Page 45 of Vital Signs (Wayward Sons #7)

Wright's gun was pointed at my chest. My blood turned to jet fuel in my veins, heart slamming against my ribs like it wanted to crawl up my throat and escape on its own. Every nerve ending screamed, the way they only did when death came knocking or when Hunter's hands were on me.

"I said step away from them," Wright demanded.

Red numbers ticked down on the wall timer, each electronic beep reminding me that my life could be measured in minutes. Not that it mattered. Some part of me had been dying since Paris until Hunter had shocked me back to life.

Behind me, three bodies breathed the shallow, desperate sounds of the dying.

"I know what you did to Tyler Graham." My hand inched toward my pocket, where the knife waited. "4-5-8-G-21. That's how you filed him, wasn't it?"

"Ah, you've been through my files." Wright's eyes were deader than the bodies in the Laskin morgue. Flat glass discs reflecting nothing but his own emptiness. "That subject provided excellent cardiovascular data."

Subject. The word tasted like ash. That's all Tyler had been to him. A collection of cells to dissect, analyze, discard.

"You killed him." I clenched my teeth.

"Of course I did. How else do we determine toxicity thresholds?" Wright's lips curved into something that resembled a smile the way a corpse resembles a sleeping person. "Death is the point. These subjects provide critical data precisely because they push past survivable limits."

The confession hung in the air, monstrous enough to feel like another presence. My skin shrink-wrapped itself to my skeleton.

My knife pressed against my thigh, both comfort and promise. One movement. One chance. But if I lunged and missed, Wright would fire. These people didn't deserve to die because I couldn't wait to carve him into pieces.

"Your corporate friends already sent their lawyers," I said, stalling for time while fantasizing about peeling his skin off in methodical strips. "Whitmore and his threats. How much are they paying you per body?"

"Enough." He smirked. "Risk management requires data. Empirical gets what they need."

"And these people? What are they to you?"

"Raw material. Society's castoffs finally serving a purpose."

My molars ground together hard enough to make my dentist weep. This wasn't just corruption or profit-seeking. This was deliberate fucking evil. The systematic slaughter of those society deemed worthless.

"Tyler Graham wasn't a waste," I spat his name as both curse and blessing. "He was a person. With dreams. With a future."

"He was a nobody. Nothing without the drugs. I gave him purpose."

The heat of my rage threatened to consume me from the inside out, starting in my core and radiating outward until my fingertips tingled.

Hunter's face flashed in my mind. What would he do if I died here, what it would it do to his fragile recovery?

I forced air into my lungs. Counted. Remembered what mattered more than the intoxicating rush of making Wright bleed out beneath my hands.

A crash sounded from upstairs, wood splintering and breaking. Wright's eyes flicked toward the ceiling, his aim wavering for half a second as animal instinct pulled his attention toward the new threat.

I lunged.

My shoulder slammed into his chest hard enough to rattle my teeth.

The gun went off with a crack that split reality in two.

The bullet whined past my ear to shatter a cabinet behind me.

My knife was already in my hand, muscle memory taking over as I pressed the blade against Wright's throat.

The edge drew a thin line of red, blood beading against pale skin.

"Move and I'll open your carotid," I hissed, pressing just hard enough to make more blood well up. His pulse hammered wildly against my blade, rabbit-quick with fear. "I'll paint this fucking room with your blood."

Wright froze beneath me, his eyes finally showing a human emotion: raw, animal fear.

Footsteps thundered down the stairs, boot heels striking concrete in urgent rhythm. Then Hunter: "Misha!"

Relief flooded through me, making my hand shake against Wright's throat.

Hunter burst into the room, Shepherd and Eli right behind him, followed by War and Xander.

The world narrowed to him, everything else blurring at the edges until I was seeing through a tunnel that led only to his face.

He was still wearing the same clothes I'd peeled off him that morning after making him come twice.

His hair was windswept, cheeks flushed with cold and exertion, eyes wild as they searched the room.

When his gaze found mine, every cell in my body lit up like lightning surged through me. Not just relief. Hunger. Primal, desperate need that hit harder than any drug I'd ever used. He was alive. He was real. He was mine.

