"What about you?" she cried, having to raise her voice over the growing whine of the engines.
As an immortal, he might live. She didn't have a chance. "Worry only for yourself - "
She cried out when the plane dipped sharply, flinging him across the aisle. Her seat belt was the only thing keeping her in place. He scrambled back to her. "Focus, Mari, and ask it how you get off this plane."
"I'm trying!" Tears began streaming down her face, each one a knife to the heart.
He rubbed her arm. "Come on, lass, focus for me."
"I can't hear her whisper over the engines! I don't know what she's saying!" When Mariketa gazed up at him, her pupils were dilated beyond anything he'd seen. "Bowen, I can't hear her."
Her heart pounded so wildly, and her breaths were so quick and shallow, he wondered how she remained conscious. She was growing nearly catatonic with fear.
Should he push her? Or accept their lot and pray for mercy? He pushed. "Witch, listen to me!" He shook her shoulders - hard - until her head lolled. No response. Another dip sent him reeling, and he lunged back to her. "Mari!" Nothing.
The sat-phone had fallen from her overturned purse and skittered by him in the aisle. He snared it, hit the redial button, and flipped on the GPS beacon.
Through the windshield, he could see the water rushing toward them. Not enough time. He couldn't break through her fear to reach her.
So he sliced open her seat belt and scooped her up. Sitting on the floor between the back aisles, he held her in his lap, arms wrapped around her. "Think of something else," he murmured, rocking her as gently as he could with the death grip he had on her body. "Think of your home. Or of the snow I'm goin' tae show you. Think of blankets of white."
Ah, gods, please let her survive this. Please...
She shook uncontrollably. "Come here, baby," he said against her hair. "I'm no' goin' tae let you be hurt."
If I lose you, I'll follow this time without a second thought.
Salt rushed his senses. Close. "There's my good lass. Now, close your eyes... "
47
Roaring in her ears... churning under the water... the force of bones shattering. A terrible pressure built on her thigh till she felt the flesh and bone giving way.
Can't swim - can't move. Sinking deeper. Drowning.
A grip under her arm?
Bowen. He was dragging her to the surface.
As soon as she felt the rock of waves, she heard him, indistinctly at first, then louder. "Mari! Ah, gods, wake up!" He was running his hands over her body, shuddering at each injury. When he touched her leg, an agonized yell broke from him.
The stench of an oil fire on the water was overpowering. She heard flames hissing in the rain.
"You doona dare leave me, witch!" His voice was heartrending. With his whole hand at the back of her head, he pulled her against him, tucking her into his chest. "You stay with me."
She wanted to nod, to reassure him - she'd never heard anyone in such pain before - but she couldn't speak, couldn't open her eyes...
In and out of consciousness. How long they stayed like this, she didn't know. She woke to a hazy drone, growing louder - the rhythmic whoosh of a helicopter's blades. She thought he murmured, "Lachlain... "
When she felt wind on her face, he rasped, "You're goin' tae be safe." She thought he kissed her temple. "You will no' get away from me this easily."
After Bowe had lost Mariah, he'd been destroyed. Lachlain had witnessed it, had known his cousin understood that all dreams of a future or of a family had died with her, gone forever. And the guilt over her gruesome demise had tormented him.
That time was nothing compared to these last four days, when the little witch's life had hung in the balance. She lay broken, seeming so small in Bowe's bed. Her skull had been fractured and her leg torn free from her body. Casts and bandages covered her.
Now Bowe's voice broke low as he smoothed her hair from her bandaged forehead. "She called me selfish on more than one occasion - and she was right. If I'd made the smallest effort to understand her and her skills, she could have practiced her magick, honed it. She might have been able to save herself from this. But I was too stubborn, too prejudiced."
Bowe had been injured gravely as well, but he'd healed even though he didn't eat, didn't sleep. Hour after hour, he sat beside her, with her hand swallowed by his shaking ones, his eyes going wet whenever she whimpered in pain. "She accepted my nature, my needs. And because I dinna do the same for her, she lies... dying."
From what Lachlain understood, the only thing keeping her alive was the magick of united covens and sorcerers, feeding her energy.
Her kind had wanted to take Mariketa back with them, but no one in the House would dare challenge the crazed male werewolf guarding her so fiercely. So since then, Bowe's home had been overrun with witches, coming and going at will, bringing food, some of Mariketa's clothes, and special potions. Bowe didn't seem to give a damn about any of them, when two months ago, this would have proved a special kind of hell for him.
But the donated magick couldn't preserve Mariketa forever. She was too powerful. Her entire being was used to power and demanding of it. She was draining the others, and it was only a matter of time before they either let her go or followed her down.
And for these last four days, uncanny things had occurred at the compound. Lachlain shuddered to recall them. The first night, hundreds of black cats had prowled around the house, mouths open but silent, watching intently. Another night, frogs had seemed to rain from the sky, hitting the tin roof, without injury...
At sunset, when Emma traced to Lachlain, he left Bowe and joined her in the hall outside the bedroom. "Have the covens found the demon who did this?" He had his own men looking, too.