Lethal Game (GhostWalkers 16)

Amaryllis had to make a supreme effort to move. Everything hurt. Every bone in her body. Every muscle. Still, she forced herself to ease her body onto the mattress beside him. He wasn’t nearly as hot as he had been, and she was grateful for that. His arm went around her waist and he dragged her back into him until her butt was snuggled in the cradle of his hips.

She knew it was only a few minutes later before several men slipped into the room. She should have been up and ready to defend Malichai, but there was no tension in his body and no strength in hers, so she lay passively, but as alert as possible as they surrounded the bed. Two men went straight to Malichai’s side of the bed, while one pulled down the shade at the window and the other locked and stood in front of the door.

“Zeke,” Malichai greeted. “You got here fast.”

“What did you think I was going to do?” There was gruff affection in the voice. Ezekiel put his hand on Malichai’s forehead in the way a father might check for a temperature in his child.

The gesture choked Amaryllis up. She was uncomfortable with Malichai curled around her so intimately with so many strangers in the room and she shifted position as if to get up. All that did was draw Ezekiel’s attention.

“You must be Amaryllis. Thank you for saving my brother’s life. Just stay there. I know it must have been tough on you. You rest while Rubin does the rest.”

Rubin. The true miracle worker. She looked at the man. He looked striking. Handsome. Dark hair, dark lashes. If she didn’t have excellent night vision, she wouldn’t have been able to see him in the blacked-out room. She had a feeling that might have been deliberate, but she couldn’t help staring. This man had a skill probably only one or two other people on earth had.

He didn’t waste time asking questions. Or even speaking at all. He simply crooked his finger at Malichai and Malichai rolled over to lay straight. Amaryllis sat up so she could see better. Rubin spread his palms above the leg and moved upward from the ankle to the hip slowly. There was no expression on his face, but Amaryllis suddenly felt a heaviness in her chest. The pressure was so severe she pushed with both hands against it.

There was no light bursting beneath his palms. Nothing to indicate he was working, but that pressure she felt told her he was. Just as her body took the brunt of the healing process, his had to be doing so as well. She admired his efficiency, but she wished she dared ask him questions and that she could see what he was doing. It was impossible not to be curious. She could push out infections and bind together a broken bone, but she couldn’t actually perform a surgery on a person. She might hold an artery together for a short length of time, but he could repair it, he could do what surgeons couldn’t when it came to actually putting together a human body.

She understood, probably better than the GhostWalkers, why Rubin’s ability had to be kept a secret from Whitney and the rest of the world. She also understood that just by giving her that knowledge, she was being included in their circle, accepted into their family because of Malichai, and if she ever tried to betray them, she would be hunted by every GhostWalker alive and they would never stop until she was dead. That was the code they lived by. And she would live by it too. She would protect this man and his gift as well.

Another hour passed. She chewed on her bottom lip. No one moved. No one fidgeted. She didn’t like that so much time slipped by. That meant, in spite of all the work she’d done, there was so much more to do. Had she missed some fractures? What was really wrong with Malichai’s bone that it continued to have those small fractures erupt around the original bullet wounds? It didn’t make sense. She tried to puzzle it out. A few times she felt eyes on her and found the man standing in front of the door watching her.

That was Trap, the owner of the plane. The genius. The one Malichai’d said had Asperger’s and wasn’t always nice to everyone but was a good friend. Mordichai, his brother, stood in front of the window, making certain no one could catch a glimpse of Rubin working, not that she thought they would have a clue what he was doing.

Eventually Rubin straightened and lifted a hand to his neck to ease his sore muscles. “This is certainly interesting, Malichai.” He looked around, saw the armchair and immediately went to it and sank down. There was weariness in his voice.