Chapter 17
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
WREN
None of us said a word on the drive to Tiger's apartment in Powell Tower, in the centre of Dusk Bay.
Lex didn't question him bringing us here. The security would be better than Lex had in his modest home.
Bray also had an apartment here. A lot of the Demons did. And the Smashers too. Not to mention a lot of the city's wealthiest residents. An apartment here would cost more than I made in several years, and then some. Times about a million.
I didn't think about any of that right now, I wanted to be somewhere no one could break in and leave their cum on my property. Or Tiger's property.
He pulled into the car park under the building and parked in one of his personal parking spaces.
"No one will touch you here," he said. "Except for us." He slid out of the driver's seat and hurried around to the passenger side.
Lex was out of his seat already, but he waited for Tiger before they opened my door and helped me out of the car.
"I can get myself out," I pointed out.
"We don't want to take the risk, even here," Lex said.
"They let some shady assholes live here," Tiger said, clearly referring to himself. "Can never be too careful."
"Exactly." Lex grabbed my suitcase and walked on one side of me while Tiger walked on the other.
We were halfway to the elevator when it pinged and the door slid open.
Bray stepped out, looking worried, his hair dishevelled like he just got out of bed.
How did he look even hotter like that?
"What the hell happened?" he barked. "Lex texted me that they were bringing you here. That was all." He looked at Lex accusingly.
Lex glanced at me, quickly realised I didn't want to talk about it, and filled Bray in on the last handful of hours.
"Fucking hell." Bray looked like he was going to slam his fist into the concrete wall beside him. Fortunately for him and his hockey career, he wasn't enough of a dumbass to follow through. "They could have—"
"They didn't." I followed him into the elevator and moved in deeper to make room for Lex and Tiger.
"They'd be dead right now if they had," Tiger growled.
"You would have had to find them first," I said.
"Was this Nicholas fucking Fiorelli?" Bray demanded.
"Probably." Tiger pressed the button for the twelfth floor. "We'll deal with him."
"Maybe you shouldn't," I said softly. "Maybe you should leave it alone. If this was a warning to back off, maybe… Maybe we should."
"I don't negotiate with terrorists, assholes, or people who take up more than one parking space with their car," Tiger said. "Nicholas is probably all of those."
"Especially the last one," Lex said. "That's an indication of how evil he actually is."
They were trying to lighten the mood, but all I could manage was a faint snort.
"That sounds like him." Honestly, that sounded like a few people I knew. Particularly those who drove cars so big that they didn't comfortably fit within one space. Why the hell anyone needed a car that big, I didn't know. Overcompensating, probably.
"Point is, I'm not backing down," Tiger said. "Not after you got abducted, and sure as fuck not after this. The minute he took aim anywhere near you was the minute he was dead. Someone should have told him never to provoke tigers. We can be cranky assholes with sharp teeth and claws."
"That might be what he wants," I said. "To provoke you into doing something rash."
If any of them got killed because of me, I'd never forgive myself.
"Then we don't do anything rash," Tiger said. "We do something cool, calm and effective. Like we do out on the ice."
"I won't rule out using my stick on him," Bray said. "Hockey stick that is. I don't want my cock anywhere near that prick."
Before anyone could respond to that, the elevator pinged and stopped at the twelfth floor. The guys hustled me out and down the corridor to Tiger's front door.
He pulled out a card and swiped it over the lock, before pushing the door open.
"Holy shit." I stepped inside.
I figured the place would be fancy, but I hadn’t imagined anything this fancy.
The entryway opened up into a huge kitchen and living area, with a massive glass window overlooking Dusk Bay. The city was a carpet of twinkling lights. Beyond that, the ocean rippled in the moonlight.
The view must be stunning during the day.
The apartment was decorated in muted shades of grey, black and off-white.
A massive sectional sat in front of the biggest TV I'd ever seen. It looked more like a movie screen than a television.
The kitchen was a study in white-veined black marble, and matte brass. Even the bowls of the sink were black, as was the enormous fridge.
"This is sexy," I said.
"It's okay." Tiger tossed his keys into a bowl on the island that was so big it would have seated the whole team on the roster. "Somewhere to sleep and eat."
"It's bigger than mine," Bray remarked.
Tiger eyed him and smirked.
"I meant your apartment, not your cock, dickhead," Bray said.
"Still right on both counts." Tiger guided us to a staircase that led to another level.
Two bedrooms and a bathroom occupied one side, and the main bedroom the other. The bed in the middle of the main bedroom was big enough to fit about ten people.
