Authors: A. C. Arthur
“You were always ungrateful no matter what we tried to do for you. I hate you!” she yelled vehemently.
“Do you hate me or yourself?” Nivea asked her. “Because of all those nights you had to lie in that big comfortable bed, in the lavish penthouse you liked to brag so often about, while your husband was down the hall doing heinous things to your youngest daughter? That ranks right up there with something to hate yourself for.
“Or maybe, it’s because you helped him transport hundreds of children and then watched as he facilitated their demise. You killed shifters, some probably from the same bloodline as your own. Again, that’s a heavy burden to bear and I can easily see how one would hate herself for participating in such acts.
“Or,” Nivea continued, her voice growing edgier with every word. “You could be hating yourself for being so gullible and eventually expendable. Did you know he escaped and left you here to rot, or to be killed, whichever comes first?”
“You think you’re so smart. Think you are so high and mighty but they don’t give a damn about you here either!” Michele spat, taking a step closer to Nivea. “Nobody cares about you, they just let you stay to do their dirty work. They knew all along who and what you were. A whore and a backstabber.”
Michele lunged at Nivea and she was ready. Stepping to the side, she let her mother tumble across the floor, falling into the wall. Before she could turn around she knew Michele would try again, so Nivea moved quickly, wrapping her arms around her mother’s neck, pulling her body back against hers as she squeezed. The brace around her neck was thick and Nivea felt it pressing into the inside of her arm as she continued to tighten her grip on her mother’s neck. In an instant the weight of a heavy realization hit her.
She could kill Michele Cannon. With all the distaste and disappointment for what she’d done and what she’d allowed over the years, Nivea could kill her and walk right out of this room as if she’d dispatched any other enemy. After all, that’s what she’d been trained to do.
With a quick motion she released her and Michele stumbled around, finally standing up straight to taunt her daughter once again.
“You can’t even do that right,” Michele said viciously. “Nothing you do will ever amount to anything. You will always be a complete failure. No man will want to touch you either because you’re disgusting to have wanted your own father in your bed.”
Nivea reacted instantly, her arm extending, fist landing against Michele’s jaw, the woman’s head snapping back from the assault.
“You are the bitch!” Nivea told her. “You never knew how to be a mother and instead of owning up to your faults, you tried to make us feel like the failure was ours. You’re no better than him, and believe me when I say both of you will rot in hell for what you’ve done.”
Michele made a move like she wanted to charge Nivea again, her sharp jaguar’s teeth and claws bared. Nivea simply shook her head at the pitiful sight.
“I didn’t kill you once,” Nivea said, her voice deadly calm. “But let’s be perfectly clear, that is the only chance you’ll ever get.”
Michele growled loudly, her arms lifting, claws bared just before her entire body trembled with the bolts of electricity soaring through her. Nivea turned to look at the door that was still closed. Had someone been watching or had Michele’s actions activated something? The woman fell to the floor, still convulsing, but Nivea turned away.
She didn’t give a rat’s ass what was happening to her mother. But more so because there was a weird feeling assailing her at the same time. She walked to the door, opened it, and walked right past Sal without a word. Inside her cat was up, its eyes trained via Nivea’s human ones on something straight ahead. She was moving but she had no idea where she was going or why she needed to get there so quickly. All she knew for certain was the scent that filled her nostrils, the warmth that coated her body, and the warning that her cat was sending was loud and clear.
Something had happened to Eli.
Eli had called her more than a dozen times. Since the moment he’d raced through the garage to get the SUV he’d been trying to get in contact with Nivea. She wasn’t responding.
There were three dead guards, all in uniform, all dumped at locations that either a human or a shifter were sure to find them. The thought that there would be more, that Nivea could be … he held the phone tightly in his hand, pressing the speed dial one more time. As it rang insistently in his ear, Eli closed his eyes. He tried to concentrate on his breathing, tried to focus on the smidgen of light he could see. It was shining amidst the dark and he knew what it was now, knew who it represented in his life. Each time he dialed her number he was reaching for that light and it was slowly diminishing, until the moment his chest constricted with the possibilities.
