The Lies That Shatter by A.V. Asher

Chapter Thirty-Two

Alec returned to the bar, his soul sinking in anguish. Mercedes’s tearful voice telling him all the ways he’d hurt her was more than he thought he could take. Here he had been worried what Ezra would do to her, but he’d done far worse.

The crowd had thinned considerably. The jovial murmur of the remaining guests didn’t match the utter fucking misery stabbing him in the gut.

“Alec . . .” a sharp voice broke through his thoughts. Charlotte was next to him, her flashing eyes taking him aback.

“Hey Charlie . . . what’s wrong?”

She stepped up to him, anger making her words quiver. “I love you, Alec. You know I do. But that fucking woman you brought with you is no longer welcome in my home. You keep her away from me, and you keep her away from my sister. Do you understand?”

What the hell?

Charlotte stepped past him, but he stopped her. “Wait! What’s going on?”

“Kristin went after Sadie in the bathroom. Told her every night in bed you tell her how grateful you are to have dodged a bullet because Sadie’s such a selfish bitch. Then she said Sadie’s nothing but trash for trying to talk to you.”

Jesus fucking Christ.“I swear, I would never say anything like that about Sadie.”

“I’m sure you wouldn’t. But Sadie doesn’t need any catty bullshit from Kristin or anyone else. She’s been through enough.”

Fuck. No wonder Mercedes was so pissed.

Alec looked down into those angry hazel eyes, identical to the expression he’d just seen on her sister. “I’m so sorry. I’ll take care of it.”

He’d start with Mercedes. She had to know the truth.

Alec strode across the room to get to the little sidebar Mercedes perched at.

“Not happening, man,” Ezra said as he stood in Alec’s way.

Alec bit back a retort. “Excuse me.” When he moved to brush past him, Ezra’s hand went to his shoulder.

“Mercy doesn’t want to talk to you now.”

Alec narrowed his eyes and lowered his voice. “Take your hand off me, Ezra.”

They were equal in height and nearly the same build. But Alec knew ten different ways to drop him if he needed to.

Ezra lifted his hand from Alec’s shoulder, hovering it above his shirt. “You’ve already upset her enough. You’re going to leave her alone.”

Anger rippled through Alec’s entire body. “Do you actually think you have the ability to stop me?”

“If I have to.” Ezra glared back at him.

But Alec was no longer listening.

Mercedes had gotten up from the bar, and Alec could swear she stumbled. Something in her face made his stomach turn to ice.

A man, who was wearing a bar uniform, was at her side. Mercedes’s step faltered again, and the bartender leaned in to say something to her. When her gaze landed on Alec, adrenaline rushed through him. She’d been looking for him.

When her mouth formed the words. “Help me.” Alec was already moving.

He pushed Ezra aside and bolted to her. The man holding on to her arm was trying to hurry her to a tunnel door. He caught sight of Alec and jerked Mercedes toward him.

Alec leaped around a chair to the bar. He wasn’t fast enough.

The bartender had a syringe in his hand.

He jabbed the needle into Mercedes’s abdomen and pressed the plunger down. Then he pushed her away and turned to run.

Alec took him down, their bodies crashing onto a table. Empty glasses flew off the top, splintered as they hit the ground. The force of Alec’s impact knocked the table over, and the two of them landed on the floor. They wrestled until Alec was straddling the man, his knee pinning down one arm.

The man grabbed a broken wineglass with his free hand and swiped at Alec. Each swing went wild. Alec registered a few hits. His cheek, his left arm. Didn’t matter.

Another jab whooshed in front of Alec’s face. This time he seized the man’s wrist, jerked it straight toward him and struck the crook of his tilted elbow. A sickening crack reverberated, as did the man’s scream of pain. The broken glass clattered to the ground.

Alec grasped the mangled arm and twisted. “What the fuck did you give her?”

“Fuck off,” the man croaked.

“Wrong answer, arsehole.” Tendons snapped away from bone as the man screamed. “Tell me what you gave her!”

“You should let her fucking die.” The man’s breathing was reduced to a pant. “He’s never going to stop.”

The man’s trapped arm broke free and landed a blow to Alec’s cheek.

Fucker.

Alec snatched up the shard of glass, jerked the man’s head to the side by his hair, and plunged the edge of the thick crystal into his neck. Alec ignored the glass cutting into his own fingers as he jerked the shard down, carving through the flesh of his throat. The man gagged and jerked, his blood pooling around him.

Frantically, Alec searched through his pockets, hoping to hell to find a clue to what he gave her. He felt a little glass vial with his bloody fingers and jerked it free.

Fucking fentanyl.

Panic swelled as he pushed off the dying man and ran to Mercedes. Vaguely, he could hear Cressida and Shake corralling most of the straggling guests back upstairs to the main bar, until only a few of them remained.

Mason was already kneeling over her, checking her eyes and searching for her pulse.

Mercedes was fighting it, but she was losing. Her pupils were pinpoints, the green and gold stood out against the pallor of her gray skin.

Alec brought her hands into his. “It’s fentanyl, Mason.”

“Shit! We need a Narcan kit!” Mason shouted to the group of onlookers. “Do you have one here? You! Where’s your Narcan kit?”

