In For the Kill (McClouds & Friends #11)(114)

“One last thing.” Sveti crouched beside Sasha, straightening his limbs. She folded his arms over his chest and bent to kiss his forehead.

Sam stared at the body of the man he’d judged and scolded. He swallowed over the tight, burning ache. “Hurry,” he rasped.

The trip back to the car was a nightmare, without the guidance of the kid on the bike. They got disoriented, which doubled the agonizing trip. Sam shuffled like a zombie, leaving a trail of blood, but giving up wasn’t an option. He was too heavy to drag, and he dared not leave her alone.

At one point, the boy popped up and skidded to a stop, eyes huge.

They must look like horror movie escapees. Sveti’s white dress was plastered to her body. Her hair hung in blood-matted strands. Sam looked worse, draped over her shoulder. Shotgun clutched in his grip.

Sam fixed the kid with a menacing stare. “Hai visto un altro tizio in giro?” Have you seen another guy around here?

The kid nodded. “Se ne andato con la macchina.” He left with the car.

“Ti ha visto?” He saw you?

The child shook his head violently.

“Bene,” Sam muttered. “Vattene. Sparisci.”

The boy didn’t need to be told twice. He pedaled frantically away.

“What was that about?” Sveti asked.

“He says the guy drove away, and didn’t see him,” Sam said. “I hope to God it’s true.”

Their car came into sight. Then came the task of prying the key out of Sam’s blood-stiffened jeans pocket, it being unpleasantly close to one of his nastiest wounds. Sveti pried them loose, to the tune of his foul, virulent cursing, and dumped all their weapons into the trunk.

She unlocked the car, now smeared with blood where Sam had sagged over it, and strapped him into the passenger’s seat. She got the car onto the road and floored it. He almost instantly started to drift off.

Her voice sounded far away. “Stay with me, Sam! Don’t pass out!”

“Call the cops.” He put the words in a bottle and sent it bobbing gently across the ocean stretching out between them. Wider, wider.

“First, let me find you a hospital! Damn it, Sam! Look at me!”

“Castellana,” he muttered. “Follow . . . signs. Ospedale.”

“Yes! I’m not an idiot! I know that much!” she snapped.

He gathered all his energy to launch another bottle into that swiftly widening ocean. “Sveti. Tell me . . . something.”

“What?” she prompted. “Anything! Keep talking! Stay with me!”

“The last thing Sasha said. In . . . Ukrainian. What was it?”

She tried to speak, but her words choked off into a sob. “He said, be happy. Goddamn him! It’s a sick joke. Your best friend is bleeding to death in your arms, and he says, be happy? Fuck that! Fuck happy!”

“No.” The water was so wide now, so vast, but he had to say this to her. It was so important. “Don’t. Sasha’s . . . right.”

“What?” He could barely hear her high, frantic voice. “Stay awake, Sam! I need you! Don’t leave me alone!”

“It’s not . . . too much to ask.” His voice was groggy. “Happiness. . . for you. I want that, too. I’m with him. I want that.”

“Fuck!” She swerved out of the path of an oncoming car. Its shrill horn dopplered out behind them. “Goddamnit, Sam! This isn’t helping!”

But he couldn’t understand her anymore. He was looking at Sasha’s face now, on some mysterious plane of existence between life and death. The dead man’s dark, direct gaze burned right into him.

He looked back, chastened. Nice move, dude. Hell of an exit.

Sasha had done it. He’d pulled off another shining moment of pure, high-octane heroism, and Sam had to love him for it, even though it was a brutal f*ck-you-and-the-horse-you-rode-in-on.

As well as a mortal challenge. Sam could practically hear the guy say the words as he sank down to a deeper layer of consciousness.

Top this, dickhead. Go on. Knock yourself out. I’ll be watching.





CHAPTER 23

A golden thread in the darkness led him through the maze of evil dreams. Blood, violence, gunshots, guts, screams. Dead, empty eyes.

He clung to the thread, following it blindly. Trusting it.

Shrill beeping, smothering gauze on his face. People manipulating his body. So much pain. He finally clawed his way up close enough to the light to frame the sensation. To name it.

The clasp of her hand. That was it. Sveti’s hand was the golden thread, and the touch of her skin on his was the sweet, unspoken promise that there was something worth waking up for.

Even so, he regretted opening his eyes. The light hurt.

Several attempts later, he kept them open long enough to place himself. A hospital room. Scarred metal bedstead. Walls painted a pale, industrial green. A crucifix hung on the wall in his line of sight.

He swiveled his eyeballs in his head, which was harder than it should have been. They felt swollen and dry, as if they had sand embedded under them. An IV was stuck in his arm. He shifted, experimentally. He was not intubated, nor did he have a catheter up his dick. Excellent. Things had been far worse for him than this.

Sveti sat beside him. Her left hand was bandaged. She had bruises and scrapes on her face, her arms, the unbandaged hand.