Chapter 26
“Thanks for the lift,” Adam said as he climbed out of Dmitri’s car.
It had taken them longer than expected to reach the hospital. Antonella’s wounds had reopened on the way to Gina’s house, requiring eight more stitches to repair the damage. Dmitri had given her painkillers and antibiotics, and by the time they left the house, the witch was fast asleep on the couch. With luck, she wouldn’t have much of a scar, but only time would tell.
Dmitri slipped the car into neutral and stared at Adam through the open passenger side window. “Do you want me to hang around?”
“Nah, it’s okay, but thanks. Go home to Gwen. She probably misses your ugly mug.” He laughed when Dmitri flipped him the middle finger.
It still seemed strange to think of Dmitri as mortal and happily married. But one look at the guy when he so much as thought about Gwen, and it was obvious he had it bad. And soon he’d be a father. Talk about surreal. If they had a girl, Adam could only imagine how the Russian would react when his daughter brought home her first boyfriend.
“Give my regards to Cassandra,” Dmitri said as he put the car back into gear. The engine rumbled when he pressed down on the gas, and Adam watched the receding taillights as the car rolled out of the lot.
Adam walked through the entrance, and the refreshing blast of air-conditioning made goose flesh rise on his arms. Even this late at night the place was busy, with doctors and nurses hurrying about, checking patients and administering treatments. In the hall, he passed an elderly patient in a wheelchair being pushed by an orderly. The scent of death clung to the old man, a sure sign he wouldn’t be around for much longer.
Before going upstairs, Adam made a quick detour to the gift shop. Since flowers weren’t allowed in the ICU, he bought a bouquet of Mylar balloons. Yeah, the witch had already gotten plenty of cards and gifts, but he couldn’t resist adding to her collection. Considering everything the poor woman had gone through, she deserved to be spoiled.
Stepping out of the elevator, he strode down the corridor leading to Cassie’s room. The room was empty, which didn’t surprise him, so he put the balloons on the table in front of the other gifts and sat by the window. He turned on the television that was mounted on the wall, flipping channels until he found an old action movie he hadn’t watched in a while. The movie was almost over when Cassie returned in a wheelchair pushed by a male orderly. The bruising around her face had lessened, and her eyes seemed clear and focused. Her entire right leg was wrapped in a cast, her toes poking out at the end.
“There’s my girl,” Adam said with a smile. “How are you feeling?”
Cassie winced as the orderly helped her get back into bed. “Well, I’m not ready to run any marathons, but I’m a lot better than I was this morning.”
The orderly draped the sheet over the lower half of her body. “If you need anything, just hit the red button on the side of the bed. I’ll be back when your discharge paperwork is ready.” He exited the room, leaving the wheelchair parked by the door.
“Where’s Marley?” Cassie asked as she settled back against the mattress.
“Probably still at the store. She said she was going to buy something for you to wear when we bust you out of this joint.”
The witch smiled. “Aw, ain’t she sweet?”
“Let me see if I can find where she’s at.” Adam reached for his phone, cursing himself for forgetting to turn it back on after taking care of Antonella. He powered it up and checked his messages, finding a text from Ruby and a voice mail message from Marlena. The sight of her number warmed him inside, so he ignored Ruby’s text and went straight to Marlena’s message.
And then his blood ran cold.
“What’s wrong?” Cassie asked, concern in her voice.
Not wanting to freak the poor woman out, he said, “Work emergency.” Before he totally lost his composure, he excused himself and exited the room.
He listened to the message again as he bolted down the hallway, his heart in his throat as he passed the nurses’ station and took the elevator down to the ground level. In a panic, he called Dmitri.
“Please tell me you can trace the location of a cell phone,” he said the instant Dmitri answered.
“Hello to you too,” the Russian replied coolly, the heavy rumble of a car engine in the background. “I take it this is important?”
“I wouldn’t be calling you if it wasn’t.” Adam dragged a hand through his hair while he prowled back and forth across the sidewalk in front of the hospital. He wasn’t used to feeling this helpless, and he hated it. “Look, can you do it or not?”
Dmitri muttered something in Russian and then the car’s engine went silent. “Give me the number.”
Adam did as he was asked.
Silence. “That’s the shifter’s phone.”
Adam wasn’t expecting him to recognize the number, but it made sense, considering his connection to Cassie. “Yeah. So? Can you help me find her or what?”
Dmitri grunted. “Of course I can. Tell me what happened while I power up my laptop.”
Anxious and impatient, Adam filled Dmitri in while the former reaper did his thing on the other end of the line. There was the faint sound of clicking on a keyboard, followed by a few more mutterings in Russian.
“How is Cassandra?” Dmitri asked between clicks.
The question caught Adam by surprise. “Much better. She’s leaving the hospital tonight.”
“That’s good to hear.” There was the sound of more keystrokes, and then Dmitri finally said, “Found her. She’s at the intersection of Lake Underhill and Chickasaw Trail.”
“That can’t be right. That’s the hospital. I’m here right now.”
In the background, Gwen spoke to Dmitri, but her voice was too low to make out the words. Dmitri said, “Good idea,” and then to Adam, “Hold on, let me check something.”
Each tick of the clock felt like an eternity while he waited for Dmitri to finish doing whatever he was doing. What the hell was taking him so long? Thoughts of what might be happening to Marlena flashed through his mind, and he ruthlessly shoved them aside. With his mate’s life hanging in the balance, now wasn’t the time to lose his head. He took several deep breaths to calm his nerves, but the panic still simmered beneath the surface.
