Oblivion

Matthew’s face blurred. “Daemon, what’s going on?”

Blood drained from my face as the pain amped up in my chest, spreading throughout my arms and legs. I started to stand, but my legs gave out. I slid back into the booth. My name was called out again, but the voice sounded so very distant. Terror dug its way up my throat as my chest seized—my heart seized frantically, and I knew what was happening.

“Kat,” I gasped out. “It’s…Kat.”

Chapter 21

My legs weren’t working right. The muscles in them, usually so damn strong, had gone soft and useless. I couldn’t walk. Couldn’t even stand on my own. Eyes followed us as Andrew and Matthew all but carried me outside.

Dawson was on the phone with Dee, and the words he spoke sounded a million miles away. “I don’t know what’s happened. He can’t walk or stand—I don’t know. We’re bringing him—”

“Kat,” I croaked out, struggling to think around the burning fire spreading through my chest. “It’s Kat.”

Matthew sucked in a shrill breath as he tightened his arm around my waist. “Tell her to go check on Katy. It has to be her.”

Dawson did just that. His body wobbled as he moved in front of me. We were standing near my SUV. “Dee is going to check on her. We—”

“Get me there,” I rasped as the sky blinked out for a second. “Get me there now.”

No one was moving fast enough. Or at least it felt that way. I had to get there—to Kat. I couldn’t fail her, and I was failing her, right now. I tried to take a step forward, but I would’ve face-planted in the parking lot if it hadn’t been for Dawson and Matthew. The ground waved in a weird way, as if it were pulsating.

“Get him in the car now.” Dawson shifted, his voice strained with panic. “Shit. We need to get him there now.” Hefted up into the backseat, I slumped against the side, barely able to hold myself up in the sitting position. My heart labored painfully with every passing second. Dawson clutched the front of my shirt and he was talking fast—too fast. The inside of the car blurred. Tires squealed. Voices, so many voices, but all I could focus on was Kat’s face. This was her—she was hurt, very badly. She was dying. Oh God, she was dying, and I wasn’t there for her. A shudder rolled through me as my chest labored for breath.

Was this it? It couldn’t be. Dammit, it would not be it. I would see Kat again. I would hear her voice—those lush lips speaking my name. I would kiss her again. I would feel her breathe against me. I would touch her again.

I would love her.

This wasn’t it.

The SUV jerked to the stop. Things were fuzzy. Dawson shifted out of the backseat, grabbing me by the legs. What was happening? I thought I asked that out loud, but no one answered. He dragged me out of the car. My hold on my human form slipped. I felt that. Someone cursed.

Kat.

And then there were trees whirling above me. The sky was down and the ground was up. Warm wind tore about my clothing. Someone was carrying me—no. It was Dawson and Andrew. They were racing over the ground and through the trees.

Time slowed to infinity, and then finally, their footfalls thumped off of wood. A door opened, and I felt the warm tingle along the back of my neck. Cool air reached out, wrapping itself around us.

I forced my eyes open and for my body to shift back into my human form, and I dug in, held on to the waning strength. I needed to for her—for us. Dawson and Andrew placed me down on the floor, and I saw her then. My vision cleared, and a thousand fears were confirmed.

Kat was lying on the floor, her beautiful face pale and strained. The front of her shirt was covered in red. The blood was under her, on her mouth and chin.

“Daemon…” she whispered.

“Shh…” I forced a smile as I willed my arm to move. Dee was on the other side, her luminous light flickering in and out. She was keeping Kat alive—keeping me alive.

“Don’t talk. It’s okay. Everything is okay.” I grabbed Dee’s bloodied hands, pulling them away from Kat. “You can stop now.”

I can do this. I can fix her, Dee responded.

“We can’t risk you doing this,” I told her, shifting onto my side. Or Dawson shifted me. He was holding me up. “You have to stop.”

“Man, you’re too weak to do this.” Andrew moved to where Dee was kneeling, grabbing Kat’s limp hand. “Let Dee do this,” Andrew urged.

I couldn’t allow her to do this. If she saved Kat, she would be bonded to her—to Kat and me, and that was too risky.

Dee slipped back into her human form as she scrambled back. Her arms were shaking. “He’s crazy. He’s absolutely crazy.”

I might be crazy, but I knew I could heal Kat. There was no doubt in my mind. Slipping into my true from, I placed my hand on her nearly-still chest. Using every ounce of Source I had in me, I fu

It’s going to be okay. I’ve got you, Kitten. It’s going to be okay.

Heat flowed from me and into her, and I heard her saying my name over and over, and I felt her heart stuttering, and then it picked up, beating stronger and steadier. Her chest inflated, and the oxygen she needed so badly to survive rushed in, filling all of her starved lungs.

You can let go now, I told her.

Kat did.

“Everything has been taken care of,” Dawson said, his voice low.

Leaning against the wall outside my bedroom, I exhaled softly. “Thank you.”

He stepped in, placing his hand on my shoulder. “You don’t ever need to thank me for any of that.” Concern filled eyes identical to mine. “Man, should you even be up? The fact that you healed Katy after how badly it affected you? You should be out cold.”

“I was out cold while Ash and Dee cleaned Kat up.” I scrubbed a hand over my face. “And I just woke up a little bit ago.”

Dawson glanced at the closed door beside me. “Has she woken up?”

I knew he’d been worried about her, and I was…yeah, I was happy to know that Kat had come to mean a lot to Dawson, and I…I should’ve been like that with Bethany. I realized that now. Realized a lot of shit now. “She hasn’t yet, but she will.”

“Yeah,” he murmured, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I can’t believe he came back—that Will came back and did that to her.”

Closing my eyes, I nodded. Will’s body had been found after Kat was healed. She’d killed him, but somehow he’d managed to shoot her with the gun he’d brought. Seconds—mere seconds—and Kat and I wouldn’t be here. That’s how close we’d come.

The dread that Will Michaels was going to reappear had been valid. We’d been so focused on going back to Mount Weather that we—or at least I—hadn’t taken the threat of him seriously enough. Guilt churned in my stomach.

“Did he…did he look that bad before?” Dawson asked.

I shook my head. I’d only caught a brief glimpse of Will before Matthew had taken his body outside and destroyed it, but the messed-up doctor looked like he’d aged by decades. Obviously, the mutation hadn’t held, but I didn’t know why he’d looked as bad off as he had.

“Everything is cleaned up next door.” Dawson pushed off the wall and turned to the stairs. “Dee is with Ash and Andrew, and Matthew just left a little while ago. I’m going to grab something to eat. You need anything?”

I shook my head. What I needed, Dawson couldn’t provide, because right now, I needed Kat to open her eyes.

Dawson turned and then stopped, facing me. His voice was hoarse when he spoke. “I’m glad you’re okay. I…I couldn’t deal with losing you,” he said, and it sounded so strange to be on the other end of those words. “And I’m glad Katy’s going to be okay.”