Wyatt's Stand (Colebrook Siblings Trilogy Book 2) (21 page)

“I know you’re still alive, Colebrook,” Scott called out.

He was breathing hard, his muscles twitching. She could smell his sweat and almost taste his fear, but it was mixed with a terrifying kind of elation and the feel of his erection pressed against her rear turned her stomach.

He was turned on by this. The thrill of the hunt, and the idea of killing her and Wyatt. Sick bastard. She swallowed, frantically thought of what she could do to get out of this.

“Come out like a man and watch what I do to her, you son of a bitch,” Scott yelled.

Austen stared at the deck, heart in her throat. Grits was no longer crying, but his agonized whining sliced at her like razors.

“Does she know what happened that day in Afghanistan, Wyatt? Did you tell her what a hero you are before you fucked her on that couch last night?”

Oh God, she was going to be sick.

“Yeah, big-time war hero. A real stud, damn near the Bionic Man!” He paused to draw a breath. “The truth is, you should have died out there with the others. You don’t deserve to be here when the rest of them are dead.”

Austen’s blood turned to ice. If Wyatt was still alive, those words would hurt him more than any bullet wound ever could. “Stop it,” she grated out.

Scott jerked his arm against her throat, momentarily cutting off her air, and kept going. “It was your fault, Wyatt, and you know it. Those Marines are dead because of you. All of them, including Taylor.”

Taylor. The grandson of the woman who’d owned this house. What was Scott’s connection to Taylor?

“You were his squad leader. He was
your
responsibility. And he was my best friend,” he added, his voice cracking. “He should still be here, not you. This house should be
his
, not your goddamn whore’s. I should be working for him, not you. But he’s dead because of you, and you were the only one who survived. You fucked up and the whole town rallied around you. I didn’t do anything wrong and they all turned on me, even my wife. Well, now you’re gonna find out the true meaning of suffering, my friend. I’m gonna take her from you while you stand there and watch and there’s not a goddamn thing you can do to save her.”

Her heart seized when she caught motion at the pile of lumber and then Wyatt appeared, pistol gripped in both hands, his expression icy calm. Relief speared through her when she saw that he wasn’t wounded, but she wished he’d stayed behind cover.

The cold look on his face was absolutely terrifying and Scott’s cruel words to him pierced her. She was furious that this asshole would blame Wyatt for something he’d had no control over. Wyatt had suffered enough and she wished she could escape Scott’s hold long enough to grab the gun and shoot him between the eyes.

“Let her go,” Wyatt commanded in a low voice, everything about him radiating cool confidence.

“I don’t think so,
sergeant
,” Scott sneered.

“I’m not gonna ask again,” Wyatt said, and her skin prickled at the menace in his voice.

She was out of time.

For a single heartbeat she stared up at Wyatt through tear-blurred eyes, drinking in the sight of him as she fought past the fear and numbness to unleash the fury burning inside her.

Now.

With a strangled cry of rage, she shot both hands up to lock around the hand holding the gun to her head at the same time as she let her legs go limp. Scott jerked in surprise as her attack caught him off guard, and she wrenched his wrist back and down as hard as she could.

The gun went off, so close to her ear the noise deafened her. He screamed as his wrist snapped, and the gun fell from his hand.

Then the scream cut off suddenly and he went limp. He crashed to the ground, dragging her with him. Terrified, Austen rolled and lunged for the gun. She grabbed it, rolled to her side and aimed it at him.

She stared in shock at the hole in the center of his forehead. Blood trickled down his face, his pale blue eyes half-open and staring vacantly.

The gun fell from her fingers as strong hands gripped her and lifted her against a wide chest. “
Austen
.”

Wyatt’s arms banded around her, crushing her to him. She whimpered, clutched at his shoulders as she buried her face in his neck. He set a hand beneath her chin and tipped her face up, his eyes scanning her face anxiously. “Are you okay?”

She managed a nod, everything shaking so badly she couldn’t get the words out. Without meaning to she looked over her shoulder, her gaze automatically going to Scott.

“No, don’t look.” Wyatt took her head in his hands and turned her to face him. Those gorgeous hazel eyes delved into hers, full of concern, and her face crumpled as everything hit home.

