His eyes bulged. “Ewwaaah.”
I spat. Blood sprayed from his mouth and mine.
The Imago threw back his head and screamed. His tongue hung by a strip.
I angled the blade over his softening dick.
A hand circled my wrist. I snapped my gaze up and met the doctor’s. Where the hell did he come from?
I tightened my fingers around the hilt. A depression of his thumb forced my hand open. The blade clanked to the floor.
“Ew do?” The Imago cried.
Hands tucked in elbows, the doctor leaned against the wall. “Saved your life.”
I looked into the Imago’s tear streaked eyes. “Saved his dick, actually. I’m afraid it’s too late to save his larger organ.”
He pawed at his mouth and ripped the flopping flesh all the way off. “Aaaah. Ew itch.”
The doctor remained unmoved. “Get out, Siraj, before you have to explain to your brother what you were doing in here.”
A shadow passed over his screwed-up expression. He gathered his pants and weapons and shouldered past the doctor. When the chamber door slammed behind him, I found myself locked behind bars with another monster. Unfortunately, the doctor wasn’t stupid enough to bring in weapons.
I rinsed my mouth with a pitcher, dressed and sat on the bed. “Let’s get this over with.”
He held his post on the wall. “Proud of yourself?”
I shrugged. “I’ve had cleaner cuts with a blade. Didn’t get the timing right.”
He read my eyes, saw the truth there. “That right?” He pushed a hand through his hair. “I don’t hold you responsible for what happened.”
“Gee, thanks.”
“I talked to your priest.”
So his lies continued.
“His cooperation wasn’t forthcoming. He decided if you thought him dead, we would lose our leverage.”
My jab hand curled in my lap.
“But I made sure he understood that his death had broken you.”
I rubbed the vein at my elbow, one of the many bruised blood taps I’d offered without fight. His death did break me.
He pushed away from the wall and knelt before me. “In Malta, the children used to sing Nannakola, mur l-iskola, aqbad siggu u ibda oghla.” His expression softened. “Ladybird, go to school, get a chair and start jumping.”
I gasped and covered it with my hand. “What did you say?”
He pulled my hand from my mouth. “His sign. The ladybirds. The Nannakola.” He squeezed my hand. Lifted my chin with the other. “You are hallowed.”
I stopped breathing.
“That’s what he called you.”
Oh, my sentimental Irishman. “Infection?”
“He’s human. No bites.”
My chest expanded. Then it heaved with the thunder of my breaths. He lived. Oh God, he lived.
The lines around the doctor’s eyes faded. Tenderness touched his features. Too tender. Was that his game? To break me then rebuild me? I jerked my hand away and jumped from the bed. “Where is he?”
“Two floors down.”
“In a cell like this?”
“The same. But no visitors.” He tipped his head to the rafters. “And the view’s not as good.”
No visitors? “Are you starving him?” I couldn’t keep my voice from hitching.
“The human staff delivers his meals.”
“Why did you let me think he was dead all this time?”
He stood, eyes fastened on mine. “He’s alive because if his death didn’t break you, his torture would.”
My jaw clenched to the verge of pain. “Free him and my cooperation will be without bounds.”
“I cannot.”
My shoulders sagged. “Let me see him. Move him here. He can stay in my cell.”
“Aiman and Siraj cannot know their plan has been compromised.”
Or they’d move to Plan B. Roark’s torture. “So I pretend to be broken. Why is that important?”
His eyes narrowed. “You’ve exceeded your questions. My turn. What are the black spots on your back?”
No idea. “Never seen them before.”
Lines rutted his forehead. Then he nodded at my chest, where the blouse had fallen away from my scar. “How’d you get that?”
Of all the questions. I gathered the material at my collar, covering the atrocity. “A prig of a man deemed me the devil and attempted a mastectomy.”
His face smoothed into a blank canvas. “Does he live?”
Same question Roark asked. I shook my head.
“It was deep. Through the muscle. It hit bone?”
He knew the extent of the damage, had scrutinized it under the slide of soap. I lifted a shoulder.
“The stitching was a sorry attempt. Who did it?”
I shrugged again. “Who cares?” Then his drawn eyebrows compelled me to say, “I did.”
He cleared his throat. “I see.”
We stared at one another in a suspended moment. Whatever his plan was, he had returned my will to fight. I would escape that damn island with Roark in tow. The key was in my physiology, in the vials the Drone collected every day. What did the doctor know about my blood?
Time to pull my head out of my ass and find out. I crooked my lips.
His brow furrowed, and he spun on his heel.
Maybe the doctor wasn’t as unaffected by me as I originally assumed. I didn’t know his intentions, but I could leverage his give-and-take to find out. I let my smile fill my face as I admired his retreating backside for the first time.