Blood & Rust (Lock & Key #4) (57 page)

WES AND I TOOK THE ROAD
out of Deadwood and headed home.

“Let’s take the long way, take it easy!” I shouted over at him.

He nodded at me, and we swerved off onto Route 14A heading south, which would take us through the Black Hills National Forest instead of the main highway. A much better road to contemplate your sins and transgressions, to meditate, to let it all fucking go rather than debate with the cars and trucks and buses rumbling in your way.

My insides hummed with my engine as we surged over the smooth asphalt, the wind pushing over us both and us ripping through it. My lungs expanded as the road burned under me, the light and heat of the sun fervent, as the elevation descended in the forested hills. That strong aroma of mineral and earth rose around us, shading the crisp fresh scent of the air.

Wes caught my glance and shot me a grin.

Yeah, it was in his blood, too.

We approached a tight curve, and he sped up ahead of me to take it. Two dots appeared in front of us on the road.

Blocking the road. Blocking us.

I decelerated, my hands tightening over the handlebars, my back rigid.

From a blur, the dots became figures that became faces, and now, they finally came into focus.

Led and another Flame on their bikes blocked our road. They raised their arms, guns in their hands.

Bam.

Wes spun out, his bike teetering, tumbling, plunging.

“Wes!”

He sprawled on the asphalt before me, motionless. His bike lay on its side.

I launched off my bike.

Bam.
Led fired.
Bam.

I scrambled through the earsplitting jolt.

Motherfucker.

This cocksucker wanted vengeance.

But Wes was an innocent. An innocent in my care.

My responsibility.

My fucking consequence.

I slid my gun from my back and fired, diving behind Wes’s fallen bike.

“Did you think I was gonna leave it like that?” Led charged toward me. “You giving Reich up to Finger? You using Nina?”

Boom
.

Crack. Crack.

I twisted back down to the ground. A numbness danced up my arm, and my vision blurred. My chest was being crushed. My heart throbbed loudly in my ears.

Push through, push through.

Wes raised himself up, a gun in his hand. The kid was carrying. His hand shook; his arm wavered. He was injured from his fall.

Everything screeched to a stunning silence.

Wes fired a round, hitting the other Flame. The heavyset man grunted, stumbling back, blood spurting from an arm.

Boom.

Wes howled, his gun flying, skidding across the pavement. “Shit!”

“Wes!” I untucked my second gun, pitching it at him.

He caught it, his eyes hanging on mine for one stinging moment. His dad had trained him. Hell, all of us had.

He turned, sliding the safety. We both aimed.

“Fuckers!” Led charged toward us, shooting.

Another figure drew up behind Led and the Flame, his weapon held high.

What the—

We emptied our rounds into Led. The injured Flame raised his gun from behind his bike and aimed.

Crack. Crack.

The Flame’s body jerked forward over his bike. The bike teetered, crashing down.

I lunged at Wes and grabbed at him, my fingers twisting in the cotton of his shirt.

Was he hurt? I had to keep him out of the line of fire.

He’s priceless.

I yanked him on the ground and pushed myself upright, pain shooting in my chest, radiating through my neck, my arms straining.

“I’m all right! I’m all right!” Wes’s dark blue eyes pulsed with life, with adrenaline, with confidence.

“Stay down,” I hissed.

My fingers uncurled and flattened on his chest. His heart beat wildly under my palm.

So fucking priceless
.

“Wes!” screamed a girl’s voice in the distance, a slight figure running toward us, red hair flying.

Wes craned his neck. “Lindy?”

My shoulders fell, and my lungs constricted tightly, the pain in my chest excruciating. The large figure beyond rushed toward us, a revolver at his side, his features snarled.

Pick.

“Kid all right?” Pick shouted.

The reply stuck in my throat. The banging in my ears so loud...so loud. My heart thrashed in my chest, galloping hard on rocky ground; there was no keeping up with it. My head knocked back, meeting the hard earth. The trees tilted. The blue sky whirled above me.

“Butler! Butler, you okay?” Wes’s voice was far away.

Pick hovered over me. Lindy. Wes.

Wes’s face faded, and in its place was my brother’s face. His voice in my ears.

“You’ve got a big heart, tough guy.”