“Sweetheart,” he groaned, one hand cradling the back of her head as he lifted her and began carrying her out of the bushes.

“N-no,” she protested, squirming out of his grip. “Grits.”

****

The moment he released her she ran on rubbery legs over to a certain spot in the bushes. Wyatt followed, his stomach hard as a block of concrete. He didn’t want to find his dog dead. Just couldn’t deal with it on top of everything else. Eddie was already lying dead in the kitchen entryway.

When Austen knelt and pushed the branches away, a pained sound escaped her when she saw Grits. He was lying curled up in a tight ball, his left hindquarters covered in blood. He was panting rapidly, his eyes glazed as he looked up at them, and his heart broke when the end of Grits’s tail wagged in recognition.

“Ah,
fuck
,” he muttered. Afraid to hurt him more, Wyatt reached in and carefully slid his hands beneath him. Grits let out a sharp yelp and tried to struggle. “No, buddy, just lie still,” he said softly as he pulled his dog out.

Wyatt blanched when he saw the full extent of the damage. Before he could say anything Austen was already tugging her shirt over her head and wrapping it around Grits’s back end. She darted a glance up at him, still shaking, the adrenaline fading away. “How bad is it?”

Wyatt cradled the dog in his arms, holding him close to his chest. “Bad. We need to get him to the vet’s.”

Her legs shook as she pushed to her feet. “I’ll drive. You keep pressure on him.”

“My phone’s in my front pocket. Call the cops. Tell them about Eddie.” He couldn’t stay, not when Grits’s life was in danger. If he stayed the cops would never let him leave just to take Grits to the vet. And nobody was dragging him away from his dog.

She pulled it out and dialed, spoke to the 911 operator as they rushed around the side of the house. He marveled at her strength, at how steady she was despite her whole body shaking and her face streaked with tears.

He didn’t dare ease up the pressure on Grits’s leg. Austen was explaining about Grits, and Wyatt didn’t even care that he was leaving the scene of a crime with two dead bodies. He hadn’t done anything wrong.

Austen jumped behind the wheel of her truck while he climbed into the passenger seat and she raced down the driveway. “Is he still conscious?”

“Barely.” He was so little, and he’d already lost so much blood. Wyatt’s shirt and lap were covered in it.

She turned onto the main road and hit the gas, racing toward town. Wyatt could feel himself zoning out, that all-too familiar numbness taking hold. The smell of the blood, Grits’s rattling gasps, were just like it had been with Raider.

He didn’t even remember arriving at the clinic or rushing Grits inside. He refused to hand Grits over, refused to leave when the vet and her staff rushed to prep Grits for surgery. He stayed glued to the edge of the operating table, crouched down near Grits’s head so the dog could see Wyatt.

“Come on, buddy, you gotta hang in there.” His voice was rough as sandpaper.

A crushing sense of guilt smothered him. This dog had suffered at the hands of a human before. Wyatt was supposed to have been his second chance, his fresh start. Instead he was fighting for his life because a fellow veteran who Wyatt had trusted had shot him, killed Eddie, and had been about to kill Austen.

Staring down into Grits’s dazed brown eyes, he was sucked back in time to those moments when he’d been holding Raider, looking into her eyes and begging her to hold on right before she’d died in his arms. He clenched his teeth together and swallowed as the acidic grief burned in his chest.

“Sir, I really need you to clear out of here so my staff and I can get to work,” the vet told him, her tone making it a command rather than a request.

Wyatt looked up at her, feeling tortured. “I can’t leave him.”

The vet’s eyes softened with sympathy. “Best way you can help him is to let us get started. We’ll let you know the prognosis as soon as we can.”

Swallowing, Wyatt stroked a hand over Grits’s head and neck. His fur was so damn soft, the white all matted and rusty-colored with blood. “I’ll be right outside,” he promised him, then forced his feet to turn him around and take him out to the waiting room.

Austen was there. She jumped out of her seat, dressed in a scrubs top someone at the clinic must have given her. Her eyes were worried, her face pale and stained with tears. “How is he?”

“Bad,” was all he could manage before the lump in his throat choked him.

Austen’s expression filled with empathy and tenderness as she reached for him.

