CHAPTER FIVE
LABANO
Elsa Etxebarriia.
I had met her at the cliff, standing over a grave he had meant for her.
Dickinson Singh's victim had held my wrist and pleaded in a whisper for my help.
And I had helped the half dead woman though I was on the verge of suicide.
The moment replayed in my mind: lifting the lid, her fingers closing around mine.
A raw animalistic sound had torn out of my mouth when she had gripped me.
Staring at her eyes in the darkness had left me paralyzed by morbid fear.
"P-please, help me," she had stammered on last time before her grip had slackened.
Her voice was barely there.
I had found the courage then to jerk my hands away like flash.
I watched her fingers slide into the dark as I stood there, trying to catch my breath while my heart kept thundering.
The organ hammered against my own ribs as if it were trying to escape my chest.
It took a minute or two to steady myself as my training took over before grief or fear could drag me down again.
I took a deep breath before I pushed the lid off the container completely.
My mouth fell agape even as my mind refused to understand what my eyes saw.
There were two bodies entangled in the shadow but one wasn't moving at all.
My skin crawled at the ghastly sight while my breath came as broken gasps.
One look at the body of the man and I knew without a doubt that he was dead.
Still, I tentatively reached for the neck to find a pulse with hope.
I was right.
The man, he was dead.
But the other body, the lady who had grabbed me earlier, twitched.
I turned my eye to her.
"Help m—"
Her voice faded.
One of her eyes opened.
It was glassy and bloodshot, the will to live in them shew she was impossibly alive.
She stared through me and not at me as if she saw ghosts only she could name.
I dropped to my knees, my training active and checked her neck.
There was a weak pulse.
I began to examine her body to find out exactly what was wrong with her.
But in the dark container, it was not easy to figure out exactly what it was.
I tried to gently push her backwards to see more in the light and she groaned.
Instantly, I suspected a thoracic injury with internal pressure.
Her eyes closed slowly.
"Stay with me," I said, even though I didn't know if she could hear me.
Both of her eyes fluttered open for a second and relief flooded my veins.
Then she shut them again.
I checked—her pulse was good.
My hands ran down her neck to her chest along her clavicle deliberately slow.
My eyes widened when I touched soft mounds of flesh—mammary glands.
She was naked.
I cleared my throat, mentally warning myself to be careful of my movements.
I successfully slipped my hands underneath her armpits and raised her.
She groaned as he body untangled from the one of the dead.
The wound in her heart greeted me the moment she was fairly upright.
Carefully, I lifted her out of the container, noting she was lighter than she should have been.
I laid her flat on the floor to expose the wound and check her breathing.
She was not breathing too well, but at least her lungs hadn't collapsed.
I swore under my breath as I examined the wound, grateful that she would live.
I took off my jacket and proceeded to stop the bleeding with pressure.
Blood soaked through the black material fast and my fingers came away red.
"You don't get to die," I murmured. "At least not tonight. And neither do I."
When the bleeding was lesser, I leaned back to catch my breath, watching her.
I made up my mind that I would take her home where I had equipment.
No hospitals because the police would be involved and she could be in danger.
I took off my shirt.
I wrapped it around her naked body before carrying her bridal style.
I left the other body where it was.
And I didn't look back.
She did not stir once on the drive back but I talked to her anyway.
Maybe because I needed to.
I told her my name.
I told her to breathe.
I told her she was safe even though I didn't know if that was true at this point.
I wondered why she had been shot and why someone would want her dead.
When we reached my house, I carried her inside to my work area and laid her on the table.
My hands shook as I worked on her, not from fear or anger.
It was from grief and the thought that I had almost jumped instead of this.
I had nearly ended my life, forgetting that this was how I had lived my life, saving people.
She had saved me.
Now she couldn't die.
I had to pay her back.
I had to save her.
I cleaned the wound as fast as I could while she bled less and less on the bed.
Her shallow breathing improved.
My examination made me deduce that the bullet aimed at her had missed the heart.
