Lover at Last (Black Dagger Brotherhood #11)(126)
Author: J.R. Ward

Qhuinn murmured some thanks at that point.

And then V glanced at Blay. Looked at Qhuinn. Cleared his throat.

Yup, the Brother was doing all kinds of math in his head. Great.

"So you guys just keep hanging here. I’ll come out and update you as soon as I know anything. So. Yeah."

The Brother’s brows lifted high on his forehead, the tattoos at his temple distorting as he tamped out his barely smoked hand-rolled on the sole of his shitkicker.

"Be with you in a few," he said as he ducked back inside.

In the wake of the Brother’s departure, Qhuinn paced around, eyes on the concrete floor, hands on his lean hips, weapons that he’d neglected to take off catching the fluorescent light and glinting.

"I’m going to go have a smoke," Blay said. "I’ll be right back."

"You can light up here," Qhuinn cut in. "There’s a seal on the door."

"I need a little fresh air. I won’t be long, though."

"Okay."

Blay strode off in a hurry, gunning for the door at the far end of the corridor that opened into the parking garage. When he got to the thing, he punched his way out and breathed in deep.

Fresh air, his ass. All he got was a noseful of dry, earthy, concrete-y stuff.

At least it was cooler, though.

Fuck.

He’d left his cigarettes in his goddamn jacket. On the floor. Outside of the OR.

As he cursed and stomped around, he was tempted to hit something – but a set of busted knuckles was just one more thing he’d have to explain to people.

And shit knew the eyeful V had just gotten was more than enough.

Pushing his hands into the pockets of his leathers, he frowned as the one on the right shoved into something.

Saxton’s lighter. The one the male had given him on his birthday.

Taking the thing out, he turned it over and over in his palm, thinking about everything that had been said in that corridor.

There had been a time when he would have taken those words and put them on the mantelpiece of his head and his heart, giving them pride of place that ensured their preciousness stayed with him for the rest of his living days.

There had been so many years when those moments at that cabin and on that cold, hard floor just now would have been enough to clear away all the conflict, and the strife, and the pain, wiping everything clean such that he could relate as a virgin would to Qhuinn.

Fresh start.

All not just forgiven, but forgotten.

That was no longer the case.

God, he was probably too young to be this old, but life had a way of being about experience, rather than calendar days. And standing out here, alone, he was positively geriatric: He was absolutely, totally, completely fresh out of the optimistic, rose-colored naivete that came with a younger person’s outlook on life.

When one believed that miracles were not impossible…but merely unusual.

Thank f**k V had come out when he had.

Otherwise, three little words would have leaked from his mouth. And undoubtedly doomed him in ways he couldn’t even guess at.

Bad time. Bad place.

For that kind of thing.

Forever.

Chapter Sixty-five

As iAm paced around the apartment, he kept his gun on him – even though it was highly unlikely that there would be a round two with some naked bimbo jacking her way into his and his brother’s home-sweet-home.

Goddamn it, he wanted some red smoke. Just to take the edge off.

Because, right now? He was on the edge of violence.

The good news, he supposed, was that he didn’t really have a target, and that was effectively keeping him in check: That migraine was beating the hell out of his brother. And that poor, used-up woman that had been frog-marched out of here? She was already being tortured on too many levels to count. Now, the security guard was an excellent candidate – but the motherfucker had gotten off an hour ago, and iAm wasn’t going to leave Trez in a vulnerable state just so he could issue a correction to an imbecile –

Off in the distance, he heard a whispering through the plumbing pipes.

It was the toilet in Trez’s bathroom being flushed. Again.

And then came the muttered cursing, and the creak of the bed frame as Trez resettled into his bed.

Poor. Bastard.

iAm went over to the huge windows that faced the river, and stopped to stare across the water at Caldwell’s opposite side. Putting his hands on his hips, he ran through the places they could move to. Short list. Hell, one of the main benes of the Commodore had been its security; they hadn’t even bothered with turning the alarm on.

Which had been a mistake.

They needed someplace safe. Secure. Impregnable.

Especially if his brother continued with the hit-it-and-quit-it shit, and AnsLai kept doing "diplomatic" drive-bys.

iAm resumed his pacing. It was impossible to ignore the fact that his brother was getting worse. The sexual stuff had been going on for years – and for the longest time, iAm had just chalked it up to a healthy male’s drive for mating.

Something that he had often thought he lacked.

Then again, his brother had been f**king enough females for the both of them.

In recent months, however, it had become clear that there was an addiction process at work – and that had been even before the high priest had started showing up. Now that things seemed to be coming to a head with AnsLai? The s’Hisbe’s machinations were just going to put more pressure on his brother, and that was going to make him act out even more.

Shit. iAm felt like he was standing in front of a train crossing, triangulating the speed of the locomotive’s engine with the approach of an oncoming car…and seeing the carnage that was going to result. The metaphor was also apt when it came to the helplessness he felt because he couldn’t put the brakes on either force: He wasn’t behind the wheel or in the engineer’s seat. All he could do was sit back and watch.

Or scream at the side of the road was more like it.

Where the hell could they go –

Frowning, he lifted his eyes up from the view, up past the molding, up to the ceiling.

After a moment, he took out his cell phone and made a call.

When he hung up, he went down to his brother’s room. Opening the door a crack, he said into the dense, black silence, "I’m going out for a second. Won’t be long."

Trez’s moan could have meant anything from, "Cool," to, "Oh, God, not so loud," to, "Have fun, I’m going to hang here and hurl some more."

iAm walked fast. Out of the apartment. To the elevator.

Inside of which, he hit the button marked "P" for "Penthouse."

When the doors slid open, there were two choices: One direction took him to the Brother Vishous’s place. The other to his old friend’s.

He strode down and rang Rehvenge’s bell.