He Bet My Life On A Table And Called It Justice For Her Chapter 05

He Bet My Life On A Table And Called It Justice For Her Chapter 05

Only after the crying upstairs finally died down did Thane come downstairs with a frown.

He walked over to me and nudged my arm with his shoe.

“Auden, get up. Stop playing dead.”

“It was a little blood. I’ll have the kitchen make you some beef stew later.”

I didn’t move.

Keaton stood nearby, staring at my bloodless face and motionless body on the floor.

His pupils shrank.

Slowly, he crouched down. His fingers trembled as he reached under my nose.

The next second, he jerked his hand back like he had been burned. His face went white, and he collapsed onto the floor.

“Mr… Mr. Calder…”

“Miss Marlowe… I don’t think she’s breathing.”

I floated above them, waiting for the system to come.

Thane’s face turned terrifyingly pale.

He stared at my body on the floor, so still he seemed to have stopped breathing too.

Beside him, Keaton’s voice shook. “Sir… is Miss Marlowe…”

Thane didn’t seem to hear him.

He lifted his foot again and tapped my arm with the toe of his shoe.

“Auden, get up.”

“The floor is cold. Stop making a scene.”

In the air above them, my fingers curled slightly. My chest still gave a dull ache.

I had been by his side for eight whole years.

Even inside that lightless Black Gallery, I spent every second praying Uncle Thane would come for me.

Before I knew the truth, I really had seen him as family. As home. As my god.

I lowered my eyes and looked at him.

He still wore that cold, irritated expression, as if I were nothing but a huge inconvenience.

He had held back with that kick.

But Thane Calder had been raised in blood and violence.

My body still rolled off the edge of the step like a dead leaf. The back of my head struck the cold marble floor with a dull crack.

Dark red blood quickly seeped through my hair and spread across the pale stone.

Thane’s pupils contracted.

The next second, he lunged toward me like something had punched through him.

He dropped to one knee and pulled me into his arms.

His fingers flew to the side of my neck, then under my nose.

My skin was cold. Silent.

His face drained of all color.

“…Auden?”

He murmured my name once.

Then, as if the touch had burned him, his voice shot up, hoarse and broken.

“Get the car. Hospital. Now!”

He carried me toward the door, his steps unsteady for the first time.

A bodyguard waiting outside froze. “Sir, Miss Marlowe is…”

“Shut up!”

Thane cut him off, his eyes terrifying.

“Tell the hospital to prep the trauma room. Notify the blood bank. Bring every dose of epinephrine and every unit of blood from my private medical lab. Move!”

He shouted the orders while laying me flat on the living room rug.

With a sharp rip, he tore open the front of my blood-soaked clothes, stacked his hands over my chest, and began compressions.

His movements were perfect.

Precise.

He had learned that kind of rescue work in his younger years, in places where men bled out on concrete floors.

But the harder he pressed, the less my chest rose.

Granger Pike, the head of Thane’s security detail, went pale with terror and stumbled away to make the calls.

The ambulance arrived fast.

Almost at the same time, Thane’s private trauma team rushed in with cases of drugs and equipment.

Thane climbed into the ambulance himself.

He shoved the paramedic aside, grabbed the syringe, and forced three full doses of epinephrine into my vein.

“No…”

He stared at my unresponsive face, and his voice began to shake.

“Why isn’t it working?”

I shook my head lightly from above.

Of course it wasn’t working.

Thane Calder, I was already dead.

Did you forget?

You signed the order yourself.

You agreed they could use whatever methods were necessary to teach me a lesson.

You used to say that as long as you were still standing in this world, no one would touch me in front of you.

But in the end, the person who hurt me the deepest…

The person who pushed me into hell…

Was you.