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“Spit it out!” Adora yelled from where she stood on his other side, swaying on her feet. I gave him a hard look, letting him know I agreed.
“She’s lost too much blood,” the doctor started. The room spun. The floor was pulled out from under me. I knew where this was going, but I refused to believe it. “One of the bullets went through her spleen. The other one through her pancreas. It shattered her spine. She’s only lived this long because her shifter healing is trying to repair it.” On the other side of the bed, Nova started convulsing. A strangled whine ripped through the air.
“No,” I snapped. “There has to be something more you can do.”
“I’m sorry, my king?—”
“Ysa.”
“I’m here,” she said, standing by Nova’s side where she kept a comforting hand on the wolf’s fur.
“Get me another doctor. All of them. Anyone who can fix her!” My breath heaved. I turned and flipped the table, throwing it across the room. Glass rained. Silverware went flying, the metal making tinking sounds as it bounced off stone.
“Elias,” she said gently.
“Don’t.”
She sighed. “There is another option?—”
“Uncle,” Kieran said. “I know the body. I know what it’s capable of. What it can heal from. What it can’t . . .” He cleared his throat. “Dannika won’t recover from this. The moment we open her up to attempt to fix it, she’ll bleed out the rest of the way. She has minutes at most.”
I stared into what was left of the flames, unbelieving that this was where we were.
I’d fallen in love with my pretend mate but hadn’t told her. My temper had chased her away. My cruel words. My coldness. She’d reached out to me, and I’d left her waiting, thinking I didn’t care and gods knew what else.
If I didn’t do something now, I’d never have the chance to tell her.
“Everyone, out.”
I knew what I needed to do. It was the only way. The only option.
“She’s a shifter,” the doctor warned. “The process will not take.”
“I don’t care,” I said simply. “We are out of options. It’s a Hail Mary. Danni’s always been different. If there’s even a chance . . .” I had to take a deep breath to steady myself. “I have to try.”
Shifters couldn’t be vampires. The times people had tried resulted in death. Always death.
But to my knowledge, there had never been a shifter quite like Dannika. She didn’t have shifter healing. Not like she should. Maybe she lacked enough magic there that it wouldn’t fight the change. Maybe, just maybe, I could save her.
I swallowed hard.
“You can’t.”
The voice rang out above all others. Above the whispering. Above Bianca’s quiet sobbing outside the door. Above the sounds of our arguing.
I turned. Adora kneeled at Dannika’s side, gripping my mate’s limp, pale hand between her two, but it was me she looked at. Me, whom she told I couldn’t.
“I’m the king. You cannot—will not—tell me how to save my mate.”
Adora shook her head. “I don’t care if she’s a vampire. She could be human. She could be a llama. I don’t give a flying fuck about her species. You can’t do it because you’ll kill her. Your bite is death.”
I blinked, assessing this woman over once more with the one eye I had. There was no way she could have known that.
No one did. Only my family and Ysa.
It was one of the most carefully guarded Laskaris secrets.
“Not if I change her.” Yes, my bite was death. It allowed me to see into someone. To peel back their memories. In doing so, it killed them—unless I turned them.
