Into the Veins by Nichole Severn

Author:Nichole Severn [Severnn, Nichole]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Nichole Severn Books, LLC

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

“So that’s what death warmed over looks like.” Lawson Mitchell angled his head through the curtain cutting her view off from the rest of the hospital room. A high widow’s peak, broad nose that’d been broken too many times, and a square jaw shaped the FBI’s Violent Crime Unit’s most recently promoted director’s face. The dark blue pinstripe suit contrasted piercing gray eyes and framed the wall of muscle underneath. It’d been a few weeks since she’d seen him last, but the fist of dread finally unclenched.

“I thought I remembered hearing your voice out there while I was dying. I don’t remember calling you in on my case though.” Blair smiled up through the arms of the attending physician bandaging the cuts around her wrists. The effects of the drug had faded, leaving every nerve ending she owned raw and exposed, but she hadn’t been willing to take any other pain medication once she’d come out of unconsciousness. Her muscles protested the smallest of movements, but she’d live with the pain if it meant having survived. She thanked the doctor as the woman finished wrapping the wounds and stood to leave. “Engaged life looks good on you.”

“Thanks. You’re invited to the wedding. We’re thinking June. The Seattle Times is keeping Arden busy, but we managed to both carve out enough time.” Hands buried in his slacks, Lawson stepped fully into view.

“I better be invited. It isn’t every day a friendship is forged in the heat of hunting a serial killer.” Her laugh dissolved almost as quickly as it’d filled the room, and the joke died between them. The last case they’d worked together had triggered ripples that would last years for the agents and deputies involved, including her and Lawson. Before she’d met the Violent Crimes agent and his fiancée, the bookcases in her living room had been relatively empty. Lawson had lost himself in love after he’d saved Arden from the most wrathful killer Seattle had ever known. Blair had bought over a hundred pounds of porcelain clay off the internet and molded it into a hundred different shapes. Each law enforcement officer handled the effects of the job differently. Hers had been to try to create in the wake of so much death. “I take it my case has caught the interest of the FBI elite.”

“Call my being here a favor for helping me a couple months ago. If it weren’t for you, I might not have gotten to Arden in time. We wouldn’t be planning a wedding.” Lawson took a seat in the chair beside the bed. “Hear you took quite a beating out there.”

The hallucinations, the fear and paranoia, the pain—it threatened to break her all over again, but she wouldn’t crack in front of Lawson or anyone else. She studied the scrapes in the palms of both hands, the broken fingernails. The ketamine had done its job as the killer intended. She’d been absolutely helpless under its effects. If it hadn’t been for Colson, she might never have walked out of that state forest alive.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.