DeliveredIntoHisHands Read Free Page A

withering look but
remained silent.
    Marc’s forehead creased. “But—”
    “I gave you an order, Captain!” Garrick
shouted.
    “What of the shackles?” Marc asked.
    “They stay where they are.”
    “Garrick, please,” he said. “This is
Tonia.”
    “And that is precisely why the chains stay
where they are,” Garrick stated.
    “You can’t—”
    “Do not argue with me! Do what you are
told, mister!” Garrick bellowed. He clamped his mouth into a thin, straight
line, a muscle flexing savagely in his cheek.
    “Aye, Sir!” Marc acknowledged with a harsh
look to his friend. He gently took Antonia’s arm and helped her up.
    “When you’ve delivered her to the healer, I
want you back here. You and I need to have a little talk, Zoltán,” Garrick
said.
    Antonia gave Marc a tremulous smile but he
dared not answer it. His commanding officer—who at that moment was not the
friend he’d known for over thirty years—was staring daggers at him. He escorted
her from the tent and away from the red-hot glower that made him shift his
shoulders.
    “He’s not angry at you,” she said as he
shortened his steps to accommodate the shackles binding her legs.
    “Aye, well, I’m angry at him,” Marcus said
around a stiff jaw.
    “Don’t be, Marc. Not over me,” she said.
    He looked down at her manacled wrists.
“That is just wrong, Tonia.”
    “He believes he has his reasons and there
is a death warrant out for me,” she reminded him.
    Marc stopped, whipping his head around to
stare at her in horror. “By the goddess, I’m not about to let them execute you
with the others!” he stated, his eyes pinpoints of fury.
    “Neither is he,” she said on a long sigh.
“Trust me. My death is the last thing he wants.” She tried to smile but didn’t
seem to be able to. “He wants to punish me himself for as long as I draw
breath.”
    * * * * *
    Garrick had always had an open door—or in
the case when in the field—open tent policy. He did not generally require his
men to seek permission to enter. After all, he was the commander of the
greatest army in the Cairghrian Galaxy. Privacy was not an option. He had to be
accessible at all times to his trusted staff. Besides, only five men enjoyed
that distinction and only they were ever allowed inside the tent. If they came
visiting, there was a reason.
    Marc returned half an hour later with his
shoulders squared and his jaw set, expecting to do verbal—if not actual
physical—battle with his old friend. To find Garrick lying on his back on the
cot with an arm flung over his eyes was not a good sign.
    “Where is the algés?” he asked quietly.
    “Desk,” Garrick mumbled.
    Moving to the desk, Marc opened the only
drawer and took out the vac-syringe, a foil packet containing an alcohol swab,
and a vial of the heavy-duty med that was needed. With expert efficiency from
having performed the procedure hundreds of times, he quickly filled the
vac-syringe, returned the vial to the drawer and went over to the cot.
    “Put your arm down,” he said, his voice
barely above a whisper for he knew the faintest sound was magnified a thousand
times in Garrick’s brain.
    With a shuddery sigh, Garrick let his arm
fall above his head. Without being asked, he turned his head to give Marc
access to the pounding vein in his neck.
    “When did this start or do I need to ask?”
    “You don’t.”
    Marc laid the vac-syringe on Garrick’s
chest then tore the foil packet open with his teeth. He swabbed his friend’s
neck. “Okay,” he said, picking up the vac-syringe. “Ready?”
    “I’m never ready,” Garrick said and let out
a yelp when the needle drove into the column of his neck. “Fuck that burns like
fire!”
    “You’re such a pussy,” Marc told him.
    “Let me inject that shit in your vein and
see how you like it,” Garrick groused. “It spreads like fire through my fucking
brain.”
    Almost instantly the med began to take
effect. Garrick put his arm over his eyes again