Fatal Strike (McClouds & Friends #10)(86)

He revved the engine, whipped it around the sharp turn on two wheels, and bounced and rattled up onto the logging road, lurching and tipping and swaying on the deep ruts.

Lara was terribly silent. Her body swayed with the centrifugal force, hitting the gearshift, then the door. Limp and flopping.

Where to stop was an artibrary decision, based mostly on the fact that he could not listen to that silence for another second without exploding. He jerked the vehicle to a stop. Raced around, and extracted Lara’s rigid, shaking body. She was still breathing, but her eyes were wide, dilated to vast black pools.

He couldn’t feel her, couldn’t find her.

He loaded her onto his shoulder, and took off through the trees. Not that there was any point in running while Greaves had a telelpathic fix on her. The first flat, grassy place he found, he let Lara’s body slide down, and laid her gently on the ground.

She stared up at the sky, breath shallow, heart racing. Her body trembled, as if she were lifting a weight that was too heavy for her.

He slapped her cheeks. “Lara! Goddamnit, Lara! Do you hear me? Get back inside! You can’t do this to me!”

Fucking duh. Could, too. The world did what it wanted. It knocked people around with no regard for their feelings or wishes.

Still, he shook her. Bellowed and pleaded. Bawled into his hands, like a child. Hit the ground until his hands bled. He was so f*cking furious, he was having a tantrum, slapping at the tree branches.

Jesus, just let him do this for her. Let him go and do the mortal combat with that evil motherf*cker on her behalf. Let him be the one to get trashed, for God’s sake. He’d been totaled already, so what the f*ck, why not? What else was he good for? Throw him out into the ring, let him freak out, crush everything that came his way. Mayhem Miles.

He’d do anything, if she’d just open her eyes and come back.

He held her in his arms, his face wet. He would follow her, but where was she? How the f*ck did she get to that place in her head? She was the active one, the seasoned psychic traveler who made the wild flights into the otherworld. He just huddled inside his shield.

Unless . . . he didn’t.

Bone weakening fear thrilled through him at that thought.

If he opened his shield. If he even could at this point. If he went out into the dark, naked as a newborn in that other dimension where his logical brain could not guide him. Could he find her?

It scared him to death. He’d tried so hard to block all that stuff out, hold it away from himself. The whole concept of psi offended his logical ideas of the way the world ought to be, so he hid from it, like a kid hiding under the covers with a flashlight.

But Greaves was coming. And Lara was dying.

He could hear them already, with his enhanced senses. The vehicle on the road below was slowing on the hairpin turn to come up the hill. The engine hummed and labored as it climbed. Two cars.

Worst case scenario, it killed him. No biggie. His life was worth nothing anyway if he didn’t try.

Blood trickled out of Lara’s nose, splitting into twin rivulets.

He called up his parent’s faces in his mind, and he offered a silent plea for forgiveness for being so distant. For not saying goodbye.

He wiped away tears and snot with his sleeve. Grabbed Lara’s cold hand, with his own grubby, bloody one. Tried to open the shield.

It wasn’t wired to open from the inside. All his efforts had been aimed at automating the mechanism, making it stay shut without having to think about it. He had put no effort at all into automating a reverse process. Each time he tried, he froze, and choked.

Not until he held the image of Lara’s beautiful face in his mind did he make any progress. Those shining eyes, the soft, shy smile. Her hand on his chest. Pressing his heart. Their lovemaking.

And he got it. The softness. Opening.

It was slow, awkward. Gears grinding, sparks flying, the shriek of metal against protesting metal, big wheels rolling, big bolts retracting.

Darkness swirled in, chilling him. Filling him. An infinity of . . . he had no way to frame it, other than darkness. Other-ness.

He moved through it like a swimmer in a dream, reaching out. Casting a huge net, like he did when he was fishing for ideas, but he was fishing for her. He was a flare in the darkness, a beacon fire.

Lara. Lara. Lara.

It didn’t take long. He was bound to her. They were like a rubber band stretched out, poised to snap back together.

He sensed her presence, and her struggle. She was wrapped in a strangling, consuming darkness, like shadowy spider-silk. Fighting it.

He gathered his energy into a ball, and hurled it like a bolt of blinding light, straight at that amorphous thing that was clamped around Lara. Surprise jolted it loose . . .

Get back inside, now now now, he wanted to scream, but he had no voice, no interface. He wanted to bellow his frustration but he had no throat, no body.

And suddenly, like a light flashing on, she was inside. His shield snapped shut like a clam instinctively against the attack from outside.

Energy battered against his shield. He hunched over her, panting, with deep, rasping breaths. Stinking with fear sweat.

He opened his eyes. She was looking up at him.

wt the hell were u doing? goddamn it why didnt u run?

if u have 2 ask he snapped back. cmon lets go Cant move im done pls go without me run run run fine then give up if you want 2 watch me die tnx 4 caring go! f*ck off!

no

Her body shuddered and arched as she suddenly dragged in a breath, like she’d been underwater. “Goddamn you, Miles,” she croaked.