As Phury kicked open the theater's side door, he knew without a doubt that he was kissing his ass good-bye tonight.
Zsadist came to by force of will, reaching out through the drug haze and grabbing onto consciousness. With a groan he dragged himself across the bath's marble floor and onto the rug in the bedroom. Clawing his way across the carpet, pushing with his feet, he barely had the strength to will the door open when he got to it.
As soon as he was in the hall of statues, he tried to yell. At first it was only hoarse whispers, but then he got a holler out. And another. And another.
The pounding, running footsteps made him dizzy with relief.
Wrath and Rhage knelt by him and rolled him over. He cut through their questions, unable to follow all the words. "Phury... gone... Phury... gone..."
When his stomach heaved, he lurched back onto his side and threw up. The voiding helped, making him feel a little more clearheaded after it stopped.
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"Have to find him..."
Wrath and Rhage were still firing questions, talking fast, and Z thought they were probably the cause of all the buzzing in his ears. Either that or his head was about to explode.
As he pushed his face off the carpet his vision spun, and he thanked God that dose of morphine had been calibrated for Bella's weight. Because he was a mess.
His gut spasmed and he vomited again, losing it all over the rag. Shit... He never had been able to handle opiates.
More feet pounding down the hall. More voices. Someone wiping his mouth with a wet cloth. Fritz. When Z's throat started working up another round of gags, a wastepaper basket was shoved in his face.
"Thank you," he said as he threw up again.
With every heave, his mind was coming back online, his body, too. He stuffed two fingers down his throat to keep himself going. The faster he got that drug out of his system, the sooner he could go after Phury.
That heroic motherfucker... God. He was going to kill his twin for this, he really was. Phury was the one who was supposed to live.
But where the hell had he been taken? And how to find him? The movie theater was the starting place, but they wouldn't have stayed there long.
Zsadist started to do the dry-heave thing, because there was nothing left in his stomach. It was in the middle of the retching that the only solution came to him, and when it did, his stomach rolled from something other than the drug. The way to his twin violated every instinct he had.
More pounding down the hall. Vishous's voice. A civilian emergency. A family of six trapped in their house, surrounded by lessers.
Z lifted his head. Then his torso. Then he was up on his feet. His will, ever the only saving grace he had, came to the rescue again. It threw off more of the drug, focused him, cleared him out better than the vomiting.
"I'll get Phury," he told his brothers. "You go take care of business."
There was a brief pause. Then Wrath said, "So be it."
Chapter Forty-six
Bella sat in a Louis XIV chair, her legs crossed at the ankles, her hands in her lap. A blaze crackled in a marble fireplace to the left, and there was a cup of Earl Grey tea at her elbow. Marissa was across the way on a delicate sofa, drawing a strand of yellow silk up through an embroidery mesh. There was no sound to the movement.
Bella thought she was going to scream-
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She leaped up, energized by instinct. Zsadist... Zsadist was close by.
"What is it?" Marissa said.
Pounding on the front door lit off like a drum, and a moment later Zsadist came into the parlor. He was dressed for his business, guns on his hips, daggers strapped on his chest. The doggen right on his heels looked scared stiff of him.
"Leave us," Marissa was told. "And take your servant with you."
As the female hesitated, Bella cleared her throat. "It's okay. It's... Go."
Marissa inclined her head. "I won't be far."
Bella held herself in place as they were left alone.
"I need you," Zsadist said.
She narrowed her eyes. God, those words she had wanted to hear. How cruel that they came so late. "For what."