The Price of Winning: London Calling Book Four by Kat Faitour Read Free Book Online Page B

make it.”
    Her mind flashed back to her father’s dying eyes. She already knew that answer.
    Madeleine didn’t allow herself to react. She tightly leashed her feelings, knowing if emotion crept through then she’d lose all control. She couldn’t afford that now. She needed the answers.  
    Tears clogged her voice, making it deeper. “Danny? The concierge to the building?”
    Connie blinked. “Gone.”
    Madeleine breathed through her nose, letting the sterile, antiseptic smell of the hospital clear her thoughts.
    “So—” Her chin wobbled dangerously. She bit her lip. “So I’m it? The only survivor?”
      “No, no.” Connie was urgent. “Mr. Payne survived too. I think he saved you.”
    Madeleine remembered.  
    He’d shielded her, tried to keep her back from the gunman. And when she broke free, he’d bodily tackled her, knocking her to the ground. Before all that, she’d been in his arms upstairs, losing herself in the feel of him. She’d simultaneously felt safe and protected, alive and sexy.
    Sebastian .
    “Madeleine.” The tone was low, a deep murmur.
    Her head jerked up. There he was, the object of her thoughts, standing tall and vital inside her hospital room. She must have said his name aloud because he was coming close, hand outstretched. Distantly, Madeleine noticed Connie moving out of the way.  
    His hand came around hers, and she clutched onto him, squeezing his fingers hard without realizing it. For the first time since waking up, she felt a measure of peace.
    A yawn caught her unaware. Sebastian’s mouth quirked a little before flattening out again. He sat down in the same chair Connie had occupied.
    Madeleine’s hand slipped a little, curiously heavy. He simply turned her wrist so she lay with her palm upward. He gently linked his fingers in hers.  
    “What—”
    “Shh, shh.” He stopped her. “Rest, Madeleine. The world will still be waiting when you wake up.”
    Tears filled her eyes, blurring his features. “But—”
    “Not now.”
    Her lids drooped, impossibly heavy. But she had to make sure. “No one else?” The words were slurred, hardly recognizable.
    Sebastian brought her hand to his lips where he pressed a chaste kiss on the underside of her wrist. “You have me. I will not leave you.”  
    Despite the grief tearing through her, Madeleine’s eyes drifted shut. The last thing she saw was Sebastian Payne sitting beside her, a solid reminder of life and survival.  
    Deeper and deeper, she fell into sleep. Finally, her mother’s screams were silenced and her father’s eyes closed in repose.  
    The blackness was complete.  
    On some level she welcomed the void with relief.
    She heard nothing. Saw nothing. Felt nothing .
    Madeleine Price became nothing.

CHAPTER THREE

    S EBASTIAN LEANED AGAINST the wall in Madeleine’s hospital room, just left of the closed door. Silent and brooding, he’d stood for nearly twenty minutes with absolutely no acknowledgement of his arrival.
    Madeleine sat in the only chair available near the window. She stared outside, rarely blinking and never moving. Her hands lay linked in her lap, a hospital-issued blanket draped over her knees.
    This had been the routine for days.
    Sebastian knew he could easily fetch a chair for himself. The nurses on the floor had come to know and like him. They plied him with hot tea and checked on him nearly as much as they did their patients. As for Madeleine, she was doing well, physically at least. Sebastian winced, thinking about her concussion and two broken ribs. She also had various cuts and abrasions, a result from landing on a floor littered with broken glass.
    All of which was his fault.  
    He sighed, straightening. His experiment in silence had failed, so he walked around to prop himself on the side of her bed. He deliberately let his knee bump her chair.
    Nothing.
    Usually this was when he talked about nothing, basically filling the air with his voice in a useless attempt to engage her. He