Текст книги "Blood Kiss"
Автор книги: J. R. Ward
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Текущая страница: 2 (всего у книги 26 страниц)
Chapter Two
It wasn’t the whole Black Dagger Brotherhood.
In fact, there were only two Brothers with the King.
As Abalone, First Adviser to Wrath, son of Wrath, sire of Wrath, entered the audience room to stand before his ruler, he was acutely aware of the other males. He had never known any of those warriors to be aught than protective and civilized, but considering he was about to turn his only blooded offspring over to them, their more obvious attributes were like screams in the night.
The Brother Vishous was staring at him with diamond eyes that didn’t blink, those tattoos at his left temple seeming properly sinister, his muscle-roped body clad in leather and stung with weapons. By his side was Butch, a.k.a. the Dhestroyer—a former human with a Boston accent who had been infected by the Omega and left for dead—only to become one of the few to survive a jump-started transition.
The two of them were rarely apart, and it was tempting to assign them bad-cop, good-cop roles. Right now, though, the paradigm had shifted. Butch, the male who tended to smile and talk to people, seemed like the one it would be best to avoid in a dark alley: His hazel stare was narrow and unwavering.
“Yes?” Abalone asked his King. “May I be of service in some manner?”
Wrath stroked the boxy blond head of his guide dog, George. “My boys here need to talk to you.”
Ah, Abalone thought. And he suspected what this was about.
Butch smiled for a split second. Like he wanted to preemptively take the sting from whatever was going to come out of his mouth. “We want to make sure you’re aware of what’s involved in the training program.”
Abalone cleared his throat. “I know that this is very important to Paradise. And I’m hoping there are some self-defense courses offered. I should like her to be … safer.”
That potential benefit had been the only thing that had helped him through the clash between what he had expected for her and her life, and what she seemed to be choosing to do.
When there was no response, Abalone looked back and forth between the Brothers. “What are you not telling me?”
Vishous opened his mouth, but the Brother Butch raised his palm and shut him up. “Your role here with Wrath comes first.”
Abalone recoiled. “Are you saying that Paradise is ineligible because of my position here? Dearest Virgin Scribe, why didn’t you tell us—”
“We need you to understand that what’s going to happen is not all book learning. This is a preparation for war.”
“But the candidates don’t necessarily have to go fight down in the alleys during the program, correct?”
“What we’re worried about is here.” The Brother indicated the room. “We can’t have anything affect your relationship with Wrath and what you do for the King. Paradise is as welcome as anyone else in the program, but not if the prospect of her dropping out or being cut could create tension between us.”
Abalone exhaled in relief. “Do not worry about that. She succeeds or fails on her own merits. I expect no special treatment for her—and if she cannot keep up? Then she should be dismissed.”
In fact, although he would never say it aloud, he both prayed for, and expected, that to be the case. He did not look forward to Paradise being disappointed in herself or her efforts, but … the last thing he wanted for his daughter was her being exposed to any ugliness—or, God forbid, actually trying to fight in the war.
He couldn’t even fathom that last one.
“Worry not,” he reiterated, glancing at the Brothers and at the King. “All shall be well.”
The Brother Butch stared at Vishous. Then looked back. “You read the application, right?”
“She filled it out.”
“So you didn’t read it?”
“This is something she’s doing independently—as her father and ghardian, was I supposed to sign it?”
Vishous lit a hand-rolled. “You might want to be prepared, true?”
Abalone nodded. “I am. I promise you, I am.”
Paradise was a female gently raised in the proper traditions of the aristocracy. She’d been working on her physical conditioning for the last two months—quite diligently, actually—and he could feel the excitement rolling off of her as she wound up her duties here and prepared to exit her position. There was, however, a very good chance that after the orientation tomorrow evening, when the real work started, she would find herself either bowing out … or being asked to leave.
It was going to kill him to see her fail.
But better that than her dying out in the field just to prove the point that she was so much more than what her aristocratic station dictated.
As the pair of Brothers continued to look at him, Abalone lowered his head. “I know this is not going to go well for her. I am more than braced for that. I am not naive.”
After a moment, Butch said, “Okay. Fair enough.”
“Is there aught else, my lord?” Abalone asked the King.
When Wrath shook his head, Abalone bowed to each of them. “Thank you for your concern. Paradise is my most precious one—all that is left of my beloved shellan. I know she shall be in kind and fair hands on the morrow.”
