Retrieval (22 page)

What had happened to Bleak? God forgive her if he hadn’t made it. What would happen to Raina then? Of course, King’s presence meant her father wasn’t holding her. She doubted he would allow her the comfort of something familiar like her dog.

So if Smythe-Ward didn’t have her—who did? What the hell had happened to her? Had she died? Maybe King was dead, and this was God’s version of Heaven?

“What’s up, boy?”

Skylar’s heart rate doubled in the space of the second that it took her to recognize Sebastian’s voice. She closed her eyes as joy speared her heart. For a second she was scared to look up, though she knew he stood above her now. Then the desire to see him couldn’t be contained, and she lifted her gaze to his.

“Hey,” she croaked out, wincing when the use of her voice caused her pain.

“Hey yourself. I was beginning to think nothing short of a tsunami was going to wake you,” Sebastian said in a low voice.

His face gave no indication of whether he was happy to be there with her or not, but his words had an almost tender tone that soothed her.

He sat gingerly on the bed beside her, and she soaked up his closeness even as she reveled in the fact that he was there with her.

“What happened?” she asked him and then again regretted the need to use words.

If she had a deep connection with him, she’d have been able to mind-speak as she did with her sisters.

“You can,” Sebastian said simply.

She looked up at him in confusion.

“Can what, she asks.” Sebastian laughed softly at her look. “You
can
talk to me mind to mind, Sky. It would seem that you and I have that deeper connection you were just thinking about.”

Before his face could give her any idea about whether or not that made him happy or mad, he got up off the bed and moved to the door.

It hurt to move, just like it hurt to talk, so Skylar, stayed still and focused on the ceiling above her. What did he mean she could talk to him mind to mind? Had he fallen and bumped his head? She hadn’t given in to the temptation to take a piece of him inside herself so that she’d always know where he was, if he was all right. She hadn’t wanted to tie someone to her in that way. The feelings she had for him were deep, but after only a couple of days together, it was hard to presume he felt anything other than lust for her.

So she hadn’t stolen any of his energy or anything that made Sebastian, well, Sebastian. She’d really wanted to though. Really, really wanted to. Shit. Shit. Shit. She needed her sisters here. What if she’d tied this man to her?

“So you’ll tie yourself to Bleak, but not to me?” Sebastian’s hard voice came from the doorway.

She was saved from having to answer by Raina’s voice.

“’Bout damn time you got up.” Raina’s voice was nasty before she slapped her hand over her own mouth with a look of horror.

“Please, Sky, don’t say it. I know. I know that I’m the reason you all resort to using curse words,” Piper teased as she too came into the room.

“Poor Piper … everybody picks on witty bitty woo,” Kinsey said on a muffled laugh and then shrieked when Piper pinched her on the arm.

Piper gave a mock snarl. “I got your witty bitty woo.”

Sky’s eyes watered.

“Quit crying, you big baby,” Piper said, her tone loving now instead of snarly.

“Yeah, you big baby. You scared the shi—umm, crap out of us, and we would appreciate it if you didn’t do it ever again,” Raina chimed in.

“I’ll second that and raise you an ass whooping if you even think of playing superwoman again, Sky. That’s straight bull-hockey, and damn if we’ll stand by and allow it to happen again.” Kinsey snarled this time.

Skylar still couldn’t talk with her voice, so she did the next best thing and held out her middle finger in that timeless single digit salute that never failed to let others know what you were thinking.

“Pretty brave now aren’t you?” Piper teased. “I mean, obviously we won’t beat the shit out of you while you’re down and out.”

Slowly, because again, moving hurt, Sky held out her other hand for the same gesture, and it sent all of her sisters into fits of relieved laughter.

“Yeah, I guess it’s all shits and giggles now that she’s out of the woods, huh?” A male voice said from the doorway.

“Hey, could you, umm, leave us alone for a few minutes?” Kinsey asked the men standing in the doorway. Her voice was tight, so Skylar assumed the smart-assed comment had come from Morrissey.

“A
few
minutes,” Sebastian stressed, and then she heard the sound of the door closing.

