Authors: Nicola R. White
“Are you sure?” Alex peered at me in the dim moonlight. “You don’t look so good.”
I pressed a hand to my side in an attempt to ease the pain and felt dampness. I looked down. My hand was wet with what had to be blood.
A lot of it.
“Jackson.” I grabbed his shoulder with the hand that wasn’t dripping with my blood, but my strength was fading and I couldn’t hold on.
He settled Nora and Ruby in the truck then turned to me. “What is it? We need to get out of here.”
“I’ve got…a problem,” I managed to say as I lost my balance. My sneakers slipped on the gravel underfoot and I fell heavily against the side of Alex’s car. Absently, I hoped I hadn’t dented it.
“Tara!” Rachel bent over me, then looked up at Jackson. I breathed in through my mouth and smelled the fear coming out of her pores. “She’s hit!”
Jackson cursed. “We’ve got to get her somewhere safe before she bleeds out. Do either of you know any first aid?”
Rachel and Alex looked at each other. “We both know a little,” Rachel answered, “but neither of us has ever dealt with an injury like this before.”
He swore again. “OK, new plan. Alex, you drive while I look after Tara. Rachel, you take the truck.”
Rachel wrung her hands helplessly. “I can’t. Oh God, I’m sorry. I can’t.”
“She doesn’t drive,” I wheezed.
“Shh, sweetie, stay quiet,” Alex soothed me. She looked at Nora crouched on the floor of the truck with Ruby, and took charge. “Nora, you drive the truck, and Rachel, you get in with Ruby. I’ll drive the car and Jackson will look after Tara. We obviously can’t take her to the hospital, so where do you want us to go?” She directed this last question at Jackson.
“Go to Nora’s, I have some gear there. We may be followed, but we have no choice. We need supplies.” There was no sign of uncertainty or embarrassment in him now, just calm, cool detachment. I was seeing the SEAL he had been before his brother’s death.
Drivers and passengers sorted out, Jackson and Alex wasted no time getting us all settled in our places. Nora took off first and Alex peeled out after her, trying to keep the ride as smooth as possible so I wouldn’t slide off the backseat. Jackson folded his big frame into the tiny passenger seat of Alex’s car and leaned back toward me. He pulled off his shirt and used it as a compress as I slipped in and out of awareness, dimly aware of pressure against my side. Alecto swirled manic colors through my mind, faster and more intense than anything I’d ever seen, and despite their psychedelic quality, they were soothing in their own way.
Slow your breathing
, she told me.
Calm your body. These things may save us.
She projected images into my mind’s eye of snakes twined together in dormancy, slowing their bodily functions as protection from the cold. I focused on my breathing and pictured my racing heart slowing to just a few beats per minute. Soon, I was barely aware of the world around me. My eyes seemed to want to stay shut, and I wondered indifferently how long it would take to bleed to death.
“Stay with us, Tara,” I heard Jackson’s voice say. “We’re almost there.”
The car stopped and Alex stayed with me, engine idling, while Jackson went ahead to check the house. It must have been clear, because I felt myself being jostled as I was picked up and carried inside a few moments later. Someone turned on a light and set me down on Nora’s bed.
“Oh, my God!” I heard a woman’s voice in the distance. Alex? Rachel? I couldn’t tell.
“There’s so much blood,” someone said.
My clothing was cut off of me and I heard Jackson’s voice. “Help me turn her on her side. We need to check for an exit wound.” I was shifted again and I tried not to cry out. A weak moan escaped and I opened my eyes long enough to see that Alex had tears running down her cheeks while she helped Jackson turn me.
“There it is.” Jackson turned his head to look at Rachel, keeping pressure on the wound. “Anything you can tell me about her biology?”
“She was able to heal herself before,” Rachel said, “when Miller hurt her. But it was nothing like this.” Her voice shook with fear.
“We’ve got to stop the bleeding so she has a chance to repair some of the damage. The bullet may have nicked a lung, so we’ve got to close off the entry and exit wounds. If air gets drawn in and her lung has been hit, it will collapse.”