It had nicked the pericardium instead.
"You're lucky," I whispered.
But luck didn't feel like the right word.
Maybe fate?
I put her under and began to operate.
I spent the next hours cleaning and draining the pericardial sac.
Then, I stitched her up after stabilizing vitals, sure she would live.
All she had to do now was wake.
I cleaned her body after the surgery and kept her warm alongside IV fluids.
Then, I had waited.
She had woken up hours later.
It had been just for a moment but I had been at her bedside.
Her eyes had found mine.
"Don't move," I warned.
Her lips parted.
"Am I dead?"
I had shaken my head and her eyes had fallen shut again.
But I stayed beside her till the next day.
And after that, she has stayed.
I hadn't asked her the questions I wanted to because I feared the answers.
She had said her name was Isla and she wanted to be reborn.
She hadn't told me anything else and I didn't push because I knew that look.
It was the one where pain lived behind the irises and waited to be let out.
Revenge.
So, I helped her to legally disappear.
I planned the surgeries that made her Isla, both body implants and voice.
And Elsa Etxebarriia was born.
She practiced everyday and I helped her because this was my new purpose.
The only way to live without Brooke until the truth about her death came later.
Brooke hadn't died from pregnancy.
The autopsy showed that he had killed her, her boss—Dickinson Singh.
And Elsa?
He was her target.
Two years had passed mapping the plans we were putting into motion now.
I had made Isla into Elsa, the lady who stepped into rooms like she owned them.
She had learned to smile without warmth to let men think they were winning.
The bid was the start.
And as I stared down at her sitting in the sofa, I was proud she had pulled through.
"Debt or not Elsa, step two is in place," I said as I headed for the corner hutch.
I put on the light in time to see her shrug.
"Pour me a glass too," she requested and I complied in the silence that followed.
I went back to her, handing her the glass.
She took it with a smile.
"I'll make him regret," she promised as she sniffed the liquid with a predatory look.
I chuckled.
"I bet you will."
I lifted the glass to my lips just as a knock came.
I frowned.
She did too.
"Were you expecting someone?" she asked with confused brows.
"No."
She stood and handed me her glass.
"I'll get the door."
I shrugged.
I sipped my drink as she walked out.
But curiosity got to me and I dropped the glasses, following behind her.
I stopped just inside the hall to see the delivery man hand her a large bouquet.
They were expensive white roses.
Who had sent her those?
She signed the deliveryman's book and shut the door just as I came up behind her.
We both stared down at the card.
"Do you know who sent them?" I asked.
She just shook her head.
Her phone rang.
"Take it," I said, taking the flowers from her with one hand to give her room.
She answered.
"Elsa Etxebarriia on the line," she began, confused at the unknown caller.
"I am aware, new CEO of Dallas."
I saw her shoulders tense and I knew exactly who that voice belonged to.
Dickinson Singh.
My pulse spiked.
Something rose inside me of me and coiled tightly inside of my chest.
It should have been Brooke here, not him.
"Do you like the flowers?"
Elsa swallowed.
After all this time, he still scared her.
"Yes," she said. "They are beautiful."
"Just like you," he added.
I rolled my eyes.
It would take me three seconds to stop a heart like his with a scapel.
I forced my breathing to remain steady.
"It's common knowledge," was her reply.
He laughed.
I blinked, my breathing heavy.
"Yes, a man like me only needs beautiful women," he drawled.
The egotistical bastard, men like him always mistook ownership for power.
"Not me," she told him.
"Oh, it's you Sparkles. You will belong to me, it's a just a matter of time."
My left hand tightened around the flowers as I placed the right in her shoulder.
I saw Elsa's shoulders relax immediately.
"You're very confident," she mused.
There was a small pause.
"I always get what I want."
She laughed softly.
"We will see."
Then she kept the call.
And when she turned to me she was smirking, like an eager predator.
Her eyes were ablaze with a fire I had never seen before.
The plan was inevitable and the end felt close for the first time since the cliff.
"He took the bait," she grinned.