With a shudder she forced her wolf back, finding it harder than she expected, but finally she succeeded, and there was nothing between their skin except the tatters of his long johns and her dress. Miranda clutched Cole’s cold hand, squeezing it to her cheek, pressing a kiss into his palm. The faintest of tremors shook his fingers.
“We need to get him back,” Blade said at the same time Isaiah told her, “Miranda, you need to move.”
She shook her head. There was blood on his face, bruises forming on his skin, and more scary, a slash across his throat. She pressed her finger to the laceration, trying to stop the drip of blood.
“It’s not an artery,” Blade said almost gently. “The blood’s too slow.”
She looked at Blade. “Thank you,” she whispered, but she kept her fingers there. Even one drop was too much. Cole’s lips shaped words. She shook her head. “Save your energy.”
He frowned. She felt the push of his mind against hers, and now that the danger was over, her first instinct was to resist.
Don’t.
The word came to her mind as clear as day. No.
“What is it?”
He licked his lips and tried again. Words didn’t come out.
“Miranda, we need to get him back.”
Whatever they thought they needed could wait. “What is it?” she asked Cole again.
His thumb stroked over her mouth the way it always did, but while there was a connection, there was no rush of sensuality. His touch was cold, foreign, as if he’d already left her. She blinked the tears back from her eyes and waited. She felt his presence in her mind like a subtle poke that grew stronger until it became pressure. The pressure built until it became a shove. So harsh, such a strong presence. She wanted to lean back, but she needed to stay because she could feel his urgency. A picture of the deadfall on the other side of the pond formed in her mind.
“Wendy. You left her there?”
He nodded and his fingers fell from her cheek. She caught them and brought them back, pressing him to her.
Don’t leave me.
Even as she held on to his energy, she felt it slip away.
The scream came from her soul, “No!”
* * *
“He’s not a goddamn Reaper, Miranda. We don’t have the luxury of time. You need to do it now.”
Miranda sat beside the bed where they’d laid Cole and touched her fingers to his cheek, still clutching his energy to her heart, feeling it get fainter with every beat. The sheets around him were stained red with his blood. She wanted to change them.
“You need to stop the bleeding,” she whispered.
“We’ve done everything we can to stop the bleeding. He’s too hurt. Cut in too many places. He’s too injured,” Isaiah said gently.
“The only thing that will save him is you,” Blade added.
She couldn’t. Miranda’s fingers trembled on Cole’s collarbone. A smear of blood just to the left marred the tan of his skin. She didn’t know if it was her blood or his. There was just no telling. Using her thumb, she rubbed at the blood.
If it was hers, it didn’t matter. She would heal. She was already healing. She could feel the power surging through her, but Cole was dying, her Cole, her might, the man who’d given his life for her and her daughter. And she had to sit back and do nothing.
“I can’t bite him.”
“Then we’ll take a chance, and I’ll do it,” Isaiah said.
“It won’t work,” Blade said.
“What do you mean it won’t work?” Isaiah snapped.
“Feel his energy, taste his blood. Both are thin. If you bite him, he’ll die anyway. He’s too weak.”
“The hell you say. What is the difference between me biting him and her?”
“He’s already tuned to her. You know he would have to adjust to you, and he just doesn’t have the strength for it.”
“You turned me,” Addy said.
“No,” Blade corrected. “Isaiah turned you. For the same reason Miranda has to change Cole.”
“Don’t you want him to live, Miranda?” Addy asked, placing her hand on Miranda’s shoulder. It was supposed to be a soothing touch, Miranda knew. She couldn’t bear the weight of it.
More than anything in the world Miranda wanted Cole to live. She wanted him in her future. She wanted to laugh with him. She wanted to dance with him. She wanted to raise her daughter with him. But not as a Reaper.
“Yes.”
“Then bite him now before it’s too late.”
“He doesn’t want that.”
“He wouldn’t want to leave you alone, unprotected.”
That was true, but it was her choice.
“Ask him,” she told Blade. “Ask him and then tell her.”
“I can’t.”
“You can do a lot of things that you don’t tell any of us about. You know a lot of things that none of us know. Surely you can ask one unconscious man one question.”
“And what would you have the question be?”
“Does he want to be one of us?”
I want to be one with you. She remembered him saying that when she’d ask him if he wanted to be a Reaper. One with her was not one with the Reapers. Cole was . . . She shook her head. He was Cole.
“He’s my cousin. He saved my life. Now, goddammit, save his,” Addy ordered.
“He wouldn’t want to live that way.”
“You don’t know that.”
“He told me.” She looked at Addy. “I’m willing to bet he told you, too.”
“He told you that when it was theory. This is reality. If you don’t change him, he’s going to die.”
Miranda looked at Isaiah. He nodded, confirming what she already knew. What they all knew.
“He’s lost too much blood to live without changing him.”
“Maybe.”
“There’s no maybe. Just fact.”
Then what was she supposed to do? She knew what it was like to have the choice taken from her, and if she did this, there was no changing him back. Or was there?
She looked at Blade. “Is there a cure for being Reaper?”