“What do you need?”
The voices faded away as I sank back into the darkness inside my head. It was hard to concentrate. I felt heat, then a burning sensation on my side, then more pressure. They labored over me for a while longer, but I lost track of time. Finally, the people surrounding me stepped away and I heard the low rumble of Jackson’s voice.
“There’s nothing more I can do. The rest is up to her.”
Alecto hissed something at me and I struggled to understand her, but it was too hard. I drifted away. She hissed again.
Ambrosia
.
Yes, that was a good idea. Maybe some medicine would help. I opened my mouth to relay Alecto’s message, but I couldn’t speak. I struggled, gasping for air, and gave up when the pain came rushing back. Better to just relax and focus on my breathing. Alecto showed me an image of the door that separated us in my mind. I knew that door. It was the barrier that kept us apart, that kept me in control of my body.
Let me out
, she urged, working on the locks I’d put up. I was too weak to help her, but she managed without me. I heard the sound of tumblers turning, and then Alecto was in control. Strands of hair slid across my face, but my body was too enervated to go full-on Furious, and the bloody tears I felt sliding down my cheeks were the only signal that Alecto had surfaced.
“Ambrosia,” she rasped in my broken, gasping voice. There was a strange, sucking feeling in my chest when she spoke. Rachel and Alex rushed from the room while Jackson stayed behind to watch over me. My eyes slid closed and my body stilled.
“Alecto, I hope you can hear me in there,” Jackson said. His voice moved closer as he crouched down next to the bed. “I know this isn’t a great time for a heart to heart, but there’s something I need to say to you.”
Alecto stayed silent, conserving our energy. I was too far removed from the situation to feel anything more than dim curiosity.
“I don’t know what it’s like to be trapped in someone else’s head,” Jackson went on, “and I don’t know exactly what you are…” He paused. “But if there’s anything you can do to save Tara, I’m begging you—do it. Please.”
Disembodied and on the edge of death, Jackson’s words were a slim thread tying me to the world. He needed my help to keep Ruby safe, but what he’d said had to mean he cared about me, at least a little. Didn’t it?
Thanks to Alecto, I was disconnected from the pain shooting through my nerve endings and the pressure in my chest, but I did feel a glimmer of hope. I longed to reach out and touch Jackson’s arm, to tell him I was there listening, but I couldn’t move.
Finally, Rachel returned, carrying a brimming coffee mug of the disgusting yellow potion. She’d put a straw in it so Alecto could drink from our prone position and the Fury raised her head weakly to accept it. When the mug was empty, Alecto let my head fall back against the pillows and I watched Jackson fade away as my eyes slid shut of their own volition.
He was the last thing I saw.
Chapter 20
When I woke the next morning, I was weak but back in control. Alecto’s presence swirled sluggishly in my head, exhausted from her efforts to keep us both alive, and I knew I owed her. If not for her, I wouldn’t have woken up at all.
I sat up slowly, stiff and sore all over, and batted aside the sheet that had been laid over me. I was naked from the waist up and had a serious, hospital-looking bandage stuck to me, but nothing seemed to be leaking or oozing underneath. I took a deep, experimental breath and there was no pain or wheezing. A good sign. Next, I swung my legs around so I sat at the edge of the bed with my feet on the floor. I gently peeled back the gauze taped to my rib cage. There was a piece of saran wrap taped underneath, though I couldn’t think of any good reason for it to be there.
Footsteps approached and I looked up. Jackson stood in the doorway with a coffee mug in his hands. I grabbed the sheet and held it up to cover myself. It wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen before, but sitting there on the bed half-clothed made me feel vulnerable.
“You’re awake.”
“I hope that’s not more ambrosia,” I tried to joke. It wasn’t funny, but he gave me a half-smile, anyway.
“Just coffee. It’s been a pretty busy couple of days. We’ve been taking turns watching you and keeping a lookout in case whoever hit you tries again.”
A couple of days? “How long was I out?”
