AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“Tamsyn’s been attacked, you need to get to Clover City General now. I’ll meet you there.”
Twenty minutes and a hell of a lot of speed limits smashed to smithereens, he was stalking toward his twin who appeared to be pacing the length of Clover City General’s ER waiting room. It was annoying that although Lo looked agitated, he was also still smartly dressed in a suit and tie.
“Why’d they call you?” Huxley demanded.
It wasn’t the most important thing, not by a long shot, but it was something he’d been wondering about since he got the call.Hewas Tamsyn’s daddy,hewas the one who took care of her,hewas the one she still came home to unlike Lo who’d abandoned them both to maybe take a job he didn’t need. What the fuck?
Most people wouldn’t be able to see it, but he’d known his brother since conception and could detect the microscopic flinch, the subtle tightening of his jaw beneath the stubble that dusted his face.
“Because they couldn’t get ahold of you.”
There was a tightness to his twin’s voice that made it sharp, the stab of a knife that might’ve looked like an attack but what Huxley knew to be a defensive maneuver.
“Did you not notice the ten thousand missed calls?” Lo asked pointedly.
Huxley dug his phone out of his pocket then, because he’d noticed…something when he’d been on and off the phone. Nothing that had seemed more important than getting here, though.
But there it was, just as Lo said there would be, a parade of missed calls. Mostly from numbers he didn’t recognize, some from Eric, from Hudson, Ian, even Cosima and Ryker.Shit. He would never set his phone to Do Not Disturb ever again, and Tamsyn was just going to have to learn to live with that. If she lived.
Lo had given him an update on the phone while they were both on the way, and his blood had run cold and then hot. Huxley had searched his body for signs that he was having another heart attack because wouldn’t that just take the cake. But while he was panicking worse than he ever had, he didn’t think the old ticker was in any danger.
Not physically anyhow. If she died, though, all bets were off. People did die from heartbreak, and he could see how. His life was so tied up in Tamsyn’s well-being that if he’d failed so profoundly he couldn’t see living through it. He couldn’t even think about how terrified she must’ve been without feeling as though his insides were going to make their way out of his mouth and onto the scuffed linoleum floor of the ER waiting room.
Someone had tried to strangle the life out of his babygirl, and it was only because the security guard on duty had noticed that a little charm with a brass horseshoe Maddie had made her had fallen off Tamsyn’s bag on the way out. The woman had followed her down to the garage and surprised the assailant. The would-be murderer had taken off and the security guard called 911. She’d no doubt saved Tamsyn’s life, and Huxley would make sure she was richly rewarded for it.
He was also going to thank the owners of Hive. He didn’t quite understand the mechanics of it, or how their spiderweb of Clover City informants worked—although Lo would probably kill to have access to it—but he did know that he, Lo, and Tamsyn all had black cards in their wallet that were the same size and shape as their licenses, but the only thing on them was an embossed letter H. Those cards meant that if something happened to them, Hive should be called. Of course, it only worked if someone knew what to look for but their network seemed to reach pretty far, and in this case, far enough.
That’s why Eric Southerland was already here, hopefully getting some information they couldn’t, and why he’d had missed calls from Hudson and company. Sure was nice to have these people on your side. They didn’t put their power on display like the Foster-Webbs did, but fuck did they have it anyway.
He couldn’t talk to Lo without his anger flaring, and he suspected his twin felt the same way so they contented themselves with pacing the waiting room until Eric emerged from a set of double doors.
They both descended on the man and he silenced their questions by holding up his hands.
“The good news is that while she’s scared as hell, and banged up pretty good, she’s out of immediate danger.”
“What’s the bad news?” Lo demanded.
“Strangulation injuries can be sneaky fuckers. It’s not just the near term we need to be concerned about. The effects can show up hours, days, even weeks afterward.”
“What kind of effects are we talking?” Huxley prodded because goddamn right that didn’t sound good, and he’d be memorizing that list and watching her like a hawk for however long it took. Probably so long he’d bug the shit out of Tamsyn, but better safe than sorry.
“You want the laundry list?” Eric asked, looking between the two of them.
They both nodded. More information was always better, no matter how sick it might make them. They needed to know so they could be there for her, be on the lookout for things that could go wrong. Or at least Huxley did. Who the fuck knew if this changed things for Lo at all.
Right as he was wrapping up, Eric pulled his cell from his pocket and held up a finger. Hopefully that would be an update on Tamsyn but Huxley remembered the man had a pregnant wife and three kids at home, plus a busy pediatric practice on top of his littles’ practice, so it could be anything. It was a wonder the man got any sleep at all.
“That was Doctor Thomas who’s been taking care of Tamsyn. They moved her out of the ER and into a private room, so you can go see her now. But you’ve got to know, she looks rough. I know you’re used to bruises and welts, but this is a different ballgame and you need to be prepared.”
He and Lo exchanged looks and nodded again, although Huxley knew they would never really be prepared for seeing their little girl in pain, not in a way she hadn’t consented to, not in a way that had almost killed her. But fuck if they were going to let their own emotions run wild instead of controlling themselves so they could be with her. Not even a choice.
Apparently Eric found them convincing enough that he continued. “She’s got some burst blood vessels in her eyes, petechiae on her face and ears, her mouth is swollen, and the mark from the ligature that was around her neck is really disturbing. And of course your girl’s a fighter, so she’s got some defensive wounds too. Scratches on her chest and neck, a bunch of bruises, and some broken nails. You should encourage her not to talk because it must hurt like fuck, but I’m not sure you’ll be able to stop her. She's been asking for you. Both of you.”
