Read Jocelynn Drake - [Asylum Tales 02] for Free Online Page B

heavily. The energy flowed back to my hands and I sent the final wave through. This one knit together any cuts in his skin, stopping any additional bleeding while urging his body to speed up the process of creating fresh blood to replace what he’d lost. There weren’t many cuts and the final wave returned to me after only a few seconds.
    I fell backward, sitting on my ass on the cold concrete, trying to get my breathing to even out again. I was exhausted, but Bronx’s life was no longer in danger from his wounds. I looked down at my friend. He breathed evenly without the sickening rattle and squish I had heard before.
    “What the hell did you do to me?” Bronx asked. He had yet to move and I was glad for it. He needed time to recover. You didn’t walk away from a troll beating even if you were a troll.
    “Heal you.”
    “Then why the hell do I still feel like shit?” he growled.
    I laughed, my head dropping back so that I could stare blindly up at the ceiling. There was nothing but blackness broken by dirty light filtering through a grime-encrusted skylight. “The spell fixed broken bones, stopped bleeding, and mended organs. You’re still badly bruised and battered. Time needs to heal that. I don’t have the energy in me to fix it all.”
    “You didn’t have to do it,” Bronx murmured.
    “Yeah, I did.” My eyes fell shut as the memory of his beating rose back to the forefront of my mind. He wouldn’t have been touched if I had protected the house like Reave had ordered. Fuck. Bronx wouldn’t have been in this mess to start with if I had killed Reave two months ago when he first threatened me with exposure.
    But I was clinging to the idea that I wasn’t a killer. Warlocks were mindless, empty killers who thought nothing of taking a life. Witches were heartless killers. I chose to leave the Towers. I chose not to be a killer.
    Simon’s laughter picked that moment to rattle through my brain like the Ghost of Christmas Past. I had killed Simon, but it had been self-defense. Right? I had to kill Simon or he would have killed me.
    “Gage?” Bronx said, jerking me from my thoughts. Silence had stretched between us, but I didn’t know for how long. Had he been talking to me, waiting for my response? I had to let these doubts go. Fuck you, Towers. I wasn’t one of you. And fuck you, Simon Thorn. I hoped you liked your new job as ferryman to the dead.
    “I had to heal you,” I said, my voice picking up strength as I returned to our conversation. “It was either leave you to die or carry your fat ass to the car. Do you know how hard it is to find a good tattoo artist to work in our part of town? Not that easy.”
    Bronx chuckled. His normally deep voice was even deeper from the pain that lanced through his body. I rose and offered him a hand while bracing my legs to help pull him to his feet. It took a couple tries and we were both puffing heavily when it was over, but Bronx was standing without help. The troll was roughly triple my weight. There wasn’t much I could do if he couldn’t walk to his car on his own.
    I waved my hand in the air, dispersing the last of the cloaking spell before bending down to scoop up my jacket. My back protested and my knees were stiff from sitting on the cold floor. I needed to get back to the gym. I had been trading off my usual trips there in order to spend time with Trixie before going into the parlor. Maybe it was time to find a little balance. I was beginning to think that I needed to be in shape if I was going to keep up with Reave and his band of thugs.
    “Now what?” Bronx asked around another wince of pain as he hobbled toward the door.
    “Home. Shower. Bed,” I listed, keeping pace beside my friend. “We’ll deal with tomorrow when tomorrow comes.”
    “Not Trixie’s?”
    Trixie’s place felt like some distant dream, an oasis in the wasteland my night had become. I would have given anything to see her and settle in her soft arms, but I shook my head.