My hand reached out.

Air. Stephan, I need air…

My heart raced to a finish line that I couldn’t make.

Would never make.

“A big heart.”

Hands pressed over me.

“He’s not shot! Then what the fuck—”

“Something’s wrong with him!” Wes shouted from far away. “Something’s wrong!”

Breaths stuttered in my chest, beyond my reach.

I can’t breathe. I can’t—

My heart hammered in my neck, pounded around my throat. Squeezing, squeezing everything from me.

I gave in.

“I’m so cold, so cold.”

Everything faded.

MY HANDS SHOOK
.

I curled my fingers into tight fists, but it did no good. The trembling and shuddering came from my insides.

Critical condition,
Boner had said over the phone.

Heart rate through the roof,
had said the EMS worker.
Severe palpitations. Tachycardia.

In the Emergency Room, they had tried an IV push drug conversion—whatever the hell that was—but that had been unsuccessful.

Unsuccessful
.

Boner burst from the hospital elevator doors, long dark hair flying, a small plastic bag in his hands. He threw the bag on the nurse’s desk. “I got ‘em! I got ‘em!”

The doctor had sent Boner to Butler’s apartment to find any medication he may have been taking.

Medication.

Prescriptions
.

Jill’s arm went through mine as we shot up out of our chairs.

“What did you find?” I asked glancing at the nurse who removed several prescription bottles from the bag.

“A lot of shit,” Boner replied. “A lot.”

Dready planted his hands on his waist. “I had no fucking idea. What the hell?” Dawes and Kicker stood at his side, their arms crossed, their faces drawn.

“Excuse me.” The nurse turned to us. “Do any of you know if Mr. Matthiessen was getting his blood drawn and tested regularly to monitor his—”

“No, I don’t know!” Boner’s green eyes flared. “I don’t know anything! He never said a damn word about—” Boner gestured at the pill bottles in her hands. “About—”

The nurse slanted her head. “His arrhythmia?”

“Yeah, that,” Boner said.

Butler had a heart condition he’d been hiding from all of us.

I approached the nurse. “What did he have to get tested?”

“With arrhythmia there’s the potential to faint and develop blood clots, so he’s been on Warfarin, a blood thinner, and Toprol—” She raised a bottle. “—to slow down his heart rate.”

“He’s a heavy smoker. And he’s been under a lot of stress lately!” I blurted.

“Oh. Not good. Plus if he’s skipped any doses of his medication and hasn’t been getting tested regularly to monitor his Prothrombin time and ratio—”

My brain zoomed back to all the times I’d noticed Butler rubbing a hand down his chest to his stomach, taking in deep breaths here and there, wincing while smoking. All the times he’d seemed tired, worn out, tense.
So many times.

“Thank you,” I muttered and sat back down with Jill.

We waited together.

Emergency surgery.

Alicia and Dawes brought everyone coffee and sandwiches.

My stomach twisted at the memory of the cryptic remarks Butler had made in the past.

“I am an antique all right. Broken casing, rusty insides, faulty wiring.”

“I’m here on borrowed time, babe.”

Jill threw away my untouched coffee.

Rusty insides.

Faulty wiring.

Borrowed time.

We waited.

He has to pull through. This can’t be his end, it can’t. Not this, please God, not this
.

And we waited.

The hallway doors separating the surgical area from the waiting room swung open, and a doctor emerged holding a tablet. “Matthiessen?”

I darted toward him. “How is he? Is he going to be all right?”

“I had to implant a pacemaker to control his heart rate. He also had a valve problem.”

“Fuck!” Dready muttered.

The doctor’s glance darted over us, an eyebrow raised. His attention returned to me. “We needed to convert this arrhythmia to a normal sinus rhythm since the IV medication conversion was unsuccessful earlier. It was tricky because he’s on the Warfarin, the blood thinner, and he could’ve bled out very easily.”

My eyes widened.

“But he made it through. He’ll be fine if he takes better care of himself.” The surgeon glanced down at his iPad. “Once his blood pressure, pulse, and breathing are stable and he’s alert, he’ll be taken to a room. We’ll keep him overnight for observation.”

“Thank you.” I let out a breath. “Thank you.”

I sank into Jill’s embrace.