keep me hydrated and to flush the sedative out of my system.
At some point, the twins and Spirit came back downstairs.
I also noticed others had arrived. I didn’t know who had called them, because it wasn’t me.
Neo was going to bitch at me for destroying yet another phone.
I was in enough pain that I was not looking forward to it. Normally their bitching amused me.
Lu came back over several times to check on me, but did not stay to help again.
I still would have preferred eating her out as a way to distract her.
Unfortunately, she was holding firm about her opinion of that.
Something about me bleeding turning her off, which I found a ridiculous sentiment. I never let her period bother me.
She claimed it wasn’t the same thing, though.
As Tommy was finishing, Holly came downstairs with Bacon. She was carrying a cup of something green that smelled… I crinkled my nose. Well, it smelled like roadkill, to be honest.
“Here, Paniolo.” She plunked a straw in it and put it next to my face where I was still lying on the couch. “I made you a smoothie.”
I lifted an eyebrow. My eyes went to Bacon over her head, and the man’s face warned me we would have a problem if I refused his little owl’s offer.
Lu came over, Pua now in her arms. Tangaloa was no longer in the basement, I noticed. She was sniffing the air like a bloodhound. “Oh, what is that? It’s smells delicious.”
Holly’s cheeks reddened. “I made it for Paniolo to help him rebuild his iron levels after losing so much blood. I didn’t think about you being hungry too. I’m sorry. I can go make another—”
“No!” Lu and I said together. Holly blinked in surprise, glancing between us. “If she’s hungry, she can have it,” I offered, trying not to sound too eager. The look Bacon gave me said I failed. “She’s pregnant,” I justified to him. “I’m not going to take food away from her.”
“We can split it,” Lu told me. “Tommy’s done. I can sit next to you and—”
“It’s fine,” I assured her. “I don’t want Pua over here right now.” To Holly, I said, “Thank you, Holly. Really. But I can’t take food from Lu. Please give it to her.”
Lu gave me a guilty look before accepting the smoothie of death from Holly. “Thank you. I’m starving and Tangaloa says all our food is destroyed upstairs.”
Everything was destroyed upstairs, but I didn’t know how much she knew. She hadn’t left the basement yet, which I was grateful for. I didn’t want her to see our home without me.
Holly turned back at me. “I checked the dart that you were injected with. It’s methohexital.
It’s a rapid sedative that wears off in about ten to fifteen minutes when administered intramuscular.
It can take forty-five to sixty minutes if done as a rectal suppository, so be grateful they hadn’t done that. ”
I blinked at her, not entirely sure how to process that. Bacon’s reverent look as he stared at Holly as she spoke to me turned dark when he realized I hadn’t responded. I cleared my throat. “Um, thank you. For checking. Any side effects from the drug?”
I literally had no idea what else to say.
“Drowsiness, coughing, impaired breathing, hiccups, nausea, vomiting…” She shrugged. “Just to name a few. Tommy was very smart to get an IV line in you. That should help. Oh,” she added quickly, “and you might have uncontrollable gas for a while.”
The entire room stopped and stared, including me.
Then Holly giggled. “Kidding. Payback for you not wanting to drink my smoothie.”
I was not the only one to let out a sigh of relief at that. I couldn’t help but chuckle too. “Well played, Holly. Very well played.”
Tommy’s boat was loaded up and ready to go.
Though my back was killing me, I was refusing to take any painkillers.
Lu was calling me a moron and a martyr, but I had no intention of dulling my aches.
I wanted to feel every single one of them so that I could make the surviving Bloody Scorpions feel my pain too.
Spirit, Tommy, Lucifer, and I were on the boat. Without knowing if there were any more Bloody Scorpions around, I was not leaving Lu, Holly, or Pua unprotected. They were at Bacon’s house with the other members for protection.
Of the seven Bloody Scorpions who had come onto my property tonight, four of them were dead.
The two who had been dragging me out of the house were bound and gagged, my dagger still in one of their shoulders.
The last one was only gagged, because binding him was just pointless. He wasn’t going anywhere.
It was nearly dawn, so we had to move fast. Tommy was taking us on a direct route out to deep waters rather than taking an evasive route. At this point, time was more pressing and I needed answers before the sun started to rise.
Not that the Bloody Scorpions knew that. They thought I had all the time in the world to play with them.
When Tommy cut the engine, he hopped down to start to help the others. Rather than using the gaff this time, we’d borrowed the construction crews’ woodchipper. With so many dead, it would be faster than having to go get other chum.
The three still living watched as the four dead were stripped naked and then fed into the chipper.
I had no issue feeding people to the sharks, but I was not going to feed them harmful materials like clothing and metal.
Tommy had us facing away from the wind so their pieces and splatter went into the open ocean.
“I like this,” I commented to Tommy. “We should get one of these for the future. Can you imagine how much we’d save on chum?”
“Seems like a decent investment,” he said, loud enough for the three prisoners to hear him over the roar of the motor.
Even out in open sea like this, all of us were on alert for another boat or the Coast Guard. Once the four bodies were fed through, I pointed to the one that had the dislocated neck.
“Nice and slow,” I reminded Spirit and Lucifer.
I was honestly surprised at the former priest, but he never even blinked when I told him to come with us.
It wasn’t like I wanted him for Last Rites or anything like that.
I wanted to make sure his faith wouldn’t interfere in our work.
Watching me cut the hand off a man he’d once called ‘brother’ was different than feeding a living man through a woodchipper.
The man’s gag was removed first. They stripped him down like the others and then put him in feet first. The man’s screams and pleas started long before his toes touched the blades, but they didn’t stop.
Based on the man’s cut, he was low level.
Just a rider, muscle. I wanted the top dog, the one who shot me. And I wanted him scared shitless.
When they got to his knees, I gave Spirit a signal and he pulled the man from the shoot. Bloody and screaming, the man was tossed onto the deck. He wasn’t going to last much longer.
“He acts like he can feel it,” Tommy scoffed, disgusted.