Once Sky was sure they were alone, she turned questioning eyes on her sisters. Raina grabbed Piper’s arm, and her eyes went from a startling milky white color to the same vibrant amber of her sisters.

“You look like you’re improving. Are you ready for another transfusion?” Raina asked Skylar quietly.

Sky nodded her head, and each of her sisters placed their hands on Sky’s chest and prepared to send as much energy into her body as they could.

Raina took the liberty of downloading as much of the past few days as she could through their mind link. Skylar was amazed she’d been out for over a week and that Sebastian had moved them four times to ensure their safety. He never let the women know where they were going, but they’d moved a long distance in short increments.

When the transfusion of energy was complete, the sisters all kissed Sky’s cheek and made to leave. Only Raina hung back. Sky still wasn’t able to move easily. It might be another week at best before she was completely well again, but she could move her limbs without searing pain.

“I need to leave, Sky,” Raina said quietly.

Skylar couldn’t mistake her meaning.

“It isn’t safe to go yet, Rain. Let me get back on my feet before you tuck tail, please?” she implored her sister.

“It’s so hard being around him and not being able to soothe him. I’ll wait until you’re up and walking, and then I’m out. Piper and Kinsey have a plan all set up, and we’ll go to Savannah and wait on you there. I just don’t have the strength to take his pain day in and day out.” Raina’s voice was a near sob by the time she finished.

Sky had never understood how out of all the people in the world, Raina had meshed with Bleak’s broken soul. But she had, and even if Bleak didn’t know it, Skylar and her sisters did. They couldn’t take Raina’s pain any more than Raina could.

“I guess that’s all I can hope for.” Sorrow coated her words.

“Enough about me,” Raina said shaking off the doom and gloom from her expression, “I know you’re wondering about your link with Sebastian.”

“What link?” Sky asked her sister.

“Come on, don’t give me that; you know what link, you little hussy. I gotta say though, at least one of us is getting their groove thing on. We’ve all been trying to live vicariously through you.”

“That’s gross on so many levels, Rain. Keep your nosy asses out of my business; do you understand me?”

“Bite me,” Raina said, still laughing as she settled down. “The only thing I can figure is that you absorbed more than your fair share when he opened himself to you in the healing. I don’t think that the, um, loving you guys have been engaging in would be enough to do it. Unless, again, you took from him and then returned it during the lovey-dovey stuff. And oh, I so don’t need a visual; it’s okay. I know he’s hot and everything, but I can do without the pictures that are flashing through your brain right now.”

“Then get out of my head,” Sky said with her own laugh this time before she literally pushed Raina out of her psyche.

“Geesh already. Couldn’t you be nicer about it?” Raina rubbed her temples.

Sky was immediately remorseful. She didn’t want to hurt Raina, only to protect the sweetest memories she’d ever hoped to have.

“So anyway, you guys are connected, and apparently it’s a two-way thing. You’ll have to build your own barriers against him. I tried to help you with that while you were in la-la land over the past week, but Sebastian’s a tough nut, and he prevented it. Apparently, he likes the replays that keep going through that dirty mind of yours. Or, crap, maybe they’re fantasies. Okay, so now I think he’s the ultimate pervert. But since you seem to feel so strongly about him, I’ll save any further comment on the issue until a better time and place.”

“Thanks, Rain. I’m gonna get some rest. I love you,” Sky said as she watched Raina leave. The door thumped closed, and she was left with thoughts of what the connection to Sebastian was going to mean … for both of them.

Was he angry about the tie? She knew she could easily sever it—

“Don’t even think about it,” he growled.

She turned her head. He stood there, completely filling the doorway with his big body. His hands clenched and unclenched at his side as if he were holding himself back.

“Apparently, think it is all I have to do,”
she whispered in her mind.

“I’m serious, Skylar. If you cut this tie, I’ll paddle your ass and make the last week look like a walk in the park.”

Oh, his mouth made the promise, but his eyes told another story. Sebastian was scared for her, but, more importantly than that, he was scared of losing the connection they’d established. And that made little to no sense unless his feelings were just as strong as hers?