He could not see Nivea. No vision appeared and he wanted to curse whatever was inside him, whatever he was truly supposed to be. If it was a Seer, how come he couldn’t see the one thing he needed desperately to see right now? How come he couldn’t find her wherever she was in this world to ensure that she was safe?
Ezra was speeding down the highway, trying his damnedest to get them back to Havenway as soon as possible. There’d been reports of suspicious deaths interrupting the radio stations and Ezra had finally turned it off, while in the backseat Rome and Nick kept an angry silence.
Eli was just about to dial Nivea’s number again when his phone rang instead. “Yeah?” he answered, instantly hoping …
He turned in his seat the moment the voice in his ear began talking, his gaze connecting with Rome’s.
“Fuck!” Eli cursed.
Rome sat forward, his hands gripping the leather-backed seats in front of him.
“Kalina?” he asked.
Eli was moving the phone slowly from his ear as he said, “There’s been an accident.”
* * *
Havenway’s side doors burst open and Caleb Sanchez carried Kalina’s unconscious body inside. Ary and her newest assistant, Lucas, the teenager that had come from the Gungi with her almost a year ago, were waiting right there dressed in scrubs with a gurney between them.
“I keep talking to her but she’s not responding,” Caleb yelled.
Lucas helped him get Kalina’s bloody body situated on the stretcher, while Ary looked down in concern.
Nivea rounded the corner having broken into a run, the anxiety centered in her chest so potent. The second she picked up the scent of blood she thought of Eli and ran faster, only to stop short at the sight of the First Female lying on the stark white sheets. Blood streaked her face and down the front of the yellow blouse she’d worn. But there was more on her legs, the beige tights almost completely covered with it, her brown suede skirt twisted around her waist.
“Kalina,” Nivea whispered.
“Let’s get her to the medical center, quickly!” Ary yelled.
“Jax and the driver are hurt too. They’re coming in the other truck,” Caleb told Ary who looked around.
She wasn’t panicking, not just yet, but with others milling about, shocked silence registering on her face, the
curandera
needed to act fast.
“Nivea, you come with me. Caleb, you stay here and wait for the others. Lucas, you go get another stretcher, and somebody page Papplin!” Ary instructed.
Nivea came around to the opposite side of the bed and helped Ary push it through the crowd spreading out before them. They moved quickly, running alongside the bed until they were finally at the medical center.
“Get those clothes off her while I check her vitals,” Ary instructed.
Nivea moved, taking off the First Female’s riding boots and tights, then her skirt, all the while her hands were shaking at the blood and the possibilities. In her mind she wished for saving mercies, that this woman who had been so strong and so nice to all the female shifters at Havenway would live. And not only that, but the baby as well.
The first child of the Assembly Leader. With emotion clogging her throat, Nivea moved slowly, using the scissors to cut the blouse away from Kalina’s chest. She tried like hell not to look down at her stomach, at the pouch where the baby should be growing and breathing.
“She’s lost a lot of blood, I just need to figure out where it’s coming from so I can stop it,” Ary was saying.
Nivea inhaled deeply and let the breath out as she looked down at Kalina, studying every part of her but not thinking about the baby or the hurt that Rome would endure if she did not live.
“There’s a head wound,” she said. “On this side, right here.” She pointed and Ary hurried around to her side of the table.
“Superficial, she probably banged it against the window or something when the truck flipped over,” Ary said. “I’ll need to stitch it but that’s not where all this blood is coming from.”
“Flipped over?” Nivea repeated.
“Yeah, five times, across the highway. That’s what Aidan said when they called.”
Ary was talking as she moved, pulling out instruments and doing things to Kalina that Nivea had never seen before.
“I’m going to start an IV. Get me that cart from over there and open those packages for me.”
Shaking her head to clear the visual of a truck rolling over with people inside of it, Nivea hurried to do what she’d been told. With skilled hands Ary inserted a needle and soon whatever was in that IV bag was dripping into the First Female.
“Found it!” Ary yelled. “There’s a gash here at her back. I can sew it up as soon as I stop this bleeding. In the meantime her pressure’s dropping.”
