nor Tohr tried to stop her or talk sense into her. Which proved they were highly intelligent males.
She pounded down the hall in her bare feet to Zsadist's room, and after she slammed the door shut, she went for the phone as if the thing were a weapon. She dialed her brother's cell.
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Rehvenge picked up and snapped, "Who are you and how did you get this number?"
"Don't you dare do this to me."
There was a long silence. Then: "Bella... I-Hold on a second." A shuffling sound came through the phone; then he said in a cutting voice, "He'd better get over here right now. We clear? If I have to go after him, he's not going to like it." Rehvenge cleared his throat as he came back on. "Bella, where are you? Let me come pick you up. Or have one of the warriors take you to our house and I'll meet you there."
"You think I'm coming anywhere near you now?"
"It's better than the alternative," he said grimly.
"And what's that?"
"The Brothers forcibly returning you to me."
"Why are you doing-"
"Why am I doing this?" His voice sank into the deep, demanding bass she was so used to. "Do you have any idea what the last six weeks have been like for me? Knowing that you were in the hands of those goddamned things? Knowing that I put my sister... my mother's daughter... in that place?"
"It was not your fault-"
"You should have been home!"
As always, the sandblast of Rehv's fury shook her, and she was reminded that on some basic level her brother had always scared her a little.
But then she heard him take a deep breath. And another. Then a curious desperation crept into his words.
"Christ, Bella... just come home, Mahmen and I, we need you here. We miss you. We... I need to see you to believe you're really okay."
Ah, yes... Now the other side of him, the one she actually loved. The protector. The provider. The tenderhearted, gruff male who had always given her everything she had ever needed.
The temptation to submit to him was strong. But then she pictured herself never being allowed out of the house again. Which was something he was damn well capable of doing to her.
"Will you rescind the sehclusion request?"
"We'll talk about it when you're sleeping in your own bed again."
Bella gripped the phone. "That means no, doesn't it?" There was a pause. "Hello? Rehvenge?"
"I just want you home."
"Yes or no, Rehv. Tell me now."
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"Our mother can't live through something like this again."
"And you think I can?" she shot back. "Excuse me, but mahmen wasn't the one who ended up with a lesser's name carved into her stomach!"
The instant the words left her mouth, she cursed. Yeah, that kind of happy little detail was really going to bring him around. Way to negotiate.
"Rehvenge-"
His voice went utterly cold. "I want you home."
"I've just been in captivity, I'm not volunteering for jail."
"And just what are you going to do about it?"
"Keep pushing me around and you'll find out."
She ended the call and slammed the cordless unit down on the bedside table. Goddamn him!
On a crazy impulse, she grabbed the receiver and spun around, ready to hurl it across the room.
"Zsadist!" She fumbled with the phone, catching it, holding it against her chest.
Standing silently next to the door, Zsadist was wearing running shorts and no shirt... and for some absurd reason she noticed that he didn't have shoes on either.
"Throw it if you want," he said.
"No. I... ah... no." She turned away and put the thing back on its little stand, taking two tries to get it in right.
Before she faced Zsadist again, she thought of him crouched over that lesser, beating it to death... But then she remembered him bringing her things from her house... and taking her there... and letting her have his vein though he'd cracked wide-open at the invasion. As she pivoted around toward him, she was tangled in the net of him, caught between the kindness and the cruelty.
He broke the silence. "I don't want you running half-cocked into the night because of what your brother's up to. And don't tell me that isn't what you're thinking."
Damn, he was smart. "But you know what he wants to do to me."
"Yeah."
"And by law the Brotherhood will have to give me up, so I can't stay here. You think I like the only option I've got?"