Hunter’s expression hardened as he took in Wright, the gun on the floor, the unconscious patients. But when his gaze returned to me, the heat there made my breath catch. I wanted to fucking devour him.

Shepherd's eyes fixed on Wright, his hands already pulling zip ties from his pocket. "Still playing doctor, I see."

War crossed the room in quick strides, dropping to his knees beside the nearest patient. His hands moved swiftly and surely, checking pulses and pupil reactions. "They're alive, but barely," he said. "Severe respiratory depression. These IV bags don't have standard labeling."

Eli moved to secure the room while Shepherd took my place restraining Wright, those thick fingers wrapping around the doctor's throat.

Hunter glanced at the timer. "Whatever that's counting down to, we need to move. Now."

Wright's laugh stopped us all cold, the sound empty of humor but full of something worse: satisfaction. "Go ahead. Take them. It won't matter. The cleaners will have sanitized the clinic by now. All the evidence is gone."

“Don’t worry,” Shepherd said calmly. “We don’t need a paper trail for what we have planned.”

Wright zeroed in on Hunter and spat, "You poor idiot.

You think this is love?" Wright's laugh was broken glass.

"He's using you as much as you're using him.

When the real world intrudes, when the honeymoon period ends, you'll both remember that damaged people don't heal. They just damage each other."

I lunged toward Wright, but Shepherd's arm caught me across the chest, holding me back. "Let me fucking kill him!"

Wright ignored my outburst. “I can prove it. You see that black bag over in the corner? It’s full of morphine. The good stuff. Help me get out of this, and it’s yours. All the fucking opiates you want.”

Hunter's jaw tightened, a muscle jumping beneath stubbled skin. His eyes flicked to the black medical bag near Wright's desk. Just for a second. Just long enough for a knife of ice to slide between my ribs.

I forgot how to breathe.

"Hunter, don't listen to him," I said, fighting against Shepherd's hold. "You're stronger than this. You chose me. You chose us."

"Once an addict, always an addict," Wright pressed, seeing the opening. "Fighting it is just delaying the inevitable."

"That's bullshit and you know it," I snarled, straining against Shepherd's grip.

The countdown continued, red numbers reflected in the sweat on Hunter's forehead. My heart squeezed in my chest. Wright was trying to destroy what mattered most: Hunter's fragile sobriety, the victory he'd clawed from addiction one agonizing hour at a time.

Shepherd's hand tightened on Wright's shoulder, but he made no move to silence him. This was Hunter's battle. Hunter's demon to face.

My throat closed around words I couldn't speak.

Hunter's eyes met mine across the room. The connection between us pulled taut, a lifeline stretched across an abyss. I forgot how to breathe. He closed his eyes, and when he opened them, there was nothing there but anger and determination.

"You're right," Hunter said steadily as he stared down at Wright. The words struck me hard, each one stealing breath I couldn't afford to lose. My vision tunneled, darkness creeping in at the edges.

Wright's smile turned triumphant, victory gleaming in his eyes. "The bag's combination is—"

"But that's not all I am," Hunter said firmly.

The sudden shift made Wright's mouth snap shut, confusion replacing triumph.

"I'm a nurse who helped people while you murdered them.

I'm Tyler's friend who's going to make sure you pay for what you did.

And I'm the man who's in love with him." His eyes found mine, fierce and tender.

"The only drug I need is standing right there. "

The breath I'd been holding rushed out in a sound halfway between a sob and his name. Pride and relief and something deeper, something with roots reaching to the core of me, flooded my veins more powerfully than any chemical ever created.

Wright's face contorted with confusion, then disgust, then rage. His professional composure shattered completely. "You're nothing. No one—"

The crash from upstairs swallowed his words whole, dust and plaster raining from the ceiling as something heavy fell through the floor above. The building shuddered around us.

"Time to go," Shepherd said, hauling Wright to his feet, the zip ties biting into the doctor's wrists. "Eli, take point. I've got Wright."

Hunter was already moving to help War disconnect IVs, his movements focused and determined: all doubt burned away by his choice. "These two can be moved. This one needs support. Misha, help me with the third."

I rushed to his side, hands steadier than they had any right to be, following his instructions as we stabilized the weakest patient for transport.