Page 118 of Speechless
Ignoring her gentle attempts to stop him, he plodded ahead, his bad leg dragging slightly. Two doors to go. Almost there. So close to Jenna he could smell her hair and hear her laugh.
Sarah stepped away and two incredibly strong arms hooked around him, halting him in his tracks. He smacked a clenched fist down on them in frustration as they carefully—and far too easily—hefted him off his feet.
“Goddamn it, Zeke, put me down!”
“Sorry, big guy. Sarah’s right; now isn’t the time.”
A door opened down the hall, the very same door he’d been heading for, and a tall masculine figure exited the room. Jenna’s room. It didn’t take Connor ten seconds to figure outwhythey thought it wasn’t a good time—Jenna’s family had swarmed in on her like locusts.
“Fuck that, Zeke. Those bastards put her in there through their actions. They don’t get to hold her hostage and make nice while she’s not even conscious to tell them to go fuck themselves!” His voice carried down to the man, whose head lifted, turned. “Yes, you! You, you sonofabitch!”
It didn’t shock him when Jenna’s father shook his head and walked away in the other direction, shoulders slumped as though the asshole carried the weight of the world on them. What right did he have to act the martyr after the events he’d set in place?
Pain blasted through Connor’s shoulder as he thrashed in Zeke’s hold. One way or another, he was going to Jenna. “Don’t make me kick your ass over this, Zeke, not when you saved her for me.”
Sarah’s massive husband chuckled as he simply carried Connor back to his room. “The saving was all you and Cain, Connor. Mostly you, seeing as you got shot twice for your trouble and nearly froze your big personality off.”
Hell, was he ever going to live hisbig personalitydown? He scowled at Sarah as she hurried ahead to open the door to his room, giggling quietly to herself. “I don’t know what you’re laughing at, missy.”
“Me? Nothing. Nothing at all.”
“Zeke, I’m not asking again.” Connor kicked out with his good leg and connected with a steel shin. The only thing that came of it was a bruised heel. “You can’t keep me away from her!”
“Her parents have custodial rights, Connor. Until the judge and the senator overturn the order, she still remains legally under their care as a mentally-ill patient.” Zeke’s tone, apologetic and gentle, did nothing to assuage Connor’s wrath. “With the additional circumstances of the last several days, it might take some time to discern whether the order remains.”
“So we’re going to have to fight this all over again?” Connor demanded as his impromptu flight ended with a bump. His feet touched the floor only briefly before Sarah and Zeke worked together to shove him back into bed. “I can’t do it. I can’t go through all this again.Shecan’t.”
“Right now, Jenna doesn’t have a clue what’s going on around her, Connor. We’re fighting for her, and there’s more people on her side than you know. We’re hopeful we’re going to beat this; fingers crossed, by the time she wakes, this won’t even be an issue anymore.” Zeke crossed his arms over his chest. “Don’t let the nurses catch you out of bed, Connor. They have instructions to sedate you if you try to go near Jenna’s room.”
Indignation ripped through him as fiercely as the pain in his shoulder when he shot up in protest. “Says who?”
“They’re trying to put a restraining order through against you,” Sarah interjected quietly, pushing him back down and deftly reinserting his IV. “I’d rather see you zoned out than handcuffed to the bed, boss.”
He hissed and slumped back against the pillows. “You?”
“Group decision,” she replied, checking the IV bag and tube. “Cain, Zeke, and I. Everything’s moving as fast as we can push it, Connor, but you have to be patient and we know you can’t. Nobody could expect you to be.”
No, but they were forcing him to stay away from the one person he couldn’t live without. The woman he’d killed for. He grimaced as images of Sire’s pulverized face floated into memory, the result of an all-consuming rage and loss of control. “I’m surprised I’m not in cuffs already.”
Zeke scowled. “Do you think I’d let them, if they’d been inclined to do so?”
“I don’t think you’d have much say in it, actually. Murder is murder.”
“I’ve seen the crime scene photos from the house, the shed. I saw what was done to Jenna and read the reports from the responding officers, police and FBI.” Zeke’s arms unfolded and he placed his hands on the bed, leaned forward into Connor’s face. “Don’t you dare apologize for what you did to that bastard, Connor. Don’t you feel guilty over ending his life. Jenna was damn dear dead when the EMS crew started on her. You weren’t far behind. There’ll be a brief investigation to wrap up the details, but it’ll go down as self-defense. With the evidence the feds are pulling out of that house, there won’t be any protests.”
“Evidence?”
“Seems Sire had a little black book of numbers. Details of every woman he kidnapped. Some names, mainly dates, places, descriptions. The feds will match some of them to the bodies already found. They’ll track others down through missing person reports.” Zeke glanced at Sarah. “They’re combing through the property. I expect there’ll be forensic evidence coming in soon enough, and…they found his killing spot.”
“The clearing?”
“Yeah. Just as Jenna described. From the look of it, and from your statement, it would seem he was on his way to take Jenna there when you took him down. Another twenty, thirty minutes, and it would have been over.”
Connor scrubbed his hand over his face. “Luna.”
“Luna’s okay, she’s doing good. Missing you guys, but she loves the boys. I don’t think they’ll want her to go when it’s time for her to come home.” Sarah stroked his arm in reassurance.
“Good, that’s good. But I meant…fuck, I wouldn’t have found them without that dog. Cain and I, we were way off the mark. We could have spent another two days wandering around in there before we found that place, but Luna…she was relentless. She just kept going until she found the next scent marker, and the next. She’d have tracked Jenna to the ends of the earth, whether I asked her to or not.”