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“Della!” A familiar, gruff voice shouted in her ear. “Stop!” Her head jerked to find Hunter was the one carrying her. He set her down, his face a mess of blood and soot, his age lines blackened by dirt and ash.
Her bloody hands fisted his shirt, shaking him in impotent fury. “You left him there to die! He didn’t do anything wrong, and you left him!” At the sight of the blood,Cal’sblood, painting her skin up to her elbows, hysteria stormed like a tsunami. “You didn’t listen to me, and now he’s going to die!”
Face grim, Hunter snatched at her flailing fists and pulled her close. Della fought his hold again, pushing and punching with all her strength, but couldn’t match his Alpha strength. Through her continued raging, he hugged her so tight the grit on his shirt abraded her cheek and her tears soaked into the cloth.
“Go help him!” she cried, refusing to be soothed. Why was he wasting time? Why wasn’t he helping Cal? Or was he already dead? A fresh sob blasted up her throat.
With one last, firm squeeze, Hunter eased her back and ran his hands over her hair and face, his gaze focused and scanning. “Are you all right? Are you hurt?”
Was she hurt? She didn’t even know. She couldn’t feel her own body, not when she couldn’t tear her attention from where Cal rested inert on the grass. A bloody stump lay mangled and sickening where his foot should have been, shards of bone sticking out. Della cursed herself for the crudeness of her work. Maybe if she’d worked faster or had more skill, strength, knowledge, orsomething...
The sight broke through the last of her fortitude. “Why aren’t you helping him?Why?” she whisper-screamed with the last of her strength.
“Paul.” Kess stepped into Hunter’s side, laying a palm against his arm. His face immediately softened in her presence. “No woman runs into a fire to save her abuser. If you want to help Della, go save her mate.” She raised her other arm, hefting an old-fashioned doctor’s bag in Hunt’s direction as a more-than-suggestion. “Go.”
Jaw clenched, he accepted the bag from Kess, frowning again at Della’s tear-streaked face. “I’ll see what I can do.”
He strode away, and Kess took his place, wrapping an arm around Della’s shoulders. “Come sit for a minute. You’re shaking all over.”
Kess guided her to one of the tree stump seats by the firepit, and Della sat. Everything inside her urged her to go to her mate, to sit at his side, touch his skin, and breathe comforting words in his ear. Yet she couldn’t. What if his skin felt cool to her touch? What if his breath never tickled against her face? What if her words fell on ears unable to hear? What if he was already gone? She studied him closely, convincing herself his chest rose and fell with shallow respirations, but was that only her imagination?
After Rakesh died, his face haunted her every day for years. Mirages sat atop strangers’ necks, there one second and gone in a blink. Her aggrieved brain played cruel tricks. Was this the same? Was she due to repeat that experience and see Cal’s hazel eyes in every Alpha face who crossed her path?
“Here.” Kess shoved a cup in Della’s trembling hand and prompted her to bring it to her lips. She drank deeply, swallowing past the fire-scorched tissues of her mouth and throat.
Everything around her seemed unreal andtooreal all at once. Was that Logan crouching at Hunter’s side, concern creasing his face? Was Lars truly arriving with clean bandages and a steaming bowl of water? Was that Cal’s friend (Simon, was it?) checking his neck for a pulse, his expression a mix of horror and grief? Was all of this happening, or was it a fever dream conjured up by her disintegrating mind as she lived the last few minutes of her life pinned under a burning building? Had she died along with him in the rubble?
“Is the attack over?” she heard herself ask.
“It’s over.” With the fire at her back, haloing her outline like blessed, holy light, Della considered if she truly was dead, and Kess wore the face of the Holy Mother Mary.
As if sensing her impending crack-up, Kess’s hand began rubbing Della’s back in a slow, soothing rhythm. The touch, genuine and kind, grounded her stroke by stroke. Yes, this was real. It was all real. She’d lopped off Cal’s foot. They’d escaped the basement. He might yet die, and she’d be a twice-over widow. She’d been ready to die with him, and now she might be forced to live without him.
Inside her chest, their tenuous bond trembled like a candle fighting a strong breeze. If he lived,if he lived, she would fix this. They could leave, go somewhere else like he wanted, start over somewhere new. If he wanted, she would give him her bite and reinforce their connection, as barbaric and insane as the practice compared to her old-world sensibilities. She pushed the promise down the bond like a paper lantern released on the wind, hoping it floated its way to her mate, wherever he was.
“There weren’t that many attackers,” Kess was saying, “but somehow one or two got past the patrol to light the fire, and then that caused a lot of confusion.” Kess’s voice reeked of disgust and hatred. “My understanding is that most are dead, and Hunter will deal with those that lived.”
Concern for her Pack elbowed its way into her awareness. “Is everyone all right? The children? The Omegas?”
Kess nodded calmly. “Our Omegas and pups are all fine.”
“Is anyone hurt?”
Kess pushed a lock of curly hair from her face. “Riddick has a good slash across his face. A few others have burns, but nothing as serious as...” Her words trailed away, and Della followed her gaze to where Hunter examined Cal’s wound. “Della, how on earth did you...?”
Della shrugged miserably, the only response she could give.
Kess’s expression brimmed with understanding. “I knew when you tore off that you’d let that building collapse on your head before you gave up.”
“Cal thought he was protecting me.” Della trailed her fingers over her claiming mark. “With this. I asked him to do it, it wasn’t forced...” Anger boiled up from deep in her chest. “And then theyleft him there.They left him to die.”
Kess rubbed her lips together and spoke slowly. “They made a mistake.”
Weighed down by too many emotions, Della sunk her face into her hands. “Cal was right. We shouldn’t have come back here. We’ll have to leave. If he lives, we’ll go east like he wanted.”
“No, Della.No.” Kess’s voice grew strong and forceful, demanding Della leave the safe avoidance of her palms. “Thanks to you and Cal, we only lost the mess hall. It could’ve been much, much worse. The Pack needs you and Cal.”
“How can you say that?” Della rasped. “You don’t even want me here.”