As he turned to leave, the Brothers remained grim, but then again, he was not privy to what was going on with the war—and there was always something. The fighting and the strategy were nothing he had ever been involved with, and for that he was grateful.
Just as he would be if Paradise left that program.
Verily, he wished her mahmen were still alive. Perhaps this all would be moot if his shellan had been present to talk some sense into the girl.
Opening the double doors, he heard a clattering in the waiting area. “Paradise?”
He strode across the foyer, and as he rounded the corner into the parlor, his daughter straightened from picking up red pens that had been knocked off the desk.
“Is all well?” he asked.
Her eyes met his. “Is it? Are you allowing me to go tomorrow night?”
Abalone smiled—and tried to keep the sadness out of his eyes, his voice. “Of course. You’re in the program, that was decided months ago.”
She ran over and embraced him, holding on tight, as if she had been convinced she was going to be denied what she wanted so badly.
Embracing his daughter, Abalone was vaguely aware of the Brothers and the King leaving out the front door. He paid them no mind.
He was too busy wishing he could save his daughter from any and all disappointment. That was not among the parenting skills he had been granted upon her birth, however.
Oh, how he wished his shellan were here with them instead of in the Fade.
She would have handled all of this better.
Standing over the horrifically injured female, Marissa closed her eyes as she got Manny’s voice mail for the third time. What the hell was going on at the clinic?
Just as she was about to redial, her phone began to ring. “Thank God—Manny? Manny?”
Something about the tone of her voice caused the wounded female to stir, her bloody face moving against the sofa cushions. God, the sound of that wheezing rattle was enough to make the heart skip beats.
“No, it’s Ehlena,” said the voice in her ear. “Manny and Jane are doing emergency surgery on Tohr. He has a compound fracture of the femur and I have to head back into the OR. Is there something wrong?”
“How long are they going to be?” she asked.
“They just started.”
Marissa closed her eyes. “Okay, please have them call me when they can? I’ve got a…” She turned away and dropped her voice. “I have a trauma case that’s just come in here. I don’t know if we have a lot of time.”
Ehlena cursed. “We can’t spare anyone here. Can you call Vishous? With his medical training, he may be able to stabilize things.”
Marissa tried to imagine that Brother walking through the house. Not her first choice, and not because she didn’t trust the male. Her hellren’s best friend was a stellar vampire all the way around.
His appearance was just terrifying.
Then again, if everyone was in the Wellsie Annex …
“Good idea. Thank you.”
“I’ll have them call you as soon as we’re done.”
“Please.”
Cutting the connection, she hit up V. And got goddamn, frickin’ voice mail. “Shit.”
Rhym spoke up from where she was pressing a towel to that leaking gash in the female’s shoulder. “When are they coming?”
It was getting close to the end of the night. V could just be in transit between the alleys of downtown Caldwell and the mansion. Or … he could be stuck fighting whoever had injured Tohr like that.
As the female on the sofa began to cough and sputter, the calculation was done in a split second. The last thing she wanted to do was reach out to her brother, but she couldn’t live with herself if her personal problems cost someone their life.
Marissa dialed Havers’s cell phone number by heart, and hoped he hadn’t changed it. One ring, two rings …
“Hello?” came his voice.
“It’s me.” Before there was some kind of awkward silence or hello, she said, “We have a medical emergency here at Safe Place. I need you to come right now—or send someone. The Brotherhood’s physicians are in surgery and we don’t have a lot of time.”
There was a short pause, as if the race’s primary healer were switching from a personal track to a professional one. “I shall be there in but a moment. Is it a trauma situation?”
“Yes.” Marissa lowered her voice again. “She’s been badly beaten and … brutalized. There’s a lot of blood. I don’t know…”
“I’m bringing a nurse. Are you containing the other residents?”
“Already have.”
“Unlock the front door.”
“I’ll meet you at it.”
And that was that.
Guess the universe was determined to have her brother on her radar screen this evening. First that idiot call with the socialite, now …
Marissa nodded to Rhym. “Help is on the way.”
Through the eye that was not swollen shut, the injured female seemed to try to focus.
Marissa leaned in and took a bloody hand. “My brother is going to take very good care of you.”
For a split second, she worried whether she should have kept quiet about the fact that a male was going to treat her. But the female didn’t seem to be tracking.
