Page 39 of Flawed Revenge

Unless …

They knew it was already too late for him, and no one wanted to tell her.

Panic lit her on fire, and she fought with the seatbelt to get it off. Shoving away the well-meaning hands that grabbed at her, Kate began to stagger through the wrecked plane in search of the only man she had ever loved, the one she’d only just gotten back, the one she couldn’t survive losing all over again.

Chapter

Twelve

March 17th

8:43 A.M.

Panic nudged him out of unconsciousness.

A horrible clawing panic that felt like something was trying to carve his chest open to get out.

For a long moment, Lion couldn’t remember the cause of the panic, only that something was wrong.

Very wrong.

Kate and Ariella.

They were in danger.

It was important he remembered why. How was he supposed to fix it, protect them, if he didn't know what he was supposed to be fixing, or what they needed protecting from?

Failure.

The word rang through his mind, making him wince. The last thing in the world he wanted to do was fail his girls. He’d already failed them in a major way by not being there for them when they needed him. But he was there now, and from the moment Kate had shown up at their place, he had vowed that never again would he allow anything to hurt them.

But something had.

He knew it even if the details were a little fuzzy.

The last thing Lion remembered was … the plane. Kate was upset, blaming herself for their having to leave the mansion because it had been potentially compromised. He’d been trying to convince her that she was wrong, that even if someone had followed her, she still wasn't to blame.

Maybe he’d convinced her of that because he remembered her kissing him.

Then the next thing he remembered was putting her in her seat, doing up her seatbelt, and holding his girls’ hands as …

The memory flitted just out of reach, and Lion was just about to give up, sink back into oblivion, when suddenly the truth came roaring into his mind with a strength that momentarily stole his breath.

Crash.

Plane crash.

One second, they’d been flying toward safety, the next, Thunder was yelling at them that they were going down.

Now that his memories had unlocked themselves, the pain came raging in. Filling his body until it was too much and a strangled scream fell from his lips. One of the enhancements his body had received with the drugs was an ability to heal himself faster than a regular person’s body could heal, but it couldn’t save him from everything.

Couldn’t stop him from dying.

Is that what was happening to him now?

Felt like it was. The pain was so all-consuming that it wasn't hard to believe that he would take his last breath at any second.

No!