Page 39 of The Scent of Seduction

“We need to get out of here. There’s something I have to show you. God damn… you’re bleeding like a stuck pig.”

Jaryn felt trails of liquid seep down his side beneath the leather of his body suit and suddenly realized that he was cold. He never got cold. That was probably not a good sign.

Shaun grabbed Jaryn’s hand and placed it on his lower back. “Press down and don’t move.”

The angle made it impossible for him to follow Shaun’s orders to put pressure on his wound. His hand fell to the floor. He turned his head enough to see Shaun looking around the room. Shaun crossed to the dresser. He jerked open several drawers, rustled the contents, then slammed the heavy wood shut time after time.

“Check the closet,” Jaryn suggested weakly.

Shaun yanked open the closet door with such force that it banged against the wall and caused Jaryn to wince, not only at the echo of sound that pulsed through his poison-ravaged body, but in sympathy for the several hundred-year-old walls. Shaun came back out with a shirt in hand. In a matter of seconds, his best friend fashioned a field dressing from the garment and had it secured around Jaryn’s waist.

He tried to push up to his feet from his knees, but almost fell back to the marble floor. Shaun’s arm came around Jaryn and helped stabilize him. He lifted one of Jaryn’s arms around his shoulders, and the two of them shuffled out of the master suite. Weakness, unlike any he knew, enveloped him. He hated it. Jaryn was not at all looking forward to walking down that grand staircase. When they got to the landing, he moaned and closed his eyes for a second.

Suck it up, you pussy.

He gripped the banister with one hand and used Shaun’s body as a counter-support. If he didn’t think he would fall right off the edge and plummet to the floor below, Jaryn would climb up and slide down the gently curved railing, just as he’d always dreamed of doing as a child.

Step by step, they slowly made their way down. The fucking poison was pumping its way deeper into his bloodstream, making Jaryn’s muscles convulse and become weaker by the second. He wouldn’t tell Shaun, but his vision was also getting a little spotty, and his ears rang with a chorus of bells that wouldn’t stop.

They made it to the base of the stairs and Jaryn clenched Shaun’s shoulder. “Wait up a second,” he gasped.

“Fuck this!” Shaun exclaimed and swung Jaryn up over his shoulder in a fireman’s carry.

“What the hell? Put me down, or I swear to God I’ll slip wolfsbane into your coffee for a month!”

“Shut the fuck up, Jaryn, and let me get you help before you fucking die on us. I would rather be shitting and puking my guts up than have to go home and tell your mate that you croaked because you were too fucking stubborn to admit you can’t do everything on your own.”

At the thought of Nicole being told the news of his death, he immediately stopped struggling. He refused to leave his mate alone in this world. He hadn’t told Shaun everything Broyles had divulged, and with his wolf not responding, Jaryn had no way of opening his link to his mate to find out what was happening back home.

“I hate you right now. You know that?” he grumbled.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Shaun crossed through the foyer and continued towards the back of the house. “It’s a good thing I’m supernaturally strong because you weigh a goddamn ton,” Shaun grunted.

“You remember that time in Libya? You weren’t exactly a lightweight, smartass.”

Shaun started chuckling. “I’d forgotten about that.”

“Dragged your busted-up ass for two clicks till we got to the ex-fil site. You conveniently came to right as the chopper arrived.”

Jaryn had no idea where Shaun was taking him, but at that moment talking to his best friend was pretty much the only thing keeping him conscious. Despite his portrayed annoyance, Jaryn tried to keep his adrenaline down because he knew it would make the poison spread faster through his system. Fuck, he hoped someone, somewhere really fucking soon, could tell him what they were dealing with.

Shaun started down another set of stairs. Jaryn would never admit it out loud, but he was grateful for the ride, even if Shaun’s shoulder dug into his gut with each stomp down the treads.

Jaryn lifted his head, and the world spun on its axis. Shaun had said something about a basement, so he figured that’s where they were. However, this didn’t look like any basement in his experience. As Shaun carried him through the room, he saw glass holding cells that housed everything from a few little kids to teenagers. They all stood with their noses pushed against the glass and followed his and Shaun’s progress down the aisle. A multitude of computers and test tubes and equipment that Jaryn was frankly afraid to know the purpose of filled the room. They went through a set of double doors, and Jaryn’s world tipped end over end as Shaun set him down on what appeared to be some type of gurney.

What the hell is this place?

Jaryn moaned as a spasm of pain racked his body.

Shaun swallowed hard. “Hold on, buddy. I’ve got you some help.”

Jaryn followed Shaun’s gaze and his eyes widened at the sight of four men in lab coats bound.

Shaun went over to the corner and yanked one man to his feet. He dragged him over to where Jaryn lay on the gurney.

“Your boss stabbed him in the back, and now he can’t find his wolf. He’s going to die if he can’t shift and cure himself. Fix it!”

Jaryn’s vision was little more than muted halos at this point. His breathing was shallow, and he knew he was in trouble. Jaryn pictured Nicole as he’d seen her last—the early colors of dawn making her bare skin glow as she slept peacefully in their bed. Vivid recollections of the soft feel of her skin and the warmth of her body pressed up against him floated through his consciousness. He loved her. He needed her. There was nothing better in his world than when he made Nicole smile.

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