"Is my father. You're still going to work for me, like I said. That hasn't changed. " Lash headed for the door as the urge to run got too strong to fight. "I'll send someone for you. "
"Please. . . don't leave me. " Watery eyes implored and a stained hand reached out. "Please. . . "
Lash's ribs seized up hard, compressing his lungs to the point of malfunction, until he could draw no more air down his throat.
"Someone will come for you. "
Out of the door, out of the house, out of the mess. He hustled for his Mercedes, got behind the wheel, and locked himself in the car. Tearing out of the farmhouse's short driveway, it took him about three miles before he could breathe properly and it wasn't until he saw the skyscrapers of downtown that he felt more himself.
As he headed to the brownstone, he called Mr. D two more times and got voice mail, and then. . . voice mail.
Taking a right down the alley to the garage, he was ready to fire the phone out the window in frustration--
Easing off on the gas pedal, he let another car go past him. . . but he didn't slow down just to be courteous to his neighbor's Porsche.
The door to the brownstone's garage was wide open and Mr. D's Lexus was parked right in there. Not protocol.
That and all the no-answering was a red flag the size of Texas and Lash's first thought was of Xhex. If those motherfucking Brothers had taken her, he was going to stake them out on the lawn and let the sun take them nice and slow.
Closing his eyes, he sent his instincts outward. . . and after a moment, he could sense Mr. D, but the signal was way dim. Nearly imperceptible.
The fucker had obviously been dusted, but not finished off yet.
When a car came up behind him and honked its horn, he realized he was stopped dead in the middle of the lane.
Ordinarily, his first move would have been to pull the Mercedes into the garage and flash into the brownstone with his fists up. . . but he was half-mast at best, all sluggish and woozy. And in the event the Brothers were still inside, now was not the time to engage his enemy.
Even lessers could wake up dead. Even the son of the evil could be sent home.
But what about his female?
Dogged by an odd, cold terror, Lash went farther down the alley, and took one right and then another. As he trolled by the front of his house, he prayed like a little bitch that she was still--
Looking up to the windows on the second floor, he saw her in the bedroom--and his relief was so powerful his breath left him on a wheeze. No matter what might have gone down in that house, no matter who had infiltrated, Xhex was still there where he had left her: Her face was plain for him, and only him, to see on the far side of that glass, her eyes lifted up to the sky, her hand raised to her throat.
What a lovely picture, he thought. Her hair was growing out and starting to curl and the moonlight on her high cheekbones and perfect lips was downright romantic.
She was still his.
Lash forced himself to keep driving. The thing was, she was safe where she was--his invisible prison was impenetrable by any vampire or human or lesser, whether it was a Brother or just any old schmo with a gun and an attitude.
If he went in there, and got into a skirmish with the Brothers? If he was injured? He was going to lose her, because that spell she was trapped in took energy for him to maintain. He was already having enough trouble summoning the strength to keep it going--and though he despised his weakness, he was a fucking realist.
It killed him to keep going. Absolutely killed him.
But it was the right decision. If he wanted to keep her, he had to leave her behind until dawn cleared that brownstone out.
It took him a while to realize he was driving around aimlessly, but the truth was, the idea of going back to crash at one of those shitty little ranches that the Lessening Society owned made him want to peel the skin off his face.
Man, was the dawn never going to come. . .
On some level, he couldn't believe he was so ball- less as to be pulling a drive-off. But on the other hand, he was having trouble keeping his head up and his eyes open behind the wheel. As he started over Caldwell's westbound bridge, he just didn't get the tired routine. The sores could well be from the battles with Xhex, but the exhaustion was--
The answer occurred to him as he glanced over at the eastbound lanes. It was so obvious and yet it struck him with such force that his foot eased off the accelerator.
East and west. Left and right. Night and day.
Of course feeding from Mr. D had only nominally helped him.