Wyatt went into her arms without a second’s hesitation, burying his face in her throat as he slid his arms around her and held her as tight as he could without hurting her.

She kissed his temple and stroked the back of his head as she whispered to him. “He’s got such a big heart, Wyatt, and he loves you. He’ll fight his way through this, just wait and see.”

Wyatt nodded because he didn’t see the point in arguing and he didn’t want to crush her hopes by telling her it wasn’t going to happen. And it wasn’t just Grits that had him so emotional. Here Austen was, trying to comfort him when she’d had a gun to her head less than an hour ago. It killed him.

He crushed her to him and he held on tight. She was his anchor, the only thing stopping him from falling to pieces right here in the middle of the veterinary office.

He dimly realized he was breathing too fast, that he was rapidly losing control. He fought back the flood of tears that threatened to escape, muscling them back by sheer force of will. Austen was traumatized enough and he wasn’t going to be a selfish asshole by unloading all his bullshit baggage on her after what she’d just gone through.

She didn’t speak. Just like in the aftermath of his nightmare last night, she simply held him, allowed him to gain control and find his footing again. And when he could breathe again, when his heart no longer felt like it would explode, he raised his head and took her face between his hands so he could look into her eyes.

That beautiful silver gaze met his, and he felt his heart free-fall. “I love you,” he blurted.

Her eyes widened in surprise but then a smile flickered at the edges of her mouth. “I love you too.”

Elation and relief filled him. “I was so fucking scared when I saw him holding that gun to your head.”

She grimaced and for a second he felt bad about saying anything, but hell, he wanted her to know how much she meant to him. “Me too.”

He stroked his thumbs across her cheeks, savoring the softness as he tried to wipe the traces of her tears away. She’d been through too much, before with losing her fiancé and leaving everything she knew and loved behind to start a new life, then today, nearly losing that life.

It shook him. “I didn’t care if I died so long as you were safe. That’s all that mattered to me.” It was important to him that she understood that.

“If you’d died, I would have anyway,” she whispered, and he recognized the ghosts of past grief in her eyes. “That would have ended me.”

“No,” he said, shaking his head. “You’re so much stronger than you even realize. You saved yourself today by taking action, all I did was pull the trigger. And then you drove me here, half-naked, after just being held at gunpoint and seeing two men die because you wanted to save Grits. So yeah, I love you. And I would have died to protect you without thinking twice about it.”

She closed her eyes and leaned her forehead against his, their noses touching. “Well let’s just be glad it didn’t come to that.”

Yeah, no kidding.

Taking her hand, Wyatt led her over to the row of chairs in the waiting room and pulled her into his lap. He was covered in blood but he knew Austen wouldn’t care. All that mattered was being able to touch her and hold her, offer her comfort and reassure himself that she was still alive.

About twenty minutes later the operating room door opened and the vet stepped out. Wyatt stiffened, his stomach shriveling into a tight, aching ball.

“We got a transfusion into him and he seems stable for the moment. But I can’t save his leg. Not in a way that would allow him to walk without pain again.”

Wyatt’s heart had swelled at the first bit of news, but the second bit made it plummet. “So what do you want to do?” he asked.

“I recommend amputation. It’s less risky for him in the short term, and much kinder in the long run. There’s no guarantee that he’ll pull out of this surgery though. He lost over half his blood volume.”

Wyatt nodded slowly. “Okay. Whatever you need to do.”

“It’s an expensive procedure, on top of the transfusion and—”

“I don’t care what it costs.” He’d sell his damn truck to pay for the bill if he had to.

The vet offered an encouraging smile. “I’ll get my staff to draw up the consent forms. He should be out of surgery within the hour, and of course we’ll want to keep him for a few days. If you want to go home and clean up, we can call you when he’s in recovery.”

“I’ll stay.” He wasn’t going until Grits was out of surgery. And he didn’t bother telling the vet that they’d rushed here from a murder scene, after Wyatt had killed the gunman.

Soon enough he’d have to face everything that had happened back at the house. The cops were probably on their way here to talk to them. He and Austen would be interviewed separately, and there’d be a lot of other steps to take care of before they’d be allowed to go home.