Eidolon’s heart missed a beat. “What about Yuri?”
“He’s dead.” Tayla closed her eyes and took a deep, rattling breath. “I tagged your pager with sort of a psychic GPS.” She looked at him, the dark circles under her eyes blending with the soot smears on her cheeks. “You must have given the pager to Yuri—”
“Hell’s blades,” Shade breathed. “The Aegis got him. What did they do to him?”
When she didn’t answer, Eidolon’s Justice Dealer cool disintegrated, and he grasped her by her collar and yanked her to her feet. His right temple throbbed, letting him know just how close to violence he was. He knew, though, that any roughness he aimed at Tayla wouldn’t be to kill her. No, he’d shred her clothes with his bare hands and take her hard, show her what he was, what she was, and that she was his.
Dammit. Grinding his molars, he brought the conversation back to less pleasant violence.
“You tortured him, didn’t you?” Gods, he could hear her heartbeat pounding, fragmenting the silence in the room, shattering his thoughts.
“Not me. He was already dead when I . . . he didn’t give anything up. He didn’t tell them anything they didn’t already know about the hospital. I’m sorry. I’m sorry about everything.”
To Tayla’s credit, she’d seemed genuinely upset that she’d brought an explosive device into the hospital, upset that her colleagues had tortured Yuri to death. It should have been Eidolon they’d captured. If the s’genesis hadn’t been acting up when it had, he’d never have given the on-call pager to Yuri after Luc’s surgery. And, oh, shit.
Eidolon released Tayla and turned to his brother. “Yuri gave Gem a ride home. See if you can locate her.”
If glares were death rays, Tayla would have been seared to ash by the look Shade gave her as he stalked toward the door. He reached for the handle and paused. “What are we going to do with her now? Hand her over to the Male-concieo or do her ourselves?”
Eidolon moved to his brother and lowered his voice. “I still need to talk to her.” When Shade would have protested, Eidolon cut him off. “She saved my life.”
“And you saved hers. You’re even. Kill her.”
Planting his open palm against the door jamb hard enough to make Shade jump, Eidolon leaned in so close he heard his brother’s heartbeat. “Do not argue with me about this.”
“I don’t like what’s happening to you, E. A year ago you’d have done the right thing.”
“Yeah, well, maybe I’m finally turning into a Seminus demon and doing the selfish thing. Seems to be working for you and Wraith.”
Shade snarled a vile curse and charged out the door, slamming it loudly behind him. Eidolon let out his own snarl of frustration. Low blows weren’t his style, but lately they were falling out of his mouth when the last thing he needed right now was to be fighting with his brothers. Shade, especially.
Eidolon’s own anger flared bright and hot as he rounded on the cause of the tension between them. “You came here to lead your Aegis colleagues to my hospital.”
“Yes.”
The betrayal streaked through him, and he had no idea why. They were enemies. He’d expected something like this. But for some reason, the knowledge that she’d wanted to destroy what he’d worked so hard for tore at him.
“I don’t need to ask why. That you hate us is obvious—”
“I don’t hate you,” she said hoarsely. Her gaze cut to him, full of misery, slicing him like a scalpel. “God help me, I don’t hate you.”
Shock made him take a step back. “You’re lying.”
“No. If I hated you, I’d have let that bomb go off in the hospital instead of the parking lot.”
He laughed, a hollow, bitter sound. “You were saving your own skin.”
“I suppose I’d think the same thing.” She studied the floor. “Was anyone hurt?”
“Yes,” he said, angry again. “The Aegis didn’t destroy my hospital, but it did take out a few staff members. Do you realize, little killer, that your own colleagues set you up to die as well?”
A ragged sob shook her. The tears she’d been holding back fell. “I was a sacrifice. For the greater good—”
“For the greater good?” Eidolon saw red. Blood red. He closed the distance between them in a single stride and seized her shoulders, fought the urge to shake her until her teeth rattled. “Do you honestly believe that?”
She looked up at him, the pain in her gaze turning her eyes into a murky mire. “I have to.”
“Why?”
“Because if I wasn’t a great sacrifice, then I was nothing to them.” She blinked, and a tear ran down her blotchy cheek. “They’re all I have. If I’m disposable . . .”