Rapture Untamed (Feral Warriors #4)(23)

He had to protect her back.

When he looked up at her through his jaguar's eyes, she was still standing, still determined to fight.

Your listening skills need some work,Red. Get on the ground ,now! Fast!

"Why?" She sank to her knees.

On your back and keep your knife at the ready,though I'd consider it a favor it you'd try not to stab me.

She looked at him like he'd lost his mind, but after only a small hesitation, she finally did as he ordered. As the first of the draden descended, Jag dove on top of her, blanketing her with his animal's body.

Get under me. And tell me if they bite you anywhere.

"Jag, this isn't going to work. We have to kill them."

I'll bite the ones I can reach.

"And the rest will wait here, trying to get at me for the rest of the night. We won't find that Daemon."

Screw the Daemon. I'm trying to keep you alive. If I get up,they'll swarm you. You'll be dead in minutes.

The draden cloud descended over them, fighting their way in, pressing into every opening. And they were reaching her, dammit. He snapped at them, eating the tasteless things, draden after draden, but he didn't seem to make a dent in the numbers.

They're getting you.

"I'm okay." But her voice said otherwise. He heard pain. A thread of fear.

His mind spiraled back to that other place, that other time. He felt those blows to his far younger body, the fists attacking him as the enclave leader's furious voice roared in his head across three and a half centuries.

Pamela Palmer Rapture Untamed

"You let her die. You let her die! You selfish,coldhearted bastard."

Yes, yes he was all those things. But not this night. Notthis night. Olivia was not going to die while he lay here, protected and safe.Useless.

In a flash of colorful light, he shifted back into a man. In one corner of his mind he reveled in the feel of her soft curves beneath him. Then the draden attacked, and any thoughts of lust disappeared as if they'd never been.

"What are you doing?" Olivia cried.

He leaped off her. "Curl up, Red!"

The draden swarmed them both, but he grabbed the knives off the ground and fought them with everything he had, keeping them off himself as best he could, but his focus was on her. He had to kill the ones who came near her.

She is not going to die.

Those gray eyes would not turn cold and sightless, that fiery spirit would not be doused. Goddess knew what she'd done to him, but she'd touched him, connected with him in a way no woman had, perhaps ever. They might do nothing but battle one another, but he was beginning to care about her, dammit. Hecared. He wasn't going to let her die.

Olivia ignored him and sat up, stabbing draden nearly as quickly as he did. Still, they kept coming. There must be fifty of them. With two hands, he couldn't get them all.

They latched onto his shoulders, his scalp, his back and flanks and legs.

"Jag, shift back!"

"No."

"You idiotic, stubborn, Feral!" she shouted.

He ignored her, his concentration on one thing and one thing only. Killing the draden.

He fought until the sweat ran in rivulets down his temples, until his body became a mass of searing pain. Until his legs began to weaken.

The damn draden were winning. He didn't know what else to do. What he'd done wasn't enough.

It wasn't enough.

Ah,goddess ,what do I do?

The question tore through Olivia's quaking mind as she fought the draden with a desperation beyond anything she'd faced in over five and a half centuries. Because she couldn't fight them her way, by stealing their energy for herself. Jag would know.

But if she didn't, if they didn't dispatch the draden soon, they were both going to die.

Jag loomed over her, killing most of the draden that tried to attack her. She looked up and gasped at the sight of him. They were covering him.Covering him . Even as she watched, his movements began to slow, and he lurched drunkenly.

They were killing him.

"Jag, shift!"

"No." His voice was low and flat, as if he'd already accepted his own death.

But he wouldn't die if he shifted, dammit. They couldn't hurt him in his animal.

My God, he was sacrificing his life in a hopeless attempt to save hers when all she had to do to live was steal the energy from the draden around her.

Which would give her secret away.

Which would destroy her life.

But what choice did she have?

If she did nothing, if she let the draden kill him, then saved herself, no one would ever know, and her secret would be safe. And the man who was sacrificing his life to save her would be dead.

"Jag, listen to me. You must shift. They can't hurt me."

He didn't look at her.

"Jag, I'm draden-kissed!"

But he didn't respond, focused only on staying alive. On keeping them both alive.

She crawled out from under the slash of his knives and pushed herself to her feet, her body still weak from the Daemon venom.

He swung to her, his gaze unfocused. "Olivia, no. They'll kill you."

"They can't kill me unless I let them." Meeting his gaze, forcing herself to watch the knowledge leap into his eyes, she spread her arms and let them bite her, then sucked them dry, not fighting them. Not needing to.