“Put me down!” Darcy squirmed in his arms, damned tired of being treated like a piece of furniture.
“Locke!” Joe roared.
Axel opened the door and looked around the small courtyard.
She looked, too. Everything appeared normal, just the courtyard, propane barbeques, and large trees.
Axel inhaled and said, “Shit, rogues.”
She caught the faintest scent of copper. Then two men materialized in front of them. Huge men with big knives.
Axel reacted at hyperspeed, turning and dropping her to her feet. He grunted once, then put his hand in the middle of her back and shoved. “Grab her, Joe!”
Darcy flew forward, losing her hold on the tapestry and tripping over her own feet. Joe caught her upper arms and yanked her past him. She fell to her hands and knees.
Voices exploded in her head. Run! Get out! Hunters!
Darcy swept her gaze from left to right, taking in Morgan huddled on the floor by the couch and Joe standing over her with his gun drawn.
Darcy looked left.
Oh, God. Oh … Darcy's chest ballooned with fear, pain, and rage: Axel stood between her and two rogues. They had to be rogues; huge, with feminine faces and no hair on their beefy arms. But the thing that made her sick was the knife sticking out of Axel's back.
She swore she could hear the screech of fury in her head from his hawk. Blood welled up around the knife to soak his T-shirt and drip down his back. When he turned slightly, Darcy saw that he held his blade. His face was blank, his eyes ferociously focused.
He struck fast, sinking his blade into the chest of the rogue closest to him.
“Nooo!” The man's scream was filled with pain, and with the terror of dying.
Axel yanked the knife out and shoved him aside as if he weighed no more than a small child.
The second rogue threw his knife.
“Axel!” Darcy screamed, knowing there wasn't enough time for him to evade the knife. Oh, God, ohmi -god …
A gunshot exploded in the apartment. Joe.
The rogue went down.
Darcy shot to her feet. “Axel!” Blood poured from a second wound on his bicep where the other rogue's knife had sliced it as Axel turned away. She fought a wave of hot, sick dizziness, but she made it to him.
Joe handed her something. “Wrap his arm.”
It was Joe's shirt. Quickly, Darcy wound the shirt around the slice on Axel's arm and tied it. “His back, Joe!”
“No time,” Axel said. “Joe, drive. Darcy, tapestry. Move!” His face shone with sweat, his mouth was thin and fierce, and his eyes glittered with pure rage.
“Go!” Joe ordered, “I'll cover.” He grabbed Morgan by the arm.
Darcy snatched up the tapestry with one hand, Axel's uninjured arm with her other, and they hurried out to the truck. “Keys!” She said to Axel. She was driving them back, and sending Joe and Morgan somewhere else. Somewhere safe.
“Pocket.”
She shoved her hand in the left front pocket and got the keys. Hurrying, she opened the truck, tossed the tapestry behind the seat, and stood back.
Axel heaved himself up to sit sideways, the knife sticking out.
She slammed the door and turned to her cousin. “Joe, you and Morgan get the hell out of here. Away from me!” She raced around the truck, climbed in, jammed the keys in to start it, then fumbled to get her seat close enough to the wheel to drive.
She tried to start the engine but her bloody hands kept slipping off the key. Axel's blood, she thought, her mouth going dry and her eyes hot with tears. Finally, she turned the engine over. “Doctor? Hospital? Where?” How could she save him?
“Darcy, it's okay. I'll live. Pull yourself together and drive home.”
She knew the way since it had been light out when they left, and Axel hadn't shielded her vision the way he had the night he'd kidnapped her. She put the truck in drive and hit the gas pedal. She turned out onto the main road and accelerated to the speed limit. There was a buzzing in her head, but she couldn't make out any words.
“Turn right here.”
She made the turn.
Axel gave her a few more directions, then said, “The only one following us is Joe.”
Feeling like her muscles were so tight that one jolt would shatter her, she said, “I'll take you to a hospital or …”
“I'm okay. Just drive back to the house.”
“You're not okay! You have a knife sticking out of you!”
He reached over his shoulder and—
“Don't! Don't you—”
He pulled the knife out.