“Don’t you think I would have tried it if there were?”
She shook her head. “No, I think you like being who you are.”
“Smart girl, but if there’s a cure, no one’s found it yet.”
“So if I bite him, it’s forever.” Forever was a long time.
A long time to be without him, she heard Blade whisper in her mind. It was a low-down trick.
“There’s something else you’re not thinking of,” Addy said.
“What?”
Addy nudged Isaiah. He sighed. “We talked.”
“Who’s we?”
“The council, Blade, Gaelen, Dirk, and me.”
“And?”
“If you don’t change him, he can’t stay here, and you’ll be alone anyway.”
“Why?” Good God, did they think any of this mattered?
“We’re having a hard enough time as it is keeping people together. Him being human is a weakness we can’t afford, and him being here disrupts the unity we need.”
Miranda stroked her fingers down Cole’s chest, skipping the jagged edges of an open wound, trying to ignore the grisly sight of his ribs showing through the tear. Placing the third finger of her left hand, her ring finger, over his heart, she felt the sluggish beat. He was slipping from her when she had just found him, leaving her alone again. She’d been alone so much. To lose Cole . . . Just thinking about it was like tearing the flesh from her bones, the soul from her heart, the will from her life. Cole. She felt a jag in his energy. Cole. Stubborn, loyal, honorable, passionate, loving. Cole. Who’d sacrificed himself for her.
Oh God, she wanted to turn him. Her teeth ached, and her fingers shook;
her talons extended out of her fingers, pressing into his flesh, making tiny indents that would be so easy to replace. To lean down, to put her mouth on that spot, to replace her nails with her teeth, to bite, to bind forever. It was such a tempting prospect.
“Do it, Miranda,” Addy pleaded. “Do it now.”
The pressure was incredible. Four minds shoving in on hers, pushing her toward what they wanted, pushing her toward her heart’s desire. Cole loved her, and he’d forgive her one day. She knew that. The words might not have been spoken between them, but they were mates, and mates did what was right. She looked up.
Addy bit her lip and whispered, “It’s time someone thought of Cole first.”
Miranda nodded and leaned down, pressing her lips to the faint marks left by her fingers in a lingering kiss. She had to do what was right.
Forgive me. Please.
21
It had been two days since Miranda had made the decision to not change Cole. Two days in which nothing else had changed, either. Cole still lay there, a shadow of himself. She tried to take heart in the fact that he hadn’t grown weaker, but he wasn’t stronger, either. Maybe she should have bitten him. It had to be better than this hell.
Better for whom? her conscience asked.
A small hand slipped into hers. “He’s going to be all right, Mommy.”
Miranda put her arm around Wendy’s shoulder and hugged her tight. “I hope so.” The reassurance was weak, even to her own ears.
Wendy’s face set in that stubborn expression. “He is. He promised he wouldn’t leave me.”
“There are some promises people can’t keep.”
“Cole keeps his. He told me so.”
How could she tell a six-year-old that the man she worshipped and who’d put his life on the line for them wasn’t going to make it? That sacrifice didn’t always result in good? That while God answered prayers, sometimes the answer was no?
Wendy tugged at her skirt. She looked down. “We just have to pray harder, Mommy.”
Yeah, they did. “All right. Then that’s what we’ll do. We’ll pray.”
“Together?” Wendy asked forlornly.
Miranda knelt down and cupped her daughter’s shoulders in her hands. “I’ve been hard to talk to the last few days, haven’t I?”
Wendy bit her lip and nodded. Miranda shook her head. She’d sworn never to let anything come between her and her daughter, but she’d surrendered to her grief.
“I’ve been sad.”
“Me, too,” Wendy said, tears filling her eyes. “I’m sad, too.” She wiped at her cheeks. “But we just have to be patient. Cole says patience is important. No one ever wins a hunt if they can’t stay still.”
It was obviously a quote. “Then we’ll be patient.”
Wendy looked up, her eyes big and round. “And pray.”
“Yes, we’ll pray.”
“Now.” Wendy knelt at the side of the bed. Miranda knelt with her. Just then the sun burst out from behind the clouds, and a narrow beam shown through the window and spread over Cole.
“See, Mommy,” Wendy whispered. “The angels see him.”
Before Miranda could contradict Wendy, there was a knock on the door. Wendy’s eyes went wide.
“The angels.”
Miranda stood, ignoring the protest from her tired legs, and opened the door. Hardly an angel.
“Hello, Blade.” She didn’t care that her tone sounded unwelcoming.
“May I come in?”
She held her ground. “No, but if you came to check on Cole’s condition, it hasn’t changed.”
“I’ve got to admit, I’m kind of surprised. I thought he would have gotten worse.”
“Me, too.” If only he would get worse, she wouldn’t have to fight the constant temptation to bite him.
“Biting him now would do nothing.”
“How do you know? You thought he’d be dead already.”
“Some things don’t take guesswork.”
“I think you’re just doing your own brand of wishful thinking.”
He cocked his eyebrow at her. His tone was as stern as his expression; he entered the room. It immediately felt smaller.