That didn’t sound good and when Ary moved Kalina’s body it looked even worse as blood gushed from the wound.
“Grab those towels and get over here!” was the next order that came Nivea’s way.
She wasn’t trained for this, wasn’t really into saving lives as much as she was defending—and usually taking—them. But this was Kalina … this was her family. All the family she figured she would ever have, all things considered. So she moved around the medical center, doing whatever Ary asked even when she barely understood what the
curandera
wanted her to do. It didn’t matter, whatever assistance she could offer, she would, to save this female shifter and her baby because there was no way in hell she was going to walk out of that door and tell Roman Reynolds that his mate was gone.
* * *
“Where is she?” Rome asked immediately, after having pushed through the double doors of the medical center.
“Sir, she’s in the back with Ary. I believe she’s stable but you cannot go back there right now,” Lucas said, his voice as shaky as his hands, which he finally put down to his sides in an attempt to keep them still.
“I will not wait here while she’s in there…” Rome paused, swallowed deeply. “Get the hell out of my way!”
He pushed past Lucas, who actually stood a little firmer than anyone could have expected.
“Sir, I’m just following orders. I can’t let you go back there until she says so.”
“Lucas, I’m not in the fucking mood for this right now. Get. Out. Of. My. Way!” Rome yelled and pushed forward again.
Lucas used both hands this time to push against Rome’s chest, trying to keep him still. Finally, it was Eli and X who took Rome by the arms.
“Give him a second, Rome.” X spoke, leaning directly into Rome’s face. “He’s gonna go tell Ary you’re here and then you can go back and see her.”
X’s voice was serious and clear as a whistle as Lucas backed up, then turned and ran into one of the other rooms.
“She can’t be…” Rome began.
“She’s not,” Eli replied confidently. “She’s breathing and so is the baby.”
Rome turned to him so fast, grabbing him by the front of his shirt and slamming him against the wall. Eli let out a whoosh of breath before looking his Leader directly in the eye.
“I can hear her heartbeat and the baby’s,” Eli told him. “I know it sounds strange and you might not believe me, but … I’m a Seer, Rome. Apparently my gift from the shaman’s poisonous smoke is a speedy track to my true destiny as a shifter. You’re the Assembly Leader, Ary’s the
curandera
and I … am … the Seer,” he said with a finality that rang true through every pore of his body. His limbs felt stronger, his breath came easier, and when he looked even deeper into Rome’s eyes, he saw the two heartbeats there. Deep inside this strong and powerful shifter, Eli could see the extensions of him, his mate, and his child—his family.
He lifted his hands and placed them on Rome’s shoulders. “They are alive,” he told him sincerely.
“She’s asking for you.”
Rome jerked at the female voice and moved away from Eli without speaking another word. Eli, on the other hand, closed his eyes again and heard screams echoing in his head of the female’s voice, blood pumping so loudly and so fiercely through his body he actually trembled.
She was covered in blood. It was on her arms, her face, her clothes. He instantly thought of her in the forest being attacked by
Lormenians,
in that bed, wearing that necklace, calling to him. Bringing his hands up, Eli clapped them to his ears and hurriedly left the room.
He collided instantly with a body, strong hands clasping his shoulders.
“You know that this is no longer the answer,” the gravelly male voice whispered to him. “Fear will feed the darkness. Love will bring back the light. Take a deep breath, shifter, and let the light in.”
Eli nodded then. Hearing the words, knowing their truth. He hadn’t been able to see Nivea earlier when he’d wanted to, but after hearing what Rome needed to get him through and admitting to himself and to the others in that room who and what he was, he knew the running had to stop.
This vision of Nivea, the one where she died because of events he’d set in motion. It scared the hell out of him. Scared him enough to want to make this right, to make her his.
“Eli,” Nivea called to him.
She’d obviously followed him out of the medical center and most likely had heard what Baxter had just said to him.
“There is strength here.” Baxter began speaking once more.
Eli stood up straight, squaring his shoulders but still not turning to face either of them.