Unable to believe what he'd done, she demanded, “Are you insane?” The cab of the truck went hot and sticky. Blood poured from the wound. It was just beneath his left shoulder blade. Stop the bleeding, she told herself. She made a right turn, then another into an alley behind a strip mall. Slamming the truck into park, she yanked her T-shirt over her head, balled it up, and shoved it against the wound. For the first time, she noticed he had a big-ass gun resting on his thigh next to his bloody knife.
Lifting her gaze, she saw Axel look around, obviously assessing if they were being followed, then his eyes settled on her. “Nice.”
“Now?” She asked incredulously. He was admiring her bra-cupped breasts now? “Are you out of your mind?” One of them was, and she wasn't the one pouring out blood. In spite of her shaking, she pressed her hand hard against the wound to get the bleeding under control. She realized that his pain was flowing into her, seeping from his nerve endings to hers.
Her chakras had opened without her conscious effort.
In reaction to Axel being hurt? Pure fear? Didn't matter, she had to help him. She closed her eyes, struggling to not fight his pain and to let her body absorb it. She forced herself to breathe and let the pain in. She had to calm down and center herself in order to control the powers flowing through the chakras. As the pain traveled through her, she sent energy back to him in exchange. Healing energy that would knit together to heal torn skin and sinew.
“Darcy, stop.”
She shook her head as the pain crawled up her arm, and edged across her neck, then slammed into her shoulder blade. It burned to a fiery pitch. She sucked in a breath, losing the connection to her energy. Had she done enough? She opened her eyes. “Let me see.” She eased her bloody shirt off the wound.
It barely seeped blood and the edges were coming together, the healing had begun.
“Hold this on there,” she said tightly. Turning in her seat, she reached for the gearshift. She had to get Axel home.
He grabbed her hand. “What did you do?” he demanded. “You took the pain, didn't you?”
Her stomach roiled with the pain, but it was starting to recede. She should try to do the same thing to close the wound on his arm, but she wasn't sure she'd be able to drive if she did. The voices were murmuring and fretting in her head, making it hard for her to focus. The rogues had roused them to a fever pitch, and the invasion of the hawk in her mind had them agitated. She couldn't feel the hawk now, but his screech earlier had been real and enraged. “I just tried to close the wound a little.”
“Your hands are shaking.” He let go of her to turn, reaching in the back and pulling a jacket from the jump seat. “Put this on.”
It dawned on her that she was so rattled, she had been planning to drive the rest of the way home in her bra. It wasn't just seeing Axel hurt that shook her up, it was the realization that he had intentionally turned his body to protect her from the knife and allowed himself to be stabbed instead. He was protecting her exactly as he'd told her he would. She sucked in a deep breath to calm herself, and looked at her hands on the steering wheel. Her skin was covered in his blood.
Dark spots danced in front of her eyes.
No. She wouldn't get faint or panic. Axel was hurt, she had to drive. The pain was inconsequential.
“Put your arm out,” Axel said.
She lifted her right hand and let him slide the j
acket on. Then he leaned so close she could smell him. Feel him. His warmth stopped her shivering. His balmy breath eased her fried nerve endings. His jacket was so big, he easily spread it across her back and held it while she slid her left arm into the remaining sleeve.
She faced him. “You have to stop moving. The pain, the cuts …”
He snorted. “I heal fast, very fast. But you, little witch, were damned stupid to open yourself up to my pain. Now you're suffering. You have to learn better control.”
She turned back, put the truck in gear, and edged out of the alley. Another turn and they were back on Pacific Coast Highway. The ocean spread out on her right in a stretch of rugged, unspoiled beauty. God, she wished she could sit on a rock and just feel the spray of the ocean, the warmth of the sun, or the light of the moon on her skin. Feeling Axel's gaze on her, she said, “I'm fine.” The pain was better, somehow her body was breaking down the pain and getting rid of it.
“The hell you are. Your shimmer has dots of red.” Axel eased back into his seat. “You're brave, compassionate, and too damned beautiful.”
