I Am the Wild (The Night Firm #1)- Karpov Kinrade Page 0,20
hands Sebastian a small black bag, flinching when she gets a good look at me.
"Is it that bad?" I ask. I feel beat up, bloody and miserable, so yes, it probably is.
"You'll be okay," she says, with an encouraging smile.
Sebastian pulls a jar of green goo and a strip of leather out of the bag. “This will hurt. A lot. But then it will be better." He hands me the leather and then gently pulls my injured leg onto his lap. "Bite on this."
Still somewhat dazed, I do what I’m told, taking the leather and placing it between my teeth, thinking, is this really necessary?
It only takes a moment to realize...It's necessary.
My teeth dig new grooves into the leather as Sebastian pulls the rod out of my leg and proceeds to smear the putrid-smelling green goo over it.
The sensation vacillates from fire to ice as the ointment is absorbed into my flesh and blood. I feel infected. Feverish. The pain is so fierce I lose sense of anything else.
He brushes my hair to the side and rubs more of the ointment into my head wound. The smell is nauseating, and my headache, already a level ten, ramps up until I have to close my eyes to keep from vomiting and passing out.
I fade in and out of consciousness for some unknowable amount of time, until finally the pain eases and then disappears entirely.
With its departure I come back to myself and open my eyes. I let out a deep sigh of relief and tentatively test sitting up on my own. Nothing terrible happens. Yay.
I extricate my leg from the delicious lap of Sebastian Night and am stunned to see that the gaping wound that was there just a few moments ago has now knitted itself back together.
“How?” I ask, my words failing me.
“You’ll find out soon enough,” he says, though he doesn’t sound happy about it.
“That’s all you have to say? I’ll find out soon enough?” I respond, incredulous.
“Why did you take this job, Eve?” he asks, deflecting.
“You answer my question first,” I counter.
And then I wait. Silently. Eyes on him as he weighs what he wants more.
"There's a lot I'm not telling you, though not by my choice. There is risk with this job. We make enemies. And our latest client is something of a high-profile celebrity in certain circles, and that comes with additional risk."
“Who’s the client?”
“You’ll find out soon enough. Your turn, Eve. A deal’s a deal”
I nod. “That it is. Very well. I took the job because everything about who I am changed the night my brother died.”
“From cancer. I was sorry to hear that. My condolences.”
I clear my throat and continue. “He didn’t die of cancer. Not officially,” I say, the words alive in my throat, like bees demanding to be let out. Words I have never spoken to another living person. But words I tell myself every single day.
“My brother, Adam, had cancer, yes. But it was in remission. We were happy. Celebrating. Planning for the future. Or so I thought. I got the call at 4:34 am on Friday the thirteen. No joke. On Friday the thirteen, of all days, I got the call that my brother had died by suicide. He’d gotten the results from his latest scan. The cancer was back. He left me a note explaining it all. How he knew this had already wiped me out financially. How I'd put my career on hold to stay home and take care of him. How my health was going to shit and I needed to take better care of myself.” At this I can’t stop the tears. They flow, and the emotion sticks in my throat as I speak. “As if losing my twin, my best friend, my other half, as if losing him would ever make my life easier in any way at all.”
What I don't say is that I already knew he was dead when the call came in. I had the worst flash of my life that morning. And I knew.
Sebastian doesn't look away from my grief when our eyes meet, and I can see in his eyes that he's known his share, too.
I wipe my tears and calm my breathing, centering myself before I continue. "After that, going back to the life I had before, well, it just seemed pointless. And painful. My brother is everywhere in my old life. There was no aspect of our lives that didn't intersect in some way. I needed something different."