“He gets to live another night.”
“Lucky him, this place is an amusement park just full of fun and games.” Lucan crossed his arms over his chest. “Your guards thought they’d done you a favor, because they didn’t know our arrangement—which is what happens when you hire mercenaries. They only get part of the job right. And you thought you’d lost your connection with Mozart. You were pissed, and because this wolf didn’t have a collar, you weren’t sure whether it was me or not. Oops.”
“You make a lot of assumptions.”
Whatever, he thought.
“All I know for sure is that you don’t want this kind of trouble.” He nodded down at the body. “When he doesn’t come back, others will search for him.”
“And exactly what kind of trouble do you think I’ll be in?”
“If they get into this facility, it’ll turn into the biggest takeout restaurant you’ve ever seen—and you’re on the menu.”
The Executioner smiled again, flashing his fangs. “No one can get in or out of here without my knowledge.”
Oh, really, Lucan thought. “Aren’t you a clever little bitch.”
The Executioner stepped forward until they were nose to nose. “Watch yourself, wolf. You can easily be in your family member’s position.”
“He’s not my family, at least not in his opinion. That’s how I ended up here. And if you want to put a bullet in me, do it where it counts.” Lucan put his arms wide. “Right in the heart.”
As the Executioner’s face hardened, it was clear that the male didn’t like the shift.
And not in the wolven’s assumption of its human-like form.
The power dynamic was not what it had started out as, with Lucan the only one who had a weakness to exploit. Now . . . the Executioner wanted something only Lucan could provide.
Tricksy, tricksy.
“I’m waiting,” Lucan snapped.
Even as Rio was telling herself that she needed to get going, explore what she could, find a way out, get back to Caldwell . . . she parted the curtains that fell from the ceiling. Over on the bed, lying on his back . . . a burn patient was in a terrible state: His face was a raw wound, the features swollen and glistening, the eyes forced shut by the injuries. The rest of his torso and arms were just as bad, nothing but raw meat that was left unbandaged, likely because any kind of gauze would just stick and become entangled— The man who had attacked her burst up from a chair that had been pulled in close to the bedside.
Before he could come at her, she put the gun up to his face. “Sit the fuck down, this isn’t about you.”
The chuckle from the patient cut through a subtle whirring sound. “Yes, Apex. Do sit down.”
There was a tension-filled moment. And then “Apex” lowered himself back into the chair.
Rio again turned her head toward the poor man in the bed. His only treatment, that she could see, was a small fan set on top of a cardboard box, the cooling air traveling across his ravaged skin.
“Are you okay,” she said roughly.
Stupid question.
“My dear,” came the response. “How kind of you to ask.”
Rio glanced at the Apex guy. He was watching her like in his mind he was ripping her arms off with his bare hands and beating her to death with the stumps. But he didn’t make another move toward her. It was as if he were a predator and his leash was in the patient’s hold.
Rio approached the other side of the bed. She kept the gun up, just in case.
“Can’t the nurse help you? Or can we get you to a doctor?”
The patient didn’t turn to her. His face stayed angled straight at the ceiling above him, not that he could see anything. She was willing to guess it was just too painful for him to move anything, even in the slightest way.
No doubt mere breath was a struggle.
“I am as well as I can be.” The patient’s rasp was softer now, as if he were running out of strength. And yet his tone and accent struck her as highbrow. “I am simply waiting out a process that began some weeks and weeks prior. And you, how fare you? Have you been aided?”
Looking around again—but like she’d missed anything?—Rio saw no monitoring of vitals, no IV, no medications.
“You need to go to a hospital.”
The other man answered. “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”
“Excuse me?” Rio lowered the gun. “Oh, so the condition he’s in is totally compatible with life. Right. Glad you pointed this out to me, because I was assuming he needed some medical help—”