Marked (Primal Obsessions #2) - Cara Wylde Page 0,44

really cared. A little, in their own way.

Barehanded, Jack and his minions wouldn’t have stood a chance, but armed to the teeth as they were? Bullets were raining down upon the shifters, and I struggled more and more against my bindings, like a mad, desperate woman, hurting myself and causing blood to soak the tape. I would’ve thought the lubrication might help, but it didn’t. And then the shooting stopped, as well as the growling.

I would have rather died. I would’ve rather had my ex-husband kill me than to live with the knowledge that I had caused Brooks, Colt and Lincoln to die, leaving behind a truly orphaned Milo. It wasn’t fair. Why should the true monster live, and the bears die just for being different? It was all my fault, and I would pay for my sins.

Sobs wrecked my body, and when the door fell to the ground, in a stomach-twisting repeat of events from not too long ago, I screamed around the gag in my mouth. Everything happened fast. Colt untied me, and in minutes, he was confessing his love to me. I almost couldn’t believe it. I wanted to soak it all up. I wanted to fall into his arms and let him hold me for hours, but I couldn’t. He was hurt, and Lincoln seemed to be in an even worse state. Brooks was trying to tend to his wounds. It was my turn to help them.

I shook the last ten minutes out of my memory and looked at them. Yes, those bullets needed to come out.

“Okay, tell me what to do.”

I would be strong for them, even if I didn’t have the slightest idea about how one removed bullets. I wasn’t a doctor. The most I had ever removed had been splinters.

“Do you have any alcohol in here?” Brooks asked.

“I know Jack’s a drinker. He must have packed something, let me see,” I replied and rummaged through every drawer and cabinet, until I remembered his duffel bag. Sure enough, there it was, a bottle of his favorite cheap whiskey. “Will this do?”

“Just fine, Rosalie,” Brooks said, and just hearing my name pour from his lips made me melt. “Ro, focus!”

“Ah, yes, sorry! What else now?”

“Bathroom, fresh towels, lighters and anything sharp. You have to dig it out of him.”

Dig it out of him? With what? I looked at the knives that were still in the duffel.

“Will these do?” I raised a few in the air and let them dangle from my fingers. I had never used knives like these before. Kitchen knives, to cut bread or peel potatoes – those I was used to. These looked so wrong, like butcher’s knives, and I was sure cutting Colt and Lincoln, or digging anything out with them, was going to hurt like a motherfucker. The blade was thick and wide.

“Yes, now the rest? Hurry, please,” he barked harshly.

I knew he didn’t mean to do that, but yes, I needed to hurry. I grabbed the whiskey, the knives and the lighter, taking a moment to appreciate the irony that I was now thankful for Jack’s vices and violence. What used to make me cower in fear, his drunken rages and his scary weapons, would now serve to save my beloved bears.

I followed them all into the bathroom.

“Now what?”

“Lincoln first,” Colt said. “I’m okay. I can wait a while longer.”

Brooks lay Lincoln down onto the cold floor. The big man with his long, bushy beard and kind eyes looked up at me. I shuddered. I remembered what we’d done together, how he’d tied me up and suspended me from that three in the woods, and then how they’d all given me pleasure way beyond what my poor body could stand.

“Don’t be afraid,” he croaked. Jack and his guys had really done a number on him. At least Colt could walk on his own, but Lincoln… From what I could tell, he could barely breathe. “Just get them out, and I’ll be fine. I’ll heal on my own.”

My palms were sweaty. Now that I was here, in the bathroom, ready to do something I’d never done before, I wasn’t so sure about it. I’d only seen it done in movies, and I knew those weren’t real. What if I messed up? Brooks snapped me out of my trance.

“Out with the bullet,” he grunted. “Pour some of that whiskey onto the blade, cut him open, dig it out, and then heat the blade to cauterize the blood vessels, to help him