“Two full days since you were shot. This morning would have been the third.” He set his mug down on the dresser and came over to inspect my side. “How are you feeling?”
“Sore. Kind of stiff.” The memory of our uneasy truce—and the kiss that had followed it—came back, but I didn’t mention it. “What happened?” I asked, trying to keep things casual.
“We can’t be sure without x-rays, but I think the bullet went in, bounced off a rib or two, nicked the lung and came out through your back.”
Wow
. My mouth went dry and I felt the blood drain from my face as I realized the seriousness of what had happened. I could have died.
“Any idea who shot me?” I swallowed hard against the nausea that threatened.
Jackson frowned and shook his head. “My money’s on whoever sent Miller and Priest after you in the first place. There wasn’t much at the scene, though. I went back to the track and picked this up when it looked like it was safe to leave you.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out a spent cartridge and a slug in a plastic baggie. “It’s an M118 Match Grade cartridge. Would have been fired by an M24 rifle.” He held the bag out to me. I took it and turned it over in my hand, getting a look at the little piece of metal that had almost killed me.
“You say those numbers like they should mean something to me.” I handed back the bag. I knew it couldn’t hurt me, but I didn’t want to hold the thing any longer than I had to.
“It was a sniper rifle,” Jackson clarified. “You should be dead.”
Silence fell between us as I thought about his words, then he picked up his cup again and took a sip, providing a welcome interruption to my morbid train of thought. “I did find a patch of flattened grass where the shooter was set up,” he said, “but nothing to tell me who it was.”
“What about my blood? Was there any left at the scene?” If Graves went back to the track, there was no chance he would miss it.
“We got lucky. Your healing ability slowed the bleed so you didn’t start dripping everywhere until you made it to the parking lot. And it rained the night you were shot—washed away anything left on the gravel. There must be someone out there looking out for you.”
I let out a breath of relief and wondered if he was more right than he knew—the forecast hadn’t called for rain that night. Could Mrs. Hadley still be alive and helping us somehow?
But, no, that couldn’t be. Dewey had confirmed that he’d seen her body himself. I really had just caught a break, my first since this whole mess had started.
My stomach growled, roused by the smell of Jackson’s dark roast. Still holding the sheet, I stretched a little, testing myself. The movement caused some pain, but nowhere near as much as there should have been, along with an uncomfortable stretch in my side. The tape holding the plastic wrap to my skin pulled uncomfortably and I reached down to peel it off.
“What’s with the saran wrap?” I took a look at the skin underneath. It was pink and tender, newer than the rest of me, but there was no hole.
“The bullet nicked a lung. We had to cover the holes to keep air from getting in and collapsing it.”
“You really know your first aid, don’t you?”
His eyes darkened. “I learned the hard way.”
I didn’t press him for details. He had to be thinking of his time in the military.
“I heard what you said to Alecto,” I told him, “when Rachel left to get the ambrosia.” I pulled the sheet tighter around me and looked down at the floor. “I, um…” I cleared my throat. “I appreciate your concern for me. I know you’re not one to ask for help.”
In fact, that might have been the understatement of the year.
“Yeah, well, we have a truce.” He studied a photo of Ruby on Nora’s dresser so he wouldn’t have to meet my eyes. “That means we’re on the same team now.”
He fed me the same, disinterested attitude as always, but this time I wasn’t buying it. I’d heard the worry in his voice when he’d asked Alecto to help me—there were more strings attached now than he wanted to admit. We were bound together whether he liked it or not.
“You can deny it all you want,” I said finally, “but what I feel for you is real and I know you feel it too. Pheromones or not, there’s something more than that between us.”
He put down the photo. “You’re twenty-two. You don’t know what real
is.”
I reached for his arm, forced him to look at me. “
Real
has nothing to do with age. It has to do with what’s happening to us here and now, however unbelievable it seems. Real
is the Fury I’m sharing my body with, and it’s my friends and your family. It’s the fact that you saved my life, that we feel something when we’re together.”