Page 34 of Burn for the Dragon
Devon pointed at the monitor on the right. “I’ve…into…” She stopped and looked up at Hawke, then smiled apologetically at Everly. “Sorry. I forget.” She gestured toward her ear and then turned to face Everly full on. “I’ve managed to hack into the camera of the lab where your brother is being held.”
Unexpected tears welled in Everly’s eyes and her pulse raced with excitement and nervousness. “You did? You can see him?” She walked the rest of the way around the desk until the monitor came into view, shaking off Hawke’s hand on her wrist when he reached for her. She didn’t know if he meant to keep her away or was just offering support, but either way scared her even more.
The man on the screen was not her brother. The man on the screen was something out of a horror movie. Naked and dirty and skeletal, he paced the large cell he was in on bare feet that looked too big for the rest of his shrunken body. And yet, he didn’t appear weakened at all. Something dark dripped from his fingers and onto the floor, and when he turned so he was facing the camera she saw it was blood from where he’d gouged his own cheeks with his fingernails. His lips moved, and Everly swiped at her eyes and leaned in to get a better view as Devon rolled back out of her way. For the most part, he was mumbling indistinct words and phrases that made no sense. But every few words she could pick out what he was saying.
Everly straightened. This man was not her brother.
Someone touched her arm. Devon. “I’m sorry I don’t have the audio, yet.”
“I don’t need it,” Everly told her. “He’s…he’s just babbling. Mostly.”
Hawke came into her line of view. “Can you understand anything else?”
Tears warmed her eyes again. “Mostly, he wants to kill everyone there. He wants to kill himself.” She didn’t want to tell him what else Matthew had said, but he came around the desk and took her by the shoulders, turning her to face him. Ducking his head, he caught her eyes with his. “What else is he saying, Everly?”
She looked away, but he took her by the chin and forced her to look at him. Tears spilled over and rolled down her cheeks as she felt the pressure of his mind poking at her brain. “He blames me for what’s happening to him.” She waved her hand at his face. “Stop that.”
He cocked his head to the side as he studied her, but then the pressure disappeared. “Why is he blaming you?”
“Because if I had never found him and made him come here, they wouldn’t have found him, either.”
Kohl got her attention. “Everly, did he—Matthew, is it?”
She nodded.
“Did Matthew know? Did he know what he is before Parasupe got a hold of him?”
Her immediate response was to shake her head. But then she stopped, because she honestly didn’t know. “I have no idea. He never said anything to me about it if he did.”
Hawke dropped his hands from her and took a step back. He and Kohl stared at each other over her head, communicating without saying a word.
“What?” she asked as she looked between them. “What?” she asked again, louder now.
“Are you hungry?” Hawke asked her. “We can go get some food.”
Everly threw both hands in the air, palms out to each of the males. “I just ate and you know it. If one of you doesn’t tell me right now what the hell is going on…”
She looked at Kohl, who looked at Hawke. Desperate for some kind of an answer, she turned to Devon.
“You guys need to tell her,” she said, looking directly at Everly.
“Tell me what?” She turned to Hawke. He was the one she wanted answers from. He would be honest with her. Somehow, she knew that.
His chest rose and fell with each steady breath. “Everly, we’re going after Parasupe. Particularly this lab. We’ve been planning it for a while now, and with Devon’s help, we now have a lot of information we didn’t have before. No one should ever have to go through what this male is going through right now.”
“This male,” she repeated. “You mean my brother.”
His eyes travelled from her eyes to her lips and back. She had no idea what he was thinking, so she waited.
“Your brother is out of control, Everly. He’s a danger to himself and anyone around him now. It isn’t his fault. Who the fuck knows what they’ve been shooting him up with all these weeks, but I can almost guarantee they have a tracking device implanted in him somewhere. Even if he happens to get out, they’ll find him. And if he’s with you, they’ll find you. He needs to be…taken out of the equation.”
It took her a good five seconds to process what he was saying. She immediately shook her head. “No. That’s not happening. He’s my brother. My only family.”
“It has to happen. I’m sorry.”
Everly stared at him. Stared at this male who made her feel so many different things she’d never experienced before. Somehow, she never thought hatred would be one of them. “I’m not letting you hurt my brother. He’s all I have.”
Hawke started to say something but stopped. His eyes travelled over her face before landing on her own and staying there. There was something about the way he was looking at her…