Dearest Virgin Scribe, what if she died before he got here?
Marissa crouched down, tucking her blond hair behind her ears. “You’re safe, it’s going to be all right.” That one eye looped over to her face. “Do you have kin we can call? Is there someone who we can get for you?”
The female’s head went back and forth.
“No? Are you sure?” The eye shut. “Can you tell me who did this to you?”
That face turned away.
Shit.
Backing off, Marissa went out to the shallow hall in the front of the house. There were long, thin windows on either side of the door, and she looked out to the lawn. The trees that had been so brilliantly colored just weeks before had molted their spectacular red and gold and yellow leaves, the spindly limbs underneath revealed like the bones of a too-thin dog.
It was impossible not to glance at the mirror next to the door and check to see that her hair was in place, and her makeup was holding up even after a ten-hour day.
Back when she had lived with her brother, she had worn silk gowns and heavy jewels, and had her hair styled up high on her head. Now? She had a pair of Ann Taylor slacks on, a blouse with a stand-up collar, and a pair of Cole Haan driving shoes on her feet because they were comfy. No jewelry other than a tiny gold cross that she wore because Butch’s God was important to him and her hellren had given her the necklace during his last Christmas season. Oh, and she had a pair of pearl studs in her ears.
In spite of Butch’s transition having been jump-started, and his status as a Brother and a relation of the King, her male remained fundamentally human, everything from his Catholic belief system to his taste in books and movies to his opinions on what he wanted in a “wife,” a product of his upbringing among Homo sapiens.
Touching the gold chain on her neck, she frowned as she had to fight the urge to take the thing off because her brother wouldn’t approve of it.
But come on, whether the symbol of her mating was on or off her throat, it wasn’t as if that changed anything. In her brother’s eyes, she had taken a rat without a tail as a hellren, and that fall from grace would never be forgiven.
A split second later, two shadows materialized out of thin air on the sidewalk: one taller and masculine, dressed in a white coat, the other smaller and feminine in a traditional nursing uniform.
As they approached and were illuminated in the security lights, Marissa rubbed her sweaty palms on the seat of her pants. Havers looked exactly the same as he always had, from the bow tie and the horn-rimmed glasses to the dark hair parted on the side and kept in Mad Men order.
At the last minute, Marissa switched the cross around to her nape and opened the door. Trying not to sound as if she were nervous, she announced, “She is in the parlor.”
No “Hello, how are you?” or “Hey, have you stopped being a prejudicial asshole?”—but then again, this was a medical emergency, not a social call.
“Marissa,” her brother said, nodding his head and stepping by her. “This is Cannest, my head nurse.”
“My pleasure, I’m sure,” the nurse murmured.
Marissa nodded at the female. “This way.”
Her legs felt stiff as she led them deeper into the modest house with its common furnishings, and for some absurd reason she pictured herself as a flamingo, her knees facing the wrong way. Meanwhile, all manner of memories boiled under the surface of her conscious mind, only the psychic weight of the tragedy unfolding in the other room keeping a lid on her emotions.
Her brother stopped at the archway into the parlor and gave his doctor’s bag to his assistant. “My nurse will do the triage, and advise me as to her condition. It will be better than having a male perform the examination.”
Marissa glanced into Havers’s eyes for the first time, and noted that his stare had remained the identical shade of blue that hers was. As if that would have changed, though?
“That is very considerate of you,” she said before looking to his associate. “Come with me.”
In the parlor, the nurse went directly to the sofa, and was kind to Rhym as she took the staffer’s place. The victim stirred as if recognizing that there was a new presence before her, and then moaned as her pulse and blood pressure were taken.
Marissa stood off to the side, crossing her arms over her chest and putting her hand up to her mouth. The movements were good, she told herself. It meant that the poor girl was still alive.
“Be careful,” she blurted as the nurse felt down that arm and tears mixed with the blood on that beaten face.
Dear God, who had done this? It had to be a member of the species—she couldn’t catch the scent of anything human on her.
Marissa had to drop her eyes as the exam became more intimate, and she motioned for Rhym to join her by the archway, as if she were protecting the privacy her brother was already respecting.
After what felt like forever, the nurse spoke quietly with the female and then came back over, nodding for Marissa to follow her out to where Havers was standing with his hands clasped behind his back. He bowed his head as he listened to his nurse speak in a quiet tone.
