Free Be Still My Heart by Jackie Ivie Page B

anyway?
    The man got to his feet, looking like he’d spent too much time shoveling down too many fatty foods, and then he waved toward the door.
    “Miss Ellenby? Eve? If you please?”
    “Hello Stuart.”
    Stuart knew who it was from the first shuffle of heelless slippers. He should’ve guessed from the moment his conscience sent him into this insanity. His vampire assassin mate was still the most stunning woman he’d ever seen, even with her hair pulled back, wearing yards of gossamer fabric, and kohl surrounding each eye. Her betrayal hit him with the force of a sledge hammer. Right to the gut. Stuart hunched forward to temper and absorb the agony, and then found he couldn’t. He gave a sob sound, watched them all note it, before shoving backward to the wall, rattling chain as he went. He’d been wrong about his punishment all along. It wasn’t just excruciating. It was a thousand times worse and it ripped right through him, taking his heart with it. He wasn’t even supposed to have one.
    “I see you’ve met Miss Ellenby.”
    He’d rip her bloody heart out. Just as soon as he finished with the sheik and these other assholes. And all that had to wait until he had this excruciating pain handled. Fire-like agony raced each vein, taking his strength and leaving him nothing but cold. Tremor-inducing, blue-tinged cold. He swore he could see the frost from each exhaled breath.
    “You do understand, don’t you, Doctor Findlay? Yes?”
    Keep talking, Asshole
. Just keep saying words.
    “That is good. We must go now. Miss Ellenby is here as my guest. We’ll be having a nice supper while I think about everything but you. I will be here again on the morrow, though. To continue our talk.”
    He heard them leave even with his hands slapped to each ear to shut it out. And even through the silent sobs rippling over him, the effort he was using to control all of it, and the fact that nothing was working. Why was everything and everyone so stinking wrong? He’d read and studied and even lectured about physiological reactions to emotion. How, when pain got too severe, a body could concentrate and turn it into a hatred-type feeling in order to absorb and then conquer it. He was concentrating and he was hating. And nothing worked. Where was that rage, huh?
    It wasn’t the first time he cried himself to sleep, silently cursing anyone who would listen, but it had to be the worst.
     

CHAPTER ELEVEN
     
    “Stuart? You there?”
    Oh no. Again no. And for emphasis, a third no
. Stuart wrapped into a tighter ball, clamped his hands tighter to his ears, and trembled at the slight whisper.
    “Stuart!”
    “Go to hell.”
    He mumbled it and shuffled closer to the wall. Manifestations were one thing he was determined to avoid, especially if they were a charcoal-haired vixen with long legs.
    “Come on, Stuart, we haven’t much time!”
    She wasn’t disappearing, and she wasn’t silencing. He might as well just face her and be done with it. Stuart moved into a bent sitting position and shoved open his arms, rattling chains with the motion.
    “I’ve got eternity, lady. Just look around.”
    “We don’t have time to argue. Move!”
    “And just how do you suggest I do that? I’ve got iron cuffs on my wrists and ankles. And I’m attached to the walls with logging chain.”
    “It’s just iron. Pull on it!”
    Stuart snorted. This was a great delusion. One of his better ones, actually. He lifted his hands at her, and then bent back into a “v” shape to pull on his ankle chains.
    “There. I pulled.”
    “We don’t have time for this, and if you make me climb down there and do it for you, it’s going to take more time! We’ll get caught. Is that what you want?”
    “Hell no. I want you to leave. That’s what I want.”
    She did that Russian curse word she always used, said it fairly vehemently, and it was recognizable even through set teeth and using a gargling sound. He smiled and started talking.
    “You know, I