“Okay, got it,” Dmitri said, and Adam almost jumped at the sound. “Both your phone and hers are in the same location, but Marlena’s is about eighty yards north of your position.”
North, north, which way was north? It took him a few seconds to gain his bearings, and then he turned right toward the parking lot. He broke into a run with the phone pressed to his ear, streaking between rows of cars. Still, he didn’t see anything. “How close am I?” he shouted into the phone.
“Almost there,” Dmitri replied. “About twenty-five feet, give or take. Turn slightly to your left.”
There weren’t many cars in this section of the lot, and Adam came to an abrupt halt when his pickup truck came into view. From where he stood, he saw glass on the ground, and the driver’s side door was ajar.
Blood roared in his ears as he raced toward the truck. He yanked the door open wider and switched on the dome light. There was broken glass on the seat and console, and the keys were in the ignition. And on the driver’s side floorboard was Marlena’s phone.
“Her phone’s in my truck,” he said as he stretched across the seat and picked it up. Aside from a few scuffmarks along the back it seemed to be in good shape. He switched it on, hoping to find something useful, but the phone was locked and password protected.
Shit, what now? He had no idea where she’d been taken. The thought of what that psycho might be doing to her made his stomach twist into knots. For all he knew, she could already be—
“Snap out of it,” Dmitri barked, as if sensing his panic through the phone. “You’re not going to find her unless you keep a clear head.”
“And what do you suggest I do? I don’t even know where to begin looking for her.” The only thought that sprang to mind was to call Ruby to see if Marlena’s name was included on any of the pending death lists.
“You’re her mate, are you not?”
“Yeah. What does that have to do with anything?”
“Your souls are bonded.” Dmitri said it like the answer was obvious. “So long as she’s still alive, you should be able to detect the bond.”
The thought hadn’t even occurred to him. Instead of her life force, he shifted his focus and mentally searched for the bond. It took a little while, but at last he found it, the faint hum in the back of his mind that had been with him for his entire life. The bond had grown stronger since he’d reconnected with Marlena, and now it also hummed in his blood whenever she was close by.
Could he possibly use it to find her?
Adam closed his eyes and sharpened his focus on the bond. It was like a tether connecting them, faint but refusing to be broken. In his mind, he felt it tugging to his right, and his eyes snapped open.
“Got her. She’s somewhere east of here.”
“Do you need backup?”
Considering he had no idea what he was walking into, it wouldn’t be a bad idea. “Where are you?”
“About ten minutes south of Ocala.”
Which meant he was roughly an hour away “Thanks, but I don’t have time to wait, so follow my signal. Oh, and could you call the coven and have someone pick up Cassie at the hospital? They’ll need some kind of excuse to explain why Marlena and I can’t do it.”
“Consider it done. Call if you need anything else.”
After wiping the broken glass from the seat, Adam started the truck and peeled out of the lot.
Marlena came to with a mind-splitting headache and a sense of impending doom. Every muscle in her body felt heavy and sluggish, most likely a lingering effect of whatever drug she’d been given.
The stench of fresh paint clung to the air, and her nose scrunched up at the smell. She cracked her eyes open, squinting against the harsh light overhead.
The room was small, with plain white walls and no furniture to speak of. Sheets of blue plastic covered the floor, and there was one small window off to her left with a plain white shade pulled over it.
As she suspected, she was lying on some kind of gurney, trussed up and completely immobile. She tried to move—nothing major, just a quick jerky movement with her arms and legs. No luck. From what she could tell, she was bound to the gurney by metal cuffs and layer upon layer of duct tape.
Where was her captor? There wasn’t anyone in sight. She strained to listen for signs of activity. There were muffled voices in one of the back rooms, but she couldn’t tell if it was coming from actual people or a television.
After a while the voices grew quiet, and the door at the end of the hall opened. Marlena squeezed her eyes shut and pretended to be asleep. The sound of footsteps thudded down the hall and came to a halt beside her.
The guy to her right stood so close she could smell the sweat from his body. “I told you, she’s out cold.”
One of them slapped her cheek hard enough for it to sting.
“Jesus, how much did you give her?” The sound of Jeremiah Brentwood’s voice sent a chill down her spine.
“I dosed her once in the parking lot and again when I got her inside the van.”
Cold fingers pressed against her neck. “You idiot. It’s a wonder she’s still alive.”
“Well, what was I supposed to do?” The other guy’s voice had turned sharp and whiny. “I couldn’t risk her waking up while I was driving. Besides, what’s the big deal if she died? We’re just gonna kill her anyway.”
Jeremiah blew out an exasperated exhale. “I want to know about the others. Once she tells me what they are and where I can find them, then we can go ahead and kill her.”
Now there’s an incentive to talk. Sarcasm wasn’t going to help her right now, so she kept her big mouth shut and continued to act like she was out cold.
She heard the sound of metal jingling, and then a door creaked open to her left. Seconds later, rough hands wrangled a thick metal band around her neck. She heard a soft click, and a warm prickly sensation skittered across her skin.
Shit. Just what she needed, another frigging collar. The magic in the metal dulled her senses and suppressed her abilities, making it impossible for her to shift. Now how was she supposed to escape? Fear shot through her, chilling her blood, and it took all of her willpower to remain motionless.
She thought of Adam, and she prayed he’d gotten her message. Because if he hadn’t, the next reaper she’d see would be the one coming to harvest her soul.