“She has extensive internal injuries,” the female reported. “She will have to be operated on immediately if she is going to survive. The arm is the least of the problems.”
Havers nodded and glanced at Marissa. “I took the liberty of arranging for transport. It should arrive in approximately fifteen minutes.”
“I’m going in the van with her.” Marissa got ready for a fight. “Until her blood comes, I am her ghardian.”
“But of course.”
“And I will assume the cost of treatment.”
“That will not be necessary.”
“It is very necessary. Allow me to get my things.”
Leaving them, she spoke to Rhym, and then she ran up to her office and got her phone, her purse, and her coat.
She thought about calling Butch, as there was some chance she wasn’t going to be home for the day, but she wasn’t going to know that for a little bit. And unfortunately, if she dialed up her hellren every time a crisis hit here at work? She would wear out his ringer.
Halfway down the stairs, she realized there was another reason she wasn’t reaching out to him.
Too close to what had happened to his sister.
And there was a possibility things could be completely the same if this female died from her injuries.
No, she thought as she returned to the first floor. He had enough on his plate without having old triggers scatter his grey matter yet again.
“I’m ready,” she told her brother, as if daring him to change his mind.
“The ambulance is two minutes out. I shall need to be in it with her as well—she is going to require a feeding if she has any chance of surviving.”
Havers gave her a little bow and retraced his steps to the front door. As he turned the corner, Marissa shook her head.
The idea that he would give of his own blood to help some unknown female, who was probably naught but a civilian, was both amazing … and a source of frustration.
That the male could be so kind to his patients and so cruel to her personally seemed like an insupportable contradiction.
But that was the glymera for you. Double standards abounded.
And typically were used to screw daughters, sisters, and mothers.
Chapter Three
As Butch stood in the BDB mansion’s grand, colorful foyer, he frowned and looked at his phone. He’d checked the time on his Audemars Piguet watch about three minutes prior, but figured maybe his Samsung whatever-the-fuck-it-was might give him an answer he could live with better.
Negative.
And his seventh call to Marissa had just gone unanswered. As had the other six.
Off in the distance, the chatter and subtle clanking of Last Meal being consumed bubbled out of the dining room.
For no good reason, he thought about the first night he’d listened to sounds like that. It had been at what was now the audience house. He’d been a homicide detective back then, out of control and looking for a source of total destruction so that he could just be done with life.
And then came the rabbit hole.
Beth had gone down it first, her mixed heritage as half human, half vampire sucking her in. His entrée had been something else entirely.
If you’re going to bloody the human, would you be good enough to do it in the backyard?
“You got her yet?”
Butch closed his eyes at the familiar male voice. Even though it was not even partially true, sometimes he felt like Vishous’s acerbic mutter had been in his head for his entire life.
“No.”
As the Brother approached, the scent of Turkish tobacco preceded him and Butch breathed in deep. Maybe it was a contact high, maybe it was the nasty bastard’s presence, but the volume of screaming panic in his ears decreased a little.
“You call her office at the Place?” V asked on the exhale.
“Voice mail. And I dialed Mary, too. Nothing.”
“Motherfucker—”
The subtle binging of the security monitor ripped his head around. When he saw the image on the screen, he lunged for the vestibule’s door, nearly tearing the heavy weight off its hinges.
“Oh, God, where have you been—”
He was on his Marissa so fast and hard, the rest of whatever gibberish came out of his mouth was lost as he held her against him.
“I’m so sorry,” she said in a muffled voice. “I was dealing with a case. I didn’t bother calling you because I had almost no time to get home.”
Pulling back, he put his palms on either side of her face and looked her over. “Are you okay?”
“Absolutely. And I’m so sorry—”
He kissed her, shuddering as her hands traveled up his back. “No, no. Not sorry. I only care that you’re okay.”
Fucking hell, that sun was a terrifying thing. A vampire caught out at dawn was nothing but a bonfire in their clothes—and although Marissa was well protected at Safe Place, shit could happen: humans were unpredicable idiots and the slayers were downright deadly.
As she separated them, she smiled. “I’m fine, just fine.”
Yeah, right, he thought as her eyes wouldn’t meet his.
He tugged her arm. “Come with me.”
“But Last Meal is on the table—”
“Who cares.”
Drawing her into the billiards room, he would have shut them in together if there had been doors to close.