Startled, she jerked her head around to look at him. His voice was throttled to a slow, rich tone that made her stomach jump. Protecting her from that knife, putting the jacket around her, being angry over her pain, those things were confusing her. She understood he needed to keep her alive to reverse the curse on Hannah. But the rest? “Are you bothered being in the truck with me?”
He turned from the side-view mirror he'd been studying, his green gaze latching on to hers. “It's like a humming that keeps growing louder and more grating. Then you touched me, using your powers to call out the pain in my shoulder, and I wanted to push you down on the seat, strip off those pants and … possess you. That urge is harder to control than the bloodlust.”
She struggled to tear her eyes away and watch the road weave along the Pacific Ocean. She spotted the turnoff, the one she'd never noticed in all the years she'd lived in Glassbreakers, and guided the truck around the corner to begin the journey up into the hills.
“I won't hurt you,” he said softly.
She clenched her fingers around the steering wheel. Her skin tingled, her nipples swelled and pebbled, and a clenching need pulsed uncomfortably between her thighs. And the worst of it was that he would hurt her. He'd pump himself into her until he lost control with his orgasm, and she'd be helpless against the truth of his feelings. She'd feel exactly how much he hated lusting after a witch—one of those that had cursed his kind. Those feelings would penetrate her skin as mercilessly as a knife, going deeper than a blade to kill off any shred of self-protection she had left. She couldn't risk that.
Even when he'd risked his life to save hers?
What was she thinking? She didn't owe him sex. Both of them were caught in a situation, the trick was to solve the problem and get out. Fast. “Hopefully the tapestry will help me cure Hannah quickly. Free you. Us.”
“And go where?”
She didn't know. “I'll think of something.” Wouldn't she? It wasn't his problem. Maybe she could find her biological mother, and together they could …
Axel cut off her daydream. “Your cousin is still following us. He followed us into the alley and waited, and he's behind us now.”
She looked in her rearview mirror and saw Joe's truck. “What should I do?” She turned to look at him. “I don't want him killed. Please.”
Axel said evenly, “I'm not going to kill him, Darcy. Nor is he going to back off. You're his family, I get that. We'll sort it out at home. Out in the open, you're too damned vulnerable.”
Axel got Darcy and the other two safely into the house and took his first real breath.
When he'd seen those rogues holding their knives, seen their eyes alight on Darcy in his arms, something possessive and feral had taken over his brain.
Mine.
He'd have done anything to save her in that moment.
But Darcy was no coward. She'd held it together and drove them home. And she'd even done what she could to heal him.
Damn, he had to get away from her. He knew it. His need for Darcy had gone from bearable to excruciating when she'd touched him with her powers. She was still pale from the amount of pain she'd pulled from him. He couldn't stand it, couldn't tolerate her agony. He'd wanted to shake her and tell her to never, ever, use her powers to ease his pain again.
More than anything, he wanted to yank her up against him and hold her. Take her fear, shock, and pain away. Assure her he'd keep her safe.
But he couldn't do that. Couldn't risk it. He was losing control of himself around Darcy inch by inch.
Eve walked in. “Hannah's asleep. What is going on?” Her gaze zeroed in on the blood on Axel and Joe's shirt that was wrapped around his bicep.
He reassured her. “I'm fine, the cuts are closing. This is Joe, Darcy's cousin, and their friend, Morgan.”
Eve nodded. “Come into the kitchen. We'll get some food and coffee.”
Axel said, “I'm going to change my shirt and get Joe a shirt. Be there in a second.” He needed a minute away from Darcy, away from the feel of her. Sweat broke out on his back and neck, his balls seized up with aching lust and he had the driving need to possess her. Make her his.
He tossed Joe's shirt in the trash and pulled his shirt off to join it. The cut on his shoulder was just an angry red welt below his shoulder blade. Darcy had done a hell of a job on that. The cut on his arm bled only a little; his own recuperative powers were taking care of that. He slapped a gauze pad on it and wrapped a piece of tape around that. Germs weren't a problem for his supersize immune system. The cut would heal by morning.
He ran cold water from the tap and stuck his head under it.