“Uh, in back.” A stunned server answered and ran to fetch the only thing that could save Mercedes. Naloxone was one of the few drugs that could reverse the effects of opioids. They frequently stashed Narcan kits in bars as the first line of defense in saving an overdose victim.

Mason held her wrist, his eyes on his watch. “I was hoping for GHB or some other sedative.”

“I think she had that, too. She was stumbling before he injected her.”

Mason’s dark eyes flicked to his, and the blood rushed from Alec’s face.

She’s not going to make it.

Mercedes blinked at him. “Alec.” Her voice was barely a whisper. She wasn’t trying to tell him something, she was just saying his name.

“Sadie, please.” The words caught in his throat. “Please don’t leave me again. Please.”

Her breath was labored and harsh, and her lips were a grayish blue. She was suffocating to death right in front of him.

Alec cupped her face. “Darling, look at me.”

Then her eyes rolled back in her head, and her body jerked.

“Fuck, no, no, no.”

Alec cradled Mercedes’s head in his arms, trying to memorize every little detail of her. The way her hair smelled, the warmth of her skin as he stroked her. Her fragile heartbeat slowing in her veins.

“I got it!” Declan ran to them, unzipping the case and handing it to Mason.

Alec held her tight, her breathing nearly gone. Her soft lips had turned purple.

Mason deftly prepping her leg for the injection, ripping the cap from the auto injector and jammed it into her thigh. He held it there until the needle sprung back with a click.

“Time it!” Mason said to Declan.

“Aye.”

Three minutes . . .

Three fucking minutes was what he needed to know if it had worked.

Her breathing stopped. “No! Fuck!”

She needed more time.

Mason’s calm direction grounded him. “Start rescue breathing, Alec.”

Alec laid her on the floor, pinched her nose, put his mouth to hers, and blew. Her chest rose and fell with each exhale.

He was vaguely aware of Declan holding her wrist, hunting for her pulse with two fingers.

“I got it.”

Mason had her other wrist. “I got it too. Keep going, Alec.”

Hope filtered through his panic, and he batted it away. It could come crashing down at any moment.

In between breaths, he asked Declan for the time.

“One minute, thirty seconds.”

Fuck.

“Is there another one?” Mason said.

Declan said, “Aye.”

“Give it to me.”

Alec focused on giving Mercedes each lifesaving breath he had in his body. He heard the click of the next injector hitting her thigh.

Within seconds, a rattling exhale came from her. Alec gave her more breaths, filling her struggling lungs with what she needed.

Her eyelids fluttered. Alec stopped, watching her chest rise and fall on its own now.

“Sadie?” He stroked her cheek. “Sadie, darling, can you hear me?”

Her eyes opened, and she blinked. They were green and glassy. The shallowness of her breathing made him think each inhale would be her last.

“Can you speak? What’s my name?”

“Alec.” It came out in a shuddering whisper.

“Do you know where you are, darling?”

Her gaze shifted to the ceiling above him. “No.”

As the counter drug coursed through her body, she was becoming more aware of what was happening to her. Fear clouded her expression, and her thin breaths turned to a panicked pant.

“No, look at me,” Alec soothed. “Just breathe. I’m right here.”

“Alec, we have a car ready out front,” Declan said. “We can wait for the ambulance, but Luke said we are only a couple streets away from a hospital. If you want to stay with her, we should go.”

Declan had a point. There was a dead man just feet away. She would get there faster and there was no opportunity for the police to detain him.

“Can you hold on to me, darling?” He scooped Mercedes into his arms. She held him tight around his shoulders, giving him the sense of hope. She had more strength in her body than he thought.

Alec carried her up the steep staircase and into the main bar. Gasps and murmurs were coming from the group of onlookers, but he ignored them. Declan barked instructions to Cressida and Shake.

He followed Luke and Mason to the door and together they got Sadie into the SUV. Alec sat in the back with her and shifted her into his arms the second he crawled in. She leaned into him, stroking his cheek with her hand.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Don’t be sorry. Just stay alive.”

“I don’t think I have a choice.”

“I know. But I need you to try.” His throat closed up and he choked back a sob. “I can’t lose you again.”

She nodded and brushed his tear away with her thumb. “Tell me.”

Alec knew exactly what she needed. “I love you. Only you.”

A smile played on her lips. “I love you, too.”

She tilted her head and kissed him. Not like the heated kisses they’d shared minutes ago, but a slow and savory kiss that was meant to stay with him for years. The kind of kiss that held a goodbye.

“Will you be there if I wake up?”

If.

“I’ll be there, I’m not going anywhere.”

Mercedes sighed and lay her head against his shoulder. “I’m so dizzy.”

“Don’t go to sleep, Sadie.” Alec gave her a little shake. “Sadie, you can’t sleep, darling. Please wake up.”

Her hand slipped off his shoulder. He’d spoken his last words to her.

Panic and grief tore through him. The only thing he could do was focus on the shallow rise and fall of her chest and pray she kept breathing.

When the SUV pulled up to the emergency room, Luke, Mason and Declan all jumped out. Everything around him happened in a whirl. Mason was barking her stats and before he knew it, they tore her limp body from him.