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“You won’t just get away with killing Drake,” I challenge and hope to God it’s true. “He’ll figure out what happened and make you pay for it.”
Richard’s gaze flicks briefly to Vaughn. “You see how quickly their attention moves from one man to another. The curse of Eve makes them much too weak-minded to be trusted.”
“Yes, Grandfather,” Vaughn replies, his voice dead.
“Drake’s father has already been tasked with teaching him an important lesson tonight. He will either learn from it, or a grave will be dug for him alongside yours,” Richard continues, tone genial. “Your absence will be noted, of course. But I am sure we can arrange for an explanation that will satisfy any curious onlookers. Perhaps an accident or even a suicide. Your mental instability has been well documented, I think.”
I pull at the rope around my wrists, but it holds tight. “You won’t get away with this.”
“I already have.” Richard leans back in his chair with a weary sigh. “Enough talk. The time is upon us, I’m afraid. Vaughn, if you would.”
Vaughn’s arm swings in a wide arc. I instinctively flinch away, every muscle in my body tightening up in preparation. This is it. This is how I die. Stabbed and abandoned in a dank basement while people obliviously party just a few hundred feet away.
But the blow I’m expecting never comes.
Instead, Vaughn shoves his grandfather’s wheelchair hard enough that it tips to the side and crashes to the floor. Richard’s head strikes the concrete with a sickening crack.
As I watch in terrified shock, Vaughn kneels, a grim look on his face, and calmly checks for a pulse. It’s impossible to tell from his expression if he finds one.
My high-pitched voice echoes off the stone, just this side of a screech. “Why did you do that?”
He isn’t the one who answers.
Olivia steps into the room, a sad smile on her face. “Because I asked him to.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
I wake up with a pounding headache. Pain that warns of a concussion at least. I’ve taken my share of hits in the past, but none of them has been enough to knock me out.
It takes a few tries for me to open my eyes. Even the small amount of light that escapes into the cracks of my squeezed eyelids is excruciating. If I open them completely, the shock of pain might just be intense enough to make me pass out all over again.
My eyes slowly open, one excruciating degree at a time. A wave of nausea washes over me that has me gasping before the urge to vomit all over myself recedes.
My aching gaze moves down my body with clinical interest. Whatever that knock did to addle my brain keeps my emotions in check for the time being. I don’t react with anything stronger than mild disbelief as I realize where I am.
Club Havoc.
More specifically, one of the smoking lounges. The surface under me is soft, yielding and throws off whiffs of old leather as I shift experimentally. I’m sitting in one of the slope-backed reclining chairs where old men usually relax as they sip aged liquor and smoke cigars.
The room is small enough that it only contains a few other empty chairs surrounding the low table and a glass-encased humidor full of what are probably very expensive cigars. I’m leaned back enough in the chair that my feet are propped on the table while the back of my head rests on the leather cushion behind me. My hands are thrown over the chair arms, but I when I try to lift them up, I can’t manage it. They feel weighted down and heavier than lead.
A sick realization washes over me. I stare at my feet where they rest on the table, willing them to move. My entire body is frozen in place. The only part of me I have control over is my eyes as they dart frantically around the room.
A door creaks open behind me.
“Good. You’re awake.”
That voice is a punch to the gut. Despite everything, I’m still surprised when I recognize it.
My father.
I struggle to move, even just turn my head, but the effort is practically wasted. Moving any part of me takes the same effort it would to push a boulder up a mountain.
“Whut tha…” The words come out slurred. Fuck. It takes a few more tries for me to string a coherent sentence together. This is more messed up than I should be from just a hard hit, even one that was enough to knock me unconscious. “What the fuck?”
My father does me the kindness of moving where I can see him. When he takes a seat in the chair closest to me, his eyes close briefly as he reclines with a sigh. “The effects of that paralytic will wear off more quickly if you relax. We had to give you a dose big enough to bring down a rhino, unfortunately. It’s a wonder you didn’t stop breathing.”
His words confirm what I’d already assumed. I wasn’t just knocked the fuck out. I was drugged. “Shit…”