“I have a way of communicating with you now, and that’s important if I’m going to keep you safe. Understand?” His face was set in stone, but his eyes burned.

“Well since it’s just a safety issue, we’ll leave it like it is. For now,”
she conceded. She did not like the fact that the bond worked both ways. She would much prefer it that she could read him, but not vice versa. There was also the little fact that unless she shielded he’d be able to feel everything she felt, and that was unacceptable. Sebastian in pain equaled Skylar very pissed off. And nobody wanted her really pissed off.

“I’m a big boy. I can handle it.”

“Go away,” she mumbled acerbically, out loud this time because the intimacy of being inside one another that way was too much right now.

“Yeah? Your mind has been silent for days now, and the only way I knew there was a chance you’d come back to me was that you were breathing.
Breathing,
Sky. Don’t bitch about me being there,” he continued as he pointed at her head, “knowing your every thought now when I went for almost a week knowing nothing.”

“Well I guess you told me,” Sky bit out.

“And I will continue to do so until it’s understood completely,” he warned.

“Enough already,” she half pleaded, half whined.

She hated that she was so out of sorts. She was in such pain that she threw a shield up automatically to prevent her sisters, and now Sebastian, from feeling it. She had no idea how they’d gotten to this point.

Before she could take another breath Sebastian was beside her. He scooped her up gently and settled her in his lap. He tucked a heavy quilt around her, leaned against the wall beside her bed and just held her.

“Let me share it with you. Raina told me I could take some of your pain, and that it would help you heal quicker,” he said against her temple.

For long moments Skylar just lay there in his arms. Peace stole through her body while huge pieces of her heart collapsed at his feet.

“Yeah? Well Raina has big mouth, and there’s no need for anyone else to hurt because of me.”

*

Her tone said “no,” but Sebastian hadn’t gotten to where he was in life by giving up so easily.

He tipped her chin up, so he could look into her eyes. His heart thudded painfully in his chest as he remembered how still she’d been on that hospital gurney. How dead she’d seemed.

Then he couldn’t think at all, because her gaze took his mind from him, and before he could stop himself he settled his lips against hers, let his warmth become hers.

He found the strength to pull away and placed kisses along her eyelids, her forehead, her cheeks, and her chin. She sighed softly and relaxed even further into him, a sign of her complete trust in him.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” Skylar whispered against his neck.

“What did you mean to do?” he whispered right back.

“What I had to do. No matter what, another person’s life isn’t worth mine. They would’ve killed Bleak, Sebastian. Then they would have killed my dog in front of me. And if you’d shown up, they would have killed you, and it would have gone on and on until they had what they wanted. Me.”

He couldn’t forget the power she wielded. He’d been talking with her sisters for a week now, trying to understand anything and everything about what made them unique in this world. He’d also been trying to get as much information on Skylar as possible because he’d a made a solid decision about her. She wasn’t getting away from him. He still didn’t understand the depth of this need he had for her, but it was there, like an unmovable boulder. He had no choice but to learn to live with it. That made his information gathering attempts with her sisters that much more important.

When he’d discovered he had a mind-link connection with her he’d been strangely satisfied. When Raina had explained what that meant, and how ultimately Skylar was in control of their link, he’d been understandably wary and then firmly resolved to do whatever he had to in order to keep that link permanent. If that included intimidation, so be it.

Not that she was going to respond to it. She’d proven time and again that she was stubborn beyond measure. But he was, too, and there wasn’t much that he didn’t get accomplished once he set his mind to it. She’d been like a blank slate for the last week. He could see snippets of her past moving through her mind, but the present had been a black, impenetrable shield. He’d spent hours moving within her mind and ferreting out how their connection worked. It made his hands shake to think of her silence during the past week.

He had a slight advantage over her right now. He’d been able to form barriers in his mind that would allow him to keep her from accessing certain thoughts. He could prevent her from reading him. He didn’t know how he’d managed to do it, but it had been similar to solving a puzzle. He couldn’t wait to see how she reacted to that.