Page 72 of Seal of Honor
“I don’t care.” Color rushed back into her cheeks. She hurried to his side and tried to tug him to his feet. “Better him than you. You’re bleeding everywhere. You need medical attention. Let’s go!”
Gabe grabbed Liam’s gun and lumbered to his feet. Shit, he was weak as a kitten from blood loss, and getting weaker. Still, he met her stare, wanting her to understand. “If we leave and he dies, you’ll have killed him. Are you prepared to live with that?”
Her chin hitched up. “I wouldn’t have pulled the trigger if I wasn’t.”
So strong. He flicked away one of the tears he didn’t think she was even aware were running down her cheeks. “I wish I could have gotten to it first.”
“But you didn’t. I did, and then did what I had to do to keep us both alive.”
A harsh, wet coughing fit wracked Liam’s body, attracting their attention.
Audrey looked down at him, and the color drained from her face again. Gabe caught her chin in his blood-stained hands and guided her gaze back to him. “You’re not okay with this.”
“No.” She firmed up her trembling lips. “But you were right. Sometimes, with people like him, violence is the only option. Now, let’s go beforesomeone comes looking for one of them.”
God, he adored her. He gripped that stubborn chin tighter and lifted it, giving her a quick, hard kiss. “All right. We’re outta here.”
Grasping her hand, he pulled her toward the door, but his legs went out from under him after the first step. One minute, he was on his feet, and the next, his hands and knees. His mouth felt like cotton and tasted like blood, and his visual acuity was way off. He blinked rapidly, trying to clear his head.
Oh, fuck. He was crashing. He’d pushed himself too far for too long.
“Dammit,” Audrey muttered under her breath and looped his arm around her slender shoulders. She tried to lift him back onto his feet. “You’re losing too much blood.”
He shoved away her helping hands. “Go.”
“Are you insane?”
He released a huff of laughter. “Only around you, honey.”
“This isn’t a time to joke.” She yanked hard on his shirt and managed only to tear it. “C’mon, Gabriel. Move.”
He tried, but his head suddenly weighed a hundred pounds, each of his limbs at least a couple thousand a piece. He collapsed and, hard as he fought it, consciousness became nothing but a good memory…
Until her palm connected smartly with his cheek. He jolted awake to find her in his face, eyes sparking with fear-fueled anger.
“Don’t you dare do this to me, sailor,” she said through her teeth as tears choked every heated word. “I killed a man for you, and you are not going to make me leave you behind. You are goingto pick your sorry ass off this floor and get us to safety.”
Yeah, forget adoration. He loved this woman.
“Yes, ma’am.” Weakness plaguing his every movement, he struggled to sit and managed to get upright. Sitting there on his butt, panting and shivering, with sweat dripping off his temples, the realization struck that he couldn’t do this under his own steam.
He looked up at Audrey. So tough, so stubborn, and almost as demanding as he was.
He held out a hand.
She released a huge breath of relief and clasped his palm. “On the count of three, big guy. One, two… up ya go.”
With her help, Gabe hauled himself to his feet. The world spun around him, and he staggered a little. Took a moment to draw a deep breath and regain his bearings. He touched his fingers to the seeping wound in his side.
Messy. A lot of torn flesh and a whole lot of blood, but he didn’t think anything vital had been hit and, with adrenaline coursing through his system, he couldn’t feel the pain. Yet. But that would change real damn fast, and they had to be well away from Mena’s estate when his brain caught on to the fact he was probably bleeding to death.
“We need to bandage you,” Audrey said when his fingers came away smeared red.
“Later.” Nausea threatened to choke him, but he swallowed it down and shuffled to the door. “Search the desk, their pockets. We need money, car keys… hell, an AK-47. Anything that will help us get the fuck out of here.”
“Okay,” Audrey said and moved away from him, back into the room.
As she rummaged through the desk drawers, he cracked the door open enough to peek into the hallway. Two guards stood there with their backs to him. They must have been told to expect gunshots, which played to his advantage and bought him some time to strategize. Too much longer, though, and those guards might start getting antsy.