“I don’t indulge in wishful thinking.”
She did, all the time. Every hour, every minute, every second of the last two days she’d done nothing but wish.
Wendy stood and squared off against Blade, her chin jutting out belligerently. Catching her daughter’s slight shoulders, Miranda pulled Wendy back against her.
“What brings you here, Blade?”
“You’re wanted by the council.”
“Tell them I’ll be there later.”
“This can’t wait.”
“What can’t wait?”
He touched a finger to Cole’s hand. “Clark has renewed his claim.”
Clark. Her lip lifted in a snarl. “I won’t have him.”
“It’s not your call.”
“The hell it’s not. I have a mate.”
“That’s Clark’s argument. He says your mate can no longer protect you.”
“Maybe I don’t need protection.” She turned slightly, reaching under the edge of the mattress, feeling the blade of her dead husband’s sword, so sharp still that it cut her finger at the slightest touch. She’d carried that sword around like a talisman, but maybe she’d been carrying it for another reason, one she hadn’t understood till just now.
“There’s no point in me going to this meeting. I won’t have him.”
“You know Reaper law. If the council decrees it, it’s as good as done.”
She set her jaw. “I won’t have him.”
“Either way it’s best you come to state your case.”
“I’m staying with Cole.” She didn’t want to leave him.
“You can’t be worried that anybody’s going to get past me.”
She cut him a glare. “Maybe I’m worried about you.”
“If you hurt my Cole, I’ll hurt you,” Wendy threatened, her fists bunched at her sides.
Blade’s tone softened. “I won’t hurt your Cole.”
“Promise?”
“I promise.”
Wendy narrowed her eyes and then held up her pinky finger. “Pinky swear.”
For a second Blade look taken aback, but then he crossed fingers with Wendy. “Done.”
He looked over at Miranda. “Now that that’s taken care of . . . ?”
“I have a right to stay by my husband. I have a right to grieve if he dies. I have a right to rejoice if he lives.”
“I agree with you.”
“Then why do I hear a ‘but’?”
“The council doesn’t. You know how they feel about unrest.”
“And how they feel about Cole being human?”
He nodded. “There are more than a few that are looking for an excuse to break the bond.”
There was no breaking the bond between Miranda and Cole. Why didn’t they understand that?
“Tell the council I’ll be there when I’m ready.”
“That will be seen as a sign of disrespect.”
She looked over at him, feeling oddly detached. “Then they would have read my mood correctly.”
With a half smile, he touched his hand to the brim of his hat. “I’ll pass your message along.”
Beside her she could feel Wendy tremble as the door closed behind Blade. Miranda put her hand on her shoulder. “It’s all right.”
Wendy shook her head. “The council does bad things to people who don’t listen.”
“I’m listening.”
A sob caught in her daughter’s throat, and the shaking didn’t stop. Miranda knelt and gathered Wendy in her arms, holding her daughter tight. “I won’t let anything happen to you, baby.”
Wendy’s arms crept around her mother’s neck, and she clung. “I don’t want anything to happen to you.”
“It won’t.”
Miranda ran her hands down Wendy’s hair, hugging her back just as tightly. Pressing a kiss to her forehead, Miranda whispered, “I promise you, baby; when this is all over, we’re going to leave here.”
Wendy’s eyes went big. “You mean it? We can be real people again?”
Miranda pushed the hair off her face. How could she not have seen for all these years that desperate desire inside her daughter? “Yes, I mean it. When Cole’s better, we’ll go.”
Wendy’s face fell. “The council won’t let us.”
“They will.”
“How do you know?”
Miranda’s fingers grazed the sword again. She changed her mind. She was going to that meeting after all. Shielding her actions with her body, she tucked the sword into the folds of her skirts. It felt good in her hand, as if her husband’s energy still clung to it—the sword with which he’d taken his life because he’d felt he’d failed her. Maybe tonight they’d get a bit of that honor back. “Because I’m going to make them.”
* * *
The council appeared exactly as she’d expected it to. A bunch of men frowning at her, their energy hitting her like a wall as soon as they came in the room. They were united in their decision, whatever it was. To the front and to the right stood Clark, his hands folded behind his back. He looked like a general surveying his troops. They couldn’t be so stupid as to be in the palm of his hand.
Blade sat in his own chair at the council, three left of center. There was no expression on his face, and when her eyes met his, he offered no comfort. She kept her mind blank and tightened her grip on the sword. She’d never realized until she embraced her wolf how easy it was to read others’ emotions. They thought they could intimidate her. That she’d be easy. They were wrong.
“Good evening, gentlemen.” She didn’t keep her eyes down, not anymore. Those days were done.
A none-too-happy Gaelen started the proceedings “Clark has petitioned the council for the position of your mate.”
There was a time she would have been shaking if called to stand in front of the council to have her fate decided by so many strangers. She would have been swallowed up by the feeling of helplessness, of being caught in a system that she couldn’t fight. But not today and not for a long time, she realized looking back on it. She was a woman grown. She had a daughter and a husband and wants and desires of which they knew nothing
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