Joe's words about Darcy's terror of being locked up came back to him, along with the memory of what he'd done to her that first night. She'd begged him not to, and even though he'd scented the fear on her, he'd done it anyway.
Then he'd just left her. She'd responded by bashing the lock with the stool and damn near breaking her own hand. Thankfully, his mom and Hannah had gone down there or she would have broken her hand, or worse.
Regret made him sick. But he hadn't thought he had a choice. If she'd gotten away, the rogues would have found and brutally killed her. That wasn't going to happen. He wouldn't allow it.
He sucked in a breath, then washed his hands and dried them off. He turned and walked into his bedroom, dragged on a T-shirt, and grabbed a second one for Joe. He went out into the kitchen.
Eve, Joe, and Morgan sat at the table with steaming cups of coffee. “Where's Darcy?” He tossed Joe the shirt.
Eve looked up. “She went downstairs through the pantry. She said she has work to do.”
Down in the basement level alone. He rubbed the ache in his chest. It was starting to feel like he was somehow incomplete. He went to the coffeepot and poured out a cup. “She can eat first before she starts working.”
Joe pulled on the shirt and said, “I told her I'd go down with her, but she said she wanted to take a shower and clean up.”
Axel slapped the cup down onto the counter. “I didn't know she was claustrophobic. Why is she afraid of locked spaces?”
Joe's gaze turned guarded and he shrugged.
Protecting his cousin's secrets. He could beat it out of him, but then Darcy would probably get mad about that. “Fine, I'll ask her myself.” Ignoring the coffee, he headed for his room.
His mom said, “Axel, leave her alone.”
He looked at his mom. “Can't.”
“Most men are spooked by Darcy,” Joe commented.
He stopped and turned. “Mortals. Cowards. They sensed her power and were threatened by it.” He went back to the kitchen and picked up the mug of coffee.
“She didn't like being different.”
Joe was distracting him, and at the same time, testing his feelings about his cousin. “She likes it now. She used her powers to take my knife from me.”
Joe laughed. “Maybe yo
u should give her some space.”
He couldn't. So instead, he went to the laptop at the end of the counter, pressed a key, and said, “Darcy.” Her image popped into view. She looked tired, and she still had dried blood on her hands. He caught sight of the framed tapestry propped up on the desk against the bathroom wall.
She glanced up at the camera. “What?”
“Come upstairs; get something to eat …”
“No. We both know I need to stay down here.” She dropped her head back down to stare at the tapestry, shutting him out.
Hadn't he told her he wouldn't hurt her? “Darcy—”
“Busy. Go away.”
Damn it, she was busting his balls. “Little witch, if I come down there …”
She raised a hand and the laptop screen blanked. He slammed his cup on the dark granite counter.
“She blew the cameras in her room,” Sutton said, appearing on the computer screen.
Joe laughed and stood up. “I'll go check on her. Show me the stairs.”
Eve stood up. “Sit. Stay. I'll be right back.” She hurried through the pantry.
“Let Eve go to Darcy, Axel.” Sutton watched him from the laptop screen. “You're barely holding the line.”
“She blew my cameras,” Axel pointed out. He needed to be able to see her, check on her, make sure she was okay. He needed … her. Damn it, Sutton was right. Shifting his focus to a safer area, he reached under the counter and pushed a button.
On the wall behind an oversize rocking chair, a big projection screen rolled down. “Everyone there, Sutton? We need a meeting.”
The four other Wing Slayer Hunters appeared onscreen in four separate squares, sort of like the Brady Bunch. Axel said, “That's Sutton West in the top left corner, top right is Ram Virtos, bottom left is Phoenix Torq, and bottom right is Key DeMicca.” He gestured to the table. “This is Joe MacAlister and Morgan Reed.”
“Hi,” Morgan said softly. She stared with huge blue eyes at the screen. “Are you all the same as Axel?”
“They are Wing Slayer Hunters. They have vowed to never become what your husband is.” He turned to the screen. “Morgan is ill. Her husband has screwed with her memory. She can't tolerate certain words, and she can't say his name.”
BLOOD MAGIC Page 14