“What happened,” he demanded.
She wandered around a little, her incredible body turning those simple clothes of hers into haute couture. “Nothing you haven’t heard before, sadly.”
Butch closed his eyes. Sometimes he hated her job; he really did. The harder it got, though, the more she fought—and though it pained him to see her worn-out, worn down, and discouraged sometimes, he respected the hell out of her for what she did for her race. And it wasn’t all bad. When people she had helped transitioned back into independent living, his shellan glowed like the sun.
Taking her hand, he backed up against one of the pool tables, and pulled her in between his thighs. “Tell me anyway.”
Her eyes traveled around the room, but he stayed focused on her. And Jesus, even after a long, hard night, she took his breath away. Her beauty was legendary in the race, something that had been spoken about for generations and was still revered, and it was obvious why. Her face was a compilation of perfect angles, her skin as smooth and luminous as a pearl, her blue eyes the color of a morning glory, those lips so pink and soft. And then there was the blond hair that was down past her shoulders, and yeah, that figure, which was the kind of thing that knocked males on their asses—and kept ’em down.
On a regular basis, he couldn’t believe she was with him. Him. A guy from Southie, with a chipped front tooth, a bad background, and a host of addictions he hadn’t been able to master until he’d met her.
Plus there was all the Omega shit.
Yet his shellan loved him, for some completely unknown reason.
“You’re not talking to me,” he whispered, sweeping her hair back and stroking her neck, her tight shoulders, her stiff arms. “You know I hate it when I don’t know what’s doing.”
As a chorus of laughter broke out across the way, Marissa nestled in close, her hips coming into contact with all kinds of party time.
And what do you know, his erection was instant, his cock thickening up and getting long behind the fly of his leathers.
Putting her arms around his neck, she leaned in and eased her breasts into his chest. “Aren’t you hungry?”
Growling deep in his throat, he reached around and cupped her rear assets. A palmful on either side, nothing more, firm as a gymnast’s—oh, God, he was starting to sweat.
Except he shook his head. “This isn’t going to work. You’re not going to distract me—”
Next thing he knew, Marissa parted her mouth and exposed her fangs. Getting close, she ran one of the canines across his lower lip, the sensation of the sharp point moving over his flesh causing him to moan.
“You sound like you need something,” she whispered against his mouth. “Do you want to tell me what it is?” Her tongue extended and licked her way into him. “What is it, Butch. Tell me what you need…”
“You,” he groaned. “I need you.”
After his transition, when his body had bulked up and become this hulking thing of power, he’d gotten used to feats of physical strength—and also this resonant weakness when it came to his female and sex. He’d needed women from time to time back when he’d been strictly human, but that was nothing compared to the roaring lust Marissa could bring out of him at the drop of a hat. One look, one touch … a sentence or two … sometimes it was just the clean ocean scent of her …
Boom! Like someone blew up his brain.
“Marissa …”
Her pelvis rotated against his arousal and then she was stepping away from him. “Come here.”
She could have commanded him to do any number of things—“Stand on your head, shave your eyebrows, pull your own arm off”—and he would have done any of it in a heartbeat. Follow her? With the possibility of giving her an orgasm—or six?
Yes, please, thank you, ma’am, how may I be of service.
Marissa led him behind the bar and pushed him against the shelves of liquor bottles. With fast hands, she went for his fly, and God help him, he gripped the edge of the granite countertop and watched her undo the buttons one by one, the ridge of his erection pushing things open as she went down.
And then she gripped him.
“Fuuuuck…” His head wanted to fall back, but he needed to see her—
His whole body swayed as her hand stroked his shaft.
“Do you like to see me do this to you?” She worked him nice and slow, up and down. “Do you, Butch.”
“Yes,” he whispered, drawing out the word. “I like … to see … your hands on me…”
“What about my mouth?”
His balls tightened, and an orgasm shot into the head of his cock, ready to explode—and that was before she got on her knees in front of him, disappearing behind the cover of the bar’s front section.
