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Marissa watched as the pool of Butch’s brilliant red blood grew bigger and bigger around the drain until she was standing in some of it. Oh, God…all his color had left him, his skin going paper white. He didn’t seem to be breathing anymore.

V came forward with a stethoscope and put it on Butch’s chest. “He’s close now. Beth, get over here. I need you.” He handed the stethoscope to the queen. “You listen to that heart of his. I want you to tell me when you don’t hear anything for ten seconds or more.” He pointed at the clock on the wall. “Track it by that third hand up there. Marissa, you come hold your boy’s ankles, true? Wrath is about to get busy.”

When she hesitated, V shook his head. “We need someone to keep him on the table and Wrath and I have to go to work. You’re still going to be with him, you can talk to him from there.”

She leaned down, kissed Butch’s lips and told him she loved him. Then she replaced Wrath, taking over the job of keeping Butch’s heavy body from sliding off the gurney onto the floor.

“Butch?” she said. “I’m right here, nallum. Can you feel me?” She squeezed the cold skin of his ankles. “I’m right here.”

She kept talking to him calmly, though she was terrified about what was going to happen next. Especially when Vishous brought over the cardiac crash cart.

“You ready, Wrath?” the Brother asked.

“Where you want me?”

“Right here next to his chest.” Vishous picked up a long, thin, sterile pack and ripped it open. The needle inside was about six inches in length and seemed thick as a pen. “How we doing with that heart rate, Beth?”

“Slowing down. God, it’s so faint.”

“Marissa? I’m going to ask you to get quiet so she can hear better, okay?”

Marissa shut her mouth and resumed praying in her head.

In the minutes that passed, they became a frozen tableau around Butch. The only thing that moved in the room was his blood as it dripped out of those deep wounds in his wrists and flowed down the drain. The soft glug, glug, glug in the floor made Marissa want to scream.

“It’s still beating,” Beth whispered.

“Here’s what’s going to happen,” Vishous said, looking back and forth across Butch’s body. “When Beth gives me the signal, I’m going to pop the table upright. While I work on Wrath, I want you two to seal up Butch’s wrists. Seconds count. You need to close those wounds quick, we clear?”

They both nodded.

“Slower,” Beth said. Her dark blue eyes narrowed on the clock and she lifted a hand to press one of the stethoscope’s earpieces in tighter. “Slower…”

Seconds suddenly stretched out into infinity, and Marissa flipped into some kind of autopilot, her fear and panic buried under a powerful focus that came out of nowhere.

Beth frowned. Bent down closer, as if that would help. “Now!”

V set the table to level and Marissa ran around to one of Butch’s wrists as Beth dropped to the other one. While they sucked the wounds closed, V shoved that thick needle right into the crook of Wrath’s arm.

“Everyone back away,” V barked when he withdrew it from the king’s vein.

He shifted his grip on the syringe so he was holding it in his fist and leaned over Butch. With hurried movements, he felt around the sternum with his fingertips. Then he slammed that needle right into Butch’s heart.

Marissa stumbled back as the plunger was depressed. Someone caught her. Wrath.

V extracted the syringe and tossed it on the table. Then he picked up the paddles of the crash cart and there was a juicing-up noise from the machine.

“Clear!” V shouted. And slapped the metal pads on Butch’s chest.

Butch’s torso jerked and V put his fingers to the male’s jugular.

“Clear!” He hit Butch again.

Marissa sagged in Wrath’s arms as Vishous threw the paddles onto the crash cart, pinched Butch’s nostrils, and blew into his mouth twice. Then the Brother started chest compressions. As he performed CPR, he growled, his fangs bared as if he were pissed off at Butch.

Whose skin was now turning gray.

“…three…four…five…”

As V continued to count, Marissa struggled