Flamebound A Lone Star Witch No(40)
“What are you saying? That you want us to just walk out of here without you?” Lily demands incredulously. Declan doesn’t say anything. He’s too busy glaring at me from eyes turned incandescent with rage.
“There are three dead bodies down here. Even if, by some miracle, the compulsion lets me walk away from Viktor, there’s no way I’ll make it out of here. Not with the guards lying so close to the entrance.”
“I’m not leaving you.”
“You have to.” I wrap my arms around his waist, rest my head on his rock-solid chest. “The ACW has been looking for a way to execute you for decades now. If you’re found here, you’ll give them exactly what they’ve been wanting.”
His stubborn-as-hell jaw locks into place. “I’d fucking love it if they came after me. It’ll give me the chance to get rid of them once and for all.”
“Be reasonable.”
“This is as reasonable as I get, baby.” At that moment, the antique grandfather clock in the corner starts to chime. Before it falls silent, it’s clanged four times. My need to get them out of here becomes urgent. I had no idea that much time had passed—I must have been out of it longer than I imagined if nearly an hour has passed since we got down here. No wonder Lily and Declan both looked so freaked out when I came to.
“I’ll be fine,” I tell them again. “The ACW won’t hurt me. Not when they have my parents to deal with.”
“Uh, I hate to point out a flaw in your logic, Xan, but the ACW just spent weeks trying to kill you,” Lily answers with a shake of her head. “Finding you here is pretty much the answer to their prayers.”
“But they did that under cover. This would have to be blatant and in my parents’ faces. They won’t risk that. Not yet.” I give her a little shove toward the door, then cross to the desk and lift up the receiver of the old-fashioned phone that resides there. “Go,” I tell them right before I dial the operator.
“Put the damn phone down, Xandra.” Declan looks more pissed than I have ever seen him—and that’s saying something.
I ignore him. When the operator answers, I say, “There’s been a break-in in Councilor Viktor Alride’s office.”
“Who is this?” the operator demands.
I don’t get the chance to answer. Declan’s across the room in a flash, ripping the phone out of my hand and throwing the whole thing against the wall. “You need to get out of here!” I tell him urgently.
“Fuck that!” He places a gentle hand on my head, murmurs something. And for the third time tonight, everything goes black.
Thirteen
This time when I wake up, I’m in the backseat of a car. At first I think I’m with Lily, but a quick look around tells me I’m in Declan’s BMW. He’s driving, his shoulders tense and his hands clenched on the wheel. I might feel bad for him if I weren’t so annoyed at basically being kidnapped against my will. He always wants to take care of me, but he never gives me the chance to take care of him. It’s just one of the many inequalities in our relationship and it is beginning to severely tick me off.
Not to mention that I’m getting damn sick of waking up not knowing where I am—or what the hell happened to knock me out. It’s one more thing I plan to talk to Declan about. The way he just takes over when he thinks he knows better, whether I need him to or not.
“How are you feeling?” Declan asks from the front seat.
I haven’t moved, haven’t made a sound, so I don’t know how he’s so certain I’m awake. Except he’s Declan and I’m beginning to think the man knows everything. Or at least is damn good at faking it.
“Fantastic, considering I’ve been kidnapped.” I sit up slowly, glare at him in the rearview mirror. Then wish I’d stayed where I was when my stomach pitches and rolls.
“I prefer to think of it as extricating you from an increasingly sticky situation.” He grins at me.
“Of course you do.” I rest my head on the seat in front of me, try to ignore the fact that my head feels like an entire flock of very busy woodpeckers have taken up residence behind my eyes.
He turns serious between one breath and the next. “You okay?”
“Yeah.” No. Everything hurts. My head. My stomach. My muscles. Even my skin feels too tight, like one quick move will split me wide open. It’s an unfortunate analogy, considering where we just came from, but it fits nonetheless.
It’s the compulsion, my punishment for ignoring it even though I didn’t have a choice. And it gets worse with each mile we travel from the murder site.