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“Darlin’, these two are startin’ to piss me off.” Summer didn’t sound happy in the least. “Please let me kill them. I’m beggin’ ya.”
Kill them?
Why was Summer being so cruel as to trick her away from the dark, where she needed to hide?
“Siren…” Soft, that hint of Spanish in his voice, some tortured emotion making his voice ragged …
’Bastian. His warmth surrounding her. She could feel him against her. She’d never felt him against her as she was pulled from her dreams. She hadn’t felt his warmth or the beat of his heart against her shoulder as she did now. Oh God, how she’d missed that. The feel of them surrounding her, warming her, holding her until nothing existed but being wherever they were.
“You can’t leave now. I won’t let you leave us.” His voice was so ragged, so filled with aching need and tortured dreams. Just as hers were. Just as she ached and needed. “We wouldn’t survive without you.”
She knew that. She knew, in this place where she could feel them, touch what was left of their souls with what was left of hers. But there was so little of hers left now.
Tears filled her eyes. She hadn’t cried in years. Those tears had lain trapped inside the shattered remnants of her soul, unable to escape.
One escaped now. She felt it fall from her closed eye as she fought to open her eyes, felt it burn down her cheek.
She knew they wouldn’t survive without her. Why did they think she had chosen to remain in the darkness rather than sinking deeper into it and letting go completely? They were bound. She couldn’t break that bond, couldn’t escape it, no matter how she tried when her conscious mind ruled her.
As she hovered between the soft light surrounding her and reality awaiting her, she felt a cool, longed-for weight settling against her breast, before surrounding her neck.
She knew what it was, knew the promises that had been broken when they had taken it. Promises she’d wanted to die without.
“This was taken from you.” Shane’s voice penetrated the warmth gently. “Remember the promises that went with it, baby? Our promises?”
Another tear fell, scalding her flesh, forcing her to drag her eyes open despite the pain that lanced her body and the fears that filled her mind.
She had to open her eyes. She had to see them.
Blurry at first, her vision cleared enough that she found herself staring into Sebastian’s black eyes. He hadn’t been sleeping again, she thought, exhaustion trying to swamp her.
“Siren,” he whispered, his eyes damp. “Have you been climbing again? That spanking’s coming.”
God, how she wanted to smile.
“Goofy.” The word was slurred, instinctive.
“Oh God. Alyssa.” His head lowered, his lips against her ear. “Don’t you leave me. Don’t dare leave.”
Behind him, Shane stared down at her, his face haggard, his blue eyes so dark. They knew not to go so long without sleep. They became irritable and made her snappish. She didn’t like it when they were irritable.
Swallowing to dampen her lips, she breathed out in exasperation, so tired it was all she could do to speak. “Sleep, Cowboy.”
Shane’s throat tightened, working as though he had difficulty swallowing before he nodded sharply. “When I know you’ll wake for us again I’ll sleep.”
Wasn’t that just like them? The hazy thought drifted through her mind.
“Bossy,” she sighed weakly. Staying awake was so hard.
“Alyssa. You can’t let them just get away with this,” Summer drawled, though Alyssa could hear the tears in her voice.
“Never.” Her eyes drifted closed. “Never. Just had to know…”
Had to know they were there. Had to know the bonds weren’t broken.
Oh, they were going to pay. Because as the warmth and healing sleep pulled her back into that place of dreams rather than darkness, there was the fragile thought that she would never remember a moment of it anyway.
And she’d sworn to herself before she was thrown into the darkness that she would break the hold they had on her.