"Are you sure you're not overcompensating?" Bray asked.
"Certain." Tiger took my suitcase from Lex and carried it into a walk-in wardrobe to the side of the room. "I've needed that much space a time or two. Before you ask, yes, everyone left satisfied." He put the suitcase down and turned to us.
"Wren can sleep in here with me." He raised his chin like that was that, the argument was over before it began.
"I'm staying too," Lex said. "If they can't get to Wren, they may try another of us. If we stay together, that will make it harder for them. And easier for us to keep an eye on each other."
Bray sighed.
"Your apartment is as secure as this," Tiger told him.
"Yeah, but Lex is right. We should all stay in one place. There's no way of knowing whether we can trust anyone that lives here or not."
"You're not filling me with much confidence," I said softly. "Can we just call Nicholas and tell him we'll back away?" Since I already knew the answer to that, I repeated Bray's sigh and rubbed my temples with my fingertips.
"I'll grab some things." Bray turned and trotted back down the stairs.
"You should get some sleep," Lex told me.
"There's something else we should do first," Tiger said. He gave Lex a meaningful look.
Lex scrubbed his chin with his hand. "Yes, we should. Is there any chance you have what we need here?"
I frowned at them both, wondering what they were referring to.
"I have all sorts of shit," Tiger replied. "I should have what we need." He disappeared into the bathroom and came back a minute or two later with a specimen jar in one hand and a syringe in the other. "Don't ask why I have these. I just do, okay?"
He handed the syringe to Lex and the small plastic specimen jar to me.
"You want to test me for whatever might be in my system?" I should have thought of that. "Shouldn't we go to a hospital or something?"
"No need," Lex said. "I’ve taken blood before. We can get the team’s doctors to look at the specimens and see what they can find. Whatever it is, chances are it's still in your system. Assuming we got to you in time."
He gestured for me to hold out my arm. "This would be better with a tourniquet, but unless Tiger has one lying around…"
"Right." Tiger disappeared into his wardrobe and returned with a red and blue striped silk tie. He wound it around my arm and tied it nice and tight.
"I don't want to get blood on your tie," I said, looking down at it.
He shrugged. "Plenty more where that came from. My mother gives them to me for some reason. I only wear them when we have some fancy dinner we have to go to, or to get on and off the plane."
I looked away as Lex pressed the needle against my skin. "Is it true that hockey players get naked the moment the plane doors close?"
It was Lex who responded. "It's been known to happen. They don't like to get their suits wrinkly."
"A guy has to have some vanity," Tiger said.
I suppressed a wince at the prick of pain as Lex slid the needle into my vein. It hurt for a second or two before he slid the needle out.
Tiger opened a Band-Aid and stuck it over the small wound.
"Do I get a lollipop?" I said jokingly.
"If you can fill that sample jar, you can suck whatever you want," Lex said.
That was the best incentive I ever had to do what I needed to do, and do it quickly.
I washed my hands and hurried out to give the jar to Lex. He placed it and the syringe of my blood into a Ziploc bag Tiger dug out from somewhere.
I'd have to get the story of that from him at some point. Most people didn't keep specimen jars and syringes lying around at home. Right? Maybe they did and it was me who was out of the loop.
Either way, he pressed the top of the bag closed and disappeared downstairs with it.
"Do you think they'll find anything?" I asked. "It can't have been that long, but it might be one of those undetectable drugs or something." That was a thing, wasn't it?
"The problem is in knowing what to test for," he said.
"They can't just test for anything and everything until they get a hit.
They'll try to narrow down the most common shit it could be.
PCP, or something like that. I'll personally make sure they keep looking until they find what it is. Whatever it takes."
He slid his arms around me and pulled me to the solid comfort of his chest.
"Thank you." I leaned against him, listening to his heartbeat as I closed my eyes.
"For what? I should be saying sorry to you," he whispered. "This never should have happened. I should have insisted you come and live here before they could do anything like this. I knew there was a chance they'd come after you, but…" His tone was heavily laced with regret.
"Before tonight, I would have said no," I replied. "I would have said it was moving too fast. We're all just getting to know each other. I thought I was perfectly fine living my life. I was happy to go on doing that in my own place. Until we were ready."
"I hate that it happened, but I don't hate that you're here," he said. "I said I was an asshole, but only a massive prick would be happy you're here because of this."
"You're not an asshole," I said. "I don't think for a moment you're happy, just…"
"I got what I wanted," he said. "You know I'm not letting you leave, now you're here. Not even when this is over."
"That's a conversation for later," I said wryly.
Now I was here, I might not want to leave.