He wasn’t going to last long, but fuck him, he wanted that sensation, that warm, wet pull, even if for just a second—no watching, though. He had to squeeze his eyes shut. If he saw what she looked like, her mouth stretched wide, her beautiful hair splaying over his leather-clad thighs, that blue stare of hers looking up at him as if she liked the taste of him …
Which, of course, couldn’t possibly be true. But that was one lie he wasn’t going to argue with—
As her name reverberated up his throat, that suction was exactly what he was after, so slick and smooth, so hot that his eyes flared open. With his head on the level, he got a brief hi-how’re-ya of the leather couches, the pool tables, the archway into the foyer. If anybody happened to come in—which was unlikely, given Last Meal—they were just going to see him with his porn face on. Marissa was hidden behind the screen of the bar’s long, high countertop piece. And more good news? His bonding scent was waaaaaay out there, the dark spices so thick, it would serve as a warning that shit was going down in here, and people needed to give them a little privacy.
Marissa rode his head and shaft with her mouth, working him out like he liked it, and he closed his lids again—thinking of the Patriots playing the Giants … what was being served in that dining room … whether Lassiter was going to make them watch The Bachelor or if it was going to be Rachael frickin’ Ray and her EVOO shit.
The image of that bossy little chef was the filter that worked best, blocking some of the sensation—or at least enough so he didn’t come all over his shellan.
Actually, his fear of that outcome worked even better.
Fucking hell, the horror he’d feel if he ever climaxed in her mouth or, God, on her face …
Nope, nope, not gonna happen.
Unhinging his clawed hands from the back countertop, he reached down and gently pushed at her shoulders. “Stop…” he choked out. “You need to stop now.”
The sensations below his waist were getting loud as a detonation—until even with the distractions and the worry, they were about to take him over, submerging him under great waves of high-octane ecstasy.
Gritting his teeth, he grimaced. “Time to stop—time to—”
At the last possible moment, he forced her head away, jerked his hips to the side, and ejaculated all over the cabinets where the big boxes of Pepperidge Farm Goldfish were kept. As he came, she fought against his hold, like she wanted back at his erection, but he didn’t let her go until his hips had stopped kicking and his body was going into a sag.
“You should let me finish,” she said quietly. “You never let me finish you.”
Refocusing on his mate, he drew her up his body, his still-hard cock bumping against her breasts, her stomach, her thighs—
The sound of the vestibule’s door chime brought their heads around—and Butch swallowed a curse. Jesus, how’d he let this happen in such a public damn room? It had seemed like a perfectly acceptable idea when he’d been lust-blind, but this was no place for a lady like her to blow some scrub like him, even if they were mated.
Butch quickly smoothed Marissa’s hair and then started doing up his fly. “We need to take this back home.”
“It was kind of fun.”
“No.”
As Fritz let Xhex and Trez in, Butch yanked himself back to reality.
“…owes me one,” Xhex was saying as she strode in.
“I so do!” Butch called out to her. “Call the chit whenever you want.”
Xhex shot him a wave, then pegged him with a finger point. “I’m holding you to that.”
“You better.”
Butch had to smile, but then he refocused on his shellan. “Let me feed you. And then get you naked in our bed.”
“Good.” She kissed him and then turned around to clean up what he had—
“No.” Butch stopped her hands on the paper towels. “That’s for me to do.”
As he eased her out of the way, he could feel her staring at him, but he ignored it. Where he came from, there were two kinds of women, and his mate was in the worship category.
He should know. He’d had more than his quota of skanks.
The last thing he would ever do was disrespect his Marissa. It would be like burning down a church, taking a knife to the Mona Lisa, and driving a 918 off a cliff for no reason at all.
So, no, she wasn’t going to clean up the nasty he’d left behind.
Marissa had other fish to fry.
As Butch insisted on paper toweling on his own, she got out of his way and shook her head. She had never understood his quirks about sex, but she accepted them. What else could she do? He wouldn’t talk to her about it—whenever she brought up the subject of him pushing her mouth away anytime he was close to climaxing, he shut her down.
Besides, right now that long-running stuff between the two of them was on her back burner.
That horrifically injured female was barely alive after having been operated on—and Marissa had come home only because there was nothing to do but sit outside that ICU room and wait for word that her organs had failed. Or had started to work on their own. God, the surgery had seemed so complicated when the nurse had explained it to her, but fixing her internal injuries and removing her spleen hadn’t taken more than an hour.
Unfortunately, she had lost too much blood, and even after Havers giving her his vein, her vitals were jumping all around.
When her brother had emerged from the OR, he had looked Marissa right in the eye and told her that he’d done the best he could.
And their own personal issues aside, she believed him.
