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Jonas must have heard her, because he cursed, swung me fully into his arms, and ran. We all but flew across the rest of the office and through the open doorway into the next room. This was a replica of the one on the other side, but the rift here was slightly smaller. Winter was midway down the room, dragging his body toward the slowly spinning rift, leaving in his wake a bloody trail. Both his feet had been blown off.
Jonas deposited me against the nearest wall, then strode forward, grabbed Winter by his calves, and dragged him back.
Winter screamed and fought, kicking and punching, to little effect. Jonas simply dragged him back to me, then planted a heavy boot on the back of Winter’s neck, mashing his face into the carpet. Winter continued to scream, but the sound was muffled and accompanied by odd gurgling sounds.
Jonas’s gaze rose to mine. “Do you want the honor?”
I sucked in a deep breath, then slowly shook my head. “You do it.”
For Penny, and for all the other children. I didn’t say those words, but I didn’t need to. He heard them anyway. I saw it in his eyes.
He flipped his rifle from over his shoulder, aimed, and fired.
Rath Winter’s head exploded and his body stilled.
The bastard was finally dead.
Relief swept me, a tide so strong my knees buckled and I fell sideways. Jonas swore and lunged forward, somehow managing to catch me before I hit the bloody floor.
“Now we get you out of here.” His voice was grim. “Corps are on their way up. We can’t be found here—they had orders not to enter this floor.”
Orders given by the woman with the smoky voice and leaf green eyes, no doubt.
“If the jet pack can’t be traced back to you, leave it,” I said. “Take me down to twenty-nine instead.”
He took off his coat and wrapped it around my body, then swung me into his arms again and strode back into the office. “What’s down there?”
“Dissections.” I rested the side of my face against his chest and listened to the steady beat of his heart. It was an oddly soothing sound. “And women who can still be saved.”
I hoped.
“There’s only one woman I care about saving right now.” His voice was grim. “You need urgent medical attention—”
“I can heal myself, but they can’t. Please, Jonas. It’ll be our way out. Bear, show him.”
After several moments, Jonas swore. He shifted his grip on me, then punched the elevator call button and said in a gruff voice that wasn’t his own, “This is four-five. I’ve reached the twenty-ninth floor. I need medical teams in hazmat suits up here immediately. I’m bringing one badly injured woman down, but there are at least six others needing urgent attention.”
I didn’t hear the response. Jonas was obviously wearing an earpiece. The elevator door opened, and he stepped inside and pressed the ground-floor button before waving what looked like a plastic card across the scanner. The doors closed and the elevator quickly began to descend.
But not as quickly as the darkness descending on me. But this time it was okay. I was safe. My two little ghosts were safe. Jonas would get us all out of here, and I would recover.
I had to recover.
I had a promise to keep.
DON’T MISS THE FIRST NOVEL IN KERI ARTHUR’S SOULS OF FIRE SERIES,
FIREBORN
NOW AVAILABLE FROM SIGNET SELECT
All of us dream.
Some of us even have pleasant dreams.
My dreams might have been few and far between, but they were never, ever pleasant. But worse than that, they always came true.
Over the course of my many lifetimes, I’d tried to interfere, to alter fate’s path and prevent the death I’d seen, but I’d learned the hard way that there were often serious consequences for both the victim and myself.
