Fourth Debt (Indebted #5)(41)

Three weeks?

Fuck, I couldn’t wait that long.

Even three days drove me insane.

I shook my head. “I can’t be a—away for that l—length of ti—time.”

Don’t give up on me, Nila.

I had to be there to keep her safe. She couldn’t be subjected to more horror—especially at the hands of my bastard father and brother.

Fuck, f*ck, f*ck!

My heart squeezed like a f*cking lemon, cauterizing my insides with citric acid at the thought of her being so vulnerable and alone.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Ambrose, but you’re not fit to leave. And you’re under my care until I say you are.” Turning his attention to the nurse, he waved her closer. “Give me that phone number. We best let the family know he’s awake.”

My heart burst through my ribs. “Wh—what family?”

Don’t tell my bastard father.

I’d be poisoned or slaughtered before the day was done.

Doctor Louille reached for the phone on the white bedside table. Everything in the room was either white, glass, or light blue. A flat-screen TV hung on the wall, while a small table and chairs squashed in the corner.

“The woman who dropped you here, of course.” He gnawed on his bottom lip as he dialled a number and put the phone to his ear. He waited for it to connect. “Yes, hello, Ms. Ambrose? Yes, it’s Doctor Jack Louille calling.”

A pause.

“I have some good news. He’s just woken up. I’ll put him on.”

Covering the mouthpiece, he passed the phone to me. My mind whirled, trying to keep up. I shook my head. What if this was a trap? What if it was Bonnie?

The doctor didn’t take my hesitation as any sign to stop his persistence. “It’s your sister. She’s called every hour for the past few days. Get her off my back and let her know you’re okay.” Nudging the phone into my hands, he said, “Talk to her. Rest. I’ll be back later to answer any more questions and assess your pain levels. And keep your arse in bed, or else.”

My fingers curled around the phone.

No promises.

I was running as soon as I could breathe without wanting to throw up.

I trembled, battling tiredness and the thought of talking to someone still at Hawksridge, someone I loved, someone I’d failed as much as I’d failed Nila.

Waiting until the doctor and nurse had left, I held the phone to my mouth. “H—hello?”

The longest pause crackled in my ear.

“H—hello? You there?”

A sniff came down the line. “About bloody time, you bloody arse.”

My heart beat stronger.

I might have failed Nila.

I might have been dead for a few days.

But Jasmine had achieved the impossible. If she’d kept me alive, I had to trust she’d done the same for Nila.

“You al—always had a gr—great way with your t—temper, Jaz.”

“God, it’s truly you…” Her voice broke then she burst into noisy tears.



I found out later what she’d done for us. How she’d saved us. How Flaw had kept Kes and me alive long enough to smuggle us from the estate unseen. How he’d hidden us in the crypt, providing medicine, leaving us to slowly fossilize and turn into skeletons beneath the house I’d lived in all my life—working against the clock to get us somewhere safe.

I owed Flaw a huge debt. I would pay him handsomely. But I would also never underestimate my sister or take her for granted ever again. I couldn’t believe she’d willingly left Hawksridge.

After a lifetime of chaining herself to the Hall, she’d commandeered one of the many vehicles in our garage and somehow delivered Kes and me to the hospital. From the way the doctors spoke, it sounded as if she’d only just made it. Another hour or two and Kestrel would’ve been dead and me not long after.

How she managed to do that, I had no idea. The phone call had been brief, hushed—a quick catch-up so Bonnie wouldn’t overhear. Her relief had been genuine, but she’d also kept something from me.

Something I meant to find out.

After I hung up, the nurse had slipped back in and against my wishes fed more sedative into my drip.

I couldn’t try to run. I couldn’t assess how weak I was. All I could do was slip into empty dreams like some drugged arsehole. Nila didn’t come visit me and I awoke pissed and hurting a few hours later.

Kestrel stole my thoughts for the billionth time since I’d woken. My heart splintered for my brother.

According to Louille, he still hadn’t woken up. He was in intensive care and an induced coma. The bullet I’d saved Jaz from had been a clean shot. By Louille’s own admission, I was a ‘luckster’, a fluke of nature, a f*cking miracle. No bones shattered, no organs ruptured. A single entry and exit wound leaving me bleeding and infected but otherwise intact.

But if I was a miracle, then that came with certain obligations and privileges.

Privileges I would call on in order to end the man who’d killed me.

Obligations I meant to uphold now I was free.

I’d returned from the dead.

And I’d bring the wrath of hell toward my enemies.





DIARY ENTRY, EMMA Weaver.

He told me tonight. Lying in my arms, believing he was safe, he told me what he did to his brother. Part of me can understand it—to spend a lifetime being told you’re second best, only to snap when something you want more than anything torments you. But another part of me could never understand because I could never be that selfish, self-centred, or cruel. One thing is for sure—his children are damned. Even the ones not infected with his madness are ruined because of what their father did to their mother and uncle.