And behind door number three? Something involving a chain saw.
The latter was a pipe dream, really, considering he was completely surrounded by absolutely no Black & Decker. But the other two hypotheticals? They were goers.
“No?” he drawled when he wasn’t popped in the chest. “Is that a no?”
Considering the amount of metal on the guy—as well as dripping off both of those guards—the no-trigger on all those fingers wasn’t from a lack of available bullets.
“Where is my deal, wolf,” the Executioner said softly. “Where is my money.”
Lucan smiled in a snarl. “I’m working on it.”
“Are you? I don’t see any forward motion from that contact of yours downtown. I have kilos to move, kilos I made a large investment in—and nothing from you. I’m beginning to think you’re not the male for this job, and I believe you know how I fire people.”
The male lifted a hand toward the wall.
Lucan didn’t bother looking at all the obvious. His mind was down in the basement, with Rio. If he died now? Or at any time before he got her off the property?
“You need me.”
“No, you’re expendable,” the Executioner murmured. “Don’t forget it.”
I should never have brought her here, Lucan thought. But what had his options been? He’d had no idea how to help her. How badly she was hurt.
“You will bring me the deal at the end of this coming night.” The Executioner stepped off. “Or I will replace you. There are others who will be helpful.”
Apex, of course. He was the other one attached to Kane.
“Do we understand one another?” the Executioner demanded.
Motherfucker, Lucan thought. Then again, there was only one thing that mattered right now, and it had nothing to do with drugs.
“Yeah,” he muttered. “So am I allowed to go now that you’ve enjoyed this little verbal masturbation session? It’s meant so much to me—”
The Executioner moved fast, outing a flashing knife and putting it to Lucan’s jugular. “Watch your tone.”
Lucan smiled—and leaned into the blade. There was a bite of pain, and then the scent of fresh blood.
Taking a finger, he ran it through the wet spot and then licked the red stain off.
“Hm,” he said. “It never tastes as good when it’s your own, does it.”
The Executioner rolled his eyes. “You’re a sick fuck.”
“And you need me to stay alive.”
“For a little longer. And it’s all up to you.”
Lucan turned away. As he met Mayhem’s eyes, he winked. And then said to the guy, “Collect your prize, asshole. You fucking burned me.”
Mayhem’s mouth twitched—and no doubt he would have winked back if he hadn’t been facing the proverbial firing squad.
“Even if it’s nothing,” the male shot back, “there’s still the satisfaction of turning you over to the proper authorities. An ass pat is good enough for me.”
“Survival,” Lucan said as he started walking. “That’s all he’s giving you.”
The Executioner spoke loudly. “You better make sure you do right by me, wolf. Or your friend Kane’s going to be put out of his misery—slowly.”
Glancing over his shoulder, Lucan stopped and narrowed his eyes. “I’ll get you what you need. And you better be prepared for war when that scout lying there dead at your feet doesn’t return to his pack.”
“Accidents happen in nature, you know that.”
“With bullets?”
“They’re never going to find the body to discover the truth.”
So the Executioner hadn’t lied about the wolf coming here rather than being hunted where the clans were.
“You better hope so.”
“Your kind is overpowered here, wolf.”
As Lucan started walking again, he wasn’t going to keep arguing over an indisputable fact. If there was one thing he’d learned after all these years, it was that reality wasn’t interested in anybody’s opinion.
Striding down the corridor and passing by the workrooms, he thought back to the night when Kane had sacrificed himself to free the Jackal and his mate. The couple had been up on the dais at the Hive, tied to the posts that had run floor to ceiling. There had been no way of saving them from the Command.
Lucan had been there. Others, too.
Kane had taken his collar off, and the thing had done what it was designed to do upon removal. It had exploded—and brought down the house, so to speak. Or a lot of it. The collapse of the ceiling had toppled those huge posts, and in the chaos, the Jackal and his mate had gotten away.
Lucan had found Kane in the rubble. The collar blast had somehow been turned away from him, maybe from a malfunction, who the fuck knew. Instead of blowing him up, the transfer of energy had sent him flying backward—not that there hadn’t been plenty of damage. He’d been burned severely in his face, down his chest, and on his hands, and then there had been the impact against one of the Hive’s stone walls.
Right after the blast, there had been no intention on Lucan’s part to do anything other than save himself. But as soon as he’d tripped over the body, he hadn’t been able to leave the male. He’d picked up that former aristocrat and started running as hard as he could toward the evacuation route. Luck, or maybe it was divine intervention, had put a Jeep in his path. He’d thrown Kane in, jumped behind the wheel, and hit the gas.
He’d followed the caravan of semis and other trucks because he hadn’t been thinking right. And it wasn’t like he had any other resources, any viable plan. Freedom, in that moment, had not been the best move. Inside the prison camp? He knew how to function, and he knew there was help for Kane.
So he had driven to the sanatorium, and gone underground . . . and found the nurse, Nadya.
They had been doing what they could for Kane ever since, not that they were helping much—and when the Executioner heard about Lucan’s savior routine, he had smiled and removed Lucan’s collar.
And told him that either he went into Caldwell and became the face of the prison’s drug operation or Kane would be killed.