Marked (17 page)

Ruby
had followed James into the RV a little hesitantly—almost as
though not entirely sure she was still welcome. She opened her mouth
as though planning on offering to drive, but Addison beat her to it.

"I'll
drive, Donovan. You have other things you need to be doing and it's
not as though Samantha is going to need me for the next little
while."

She
said it with a kind of nonchalance that I knew had to be on purpose.
Only time would tell whether or not Addison had really turned over a
new leaf, but the offer to drive had the feel of an apology to it. I
nodded my agreement and then turned to Dom.

"I'm
sorry to push, Dom, but would it be possible for you to try to heal
Alec now?"

Dom
looked like she wanted to refuse, but I knew that wasn't because she
was unwilling to help. Dom always wanted to help, but she was
terrified of failing yet again. After a second she nodded, but her
eyes were bright, almost like she was fighting back tears.

I
waited until we'd made it back to the bedroom and shut the door
before saying anything.

"It's
going to be okay, Dom. Even if you can't heal him we aren't going to
kick you to the curb. We all loved you even before you started being
able to heal people. It's a useful skill for you to have—one
that's saved a lot of lives already—but that isn't why we are
your friends."

"But
what if I fail and then Alec dies because of me?"

"I
don't know what's going to happen, Dom. I keep thinking that it's
impossible for Alec to die now that he's made it this long, but
Donovan is still really skittish about the state of Alec's heart.
What I do know is Alec dying—if that's what really
happens—isn't going to be your fault. I would love for you to
get to the point where your power came when you called it, but if
you're not there yet then you're not there. Just give it your best
shot."

Dom
reached over and gave my hand a squeeze. "You always seem to see
exactly the thing that is bothering me. Thank you for the vote of
confidence, I'm ready now."

I
nodded as she released my hand and then knelt down next to Alec's
bed. Dom gently rested her hands on the bare skin of Alec's chest and
then she closed her eyes and slowed down her breathing.

Time
seemed to grind to a standstill. I'd been present the last time Dom
had healed someone, and that time the people she touched had gotten
incredibly hot while she'd healed them. I wanted to get up and move
closer so that I would be able to tell if Alec's skin started to heat
up, but at the same time I was terrified of breaking her
concentration.

Dom
could be shockingly self-confident regarding certain things, but her
healing ability wasn't one of them and despite my words earlier, a
very tiny part of me was worried that each failed attempt at healing
reduced the chance that she would ever be able to heal again. At some
level, if you believed that you really
couldn't
do something, it was bound to eventually become a fact.

If
Dom could get her gift under control then the possibilities were
almost endless, but I wasn't thinking about all of the people she
could save. I was thinking about Alec, about the fact that I needed
him to live, that while I might be able to guide our people into
hunting Dream Stealer down and killing him, there wasn't anything I
could do to fix Alec's heart if it really was only seconds away from
tearing itself apart.

The
RV rumbled into motion, but I barely noticed. All of my attention was
focused on Dom and I barely even breathed because I was so worried
about disturbing her. Minutes stretched into what felt like hours
with no discernible change in Alec's condition.

I
was nearly ready to tell Dom that she could stop trying, that we
would wait and try again tomorrow, when I felt
something
happen. It was hard to describe and it was so subtle that I almost
didn't notice it. The air picked up a faint hum at the same time that
the tiny hairs on the back of my neck all stood on end.

Dom
hadn't moved at all, but for the briefest of instants it almost
seemed as though she expanded to the point where she took up the
entire room. Despite my earlier determination not to jostle Dom's
elbow, I opened my mouth to ask her what was going on, but before I
could get the words out she collapsed to the side, hands sliding off
of Alec as her body hit the carpeted floor underneath her.

Her
lips were blue and she wasn't breathing. I screamed for Donovan as I
tried to start mouth to mouth on her.

Adriana Paige
Interstate 70
Eastern Colorado

I thought we were going to lose Dom. I'd had a CPR class back in
Minnesota as a way of getting extra credit in one of my classes, but
I barely remembered any of it. For all I knew, I was doing more harm
than good, and it seemed to take forever for Donovan to arrive.

I
could tell that I was in shock. I was barely functioning, but I still
managed to tip Dom's head back and breathe into her mouth several
times before the bedroom door opened behind me. Moving with the speed
of a shape shifter and the economy of a practiced professional,
Donovan knelt down at my side and straightened out Dom's body so he
could start doing chest compressions as soon as I paused the rescue
breathing.

"James,
Ruby, I need one of you in here now! Adri, stop."

I
pulled back from Dom and Donovan started doing chest compressions as
I heard James' heavy footfalls as he ran towards us.

"Get
the crash paddles charging! Adri, go."

I'd
been staring at Dom rather than counting compressions like I should
have been, so Donovan's order to resume rescue breathing caught me by
surprise. I bent down and put my mouth over Dom's as James reached
us.

"Where
are they?"

"In
the plastic case on the other side of the bed—no, curses, that
was the other RV. They should be here somewhere, Mallory assigned
someone to make sure that they were moved out of the old vehicle. My
turn, Adri."

The
sound of ripping cloth next to my ear nearly drowned out the order,
but once again I moved out of the way as Donovan resumed compressions
on Dom. Another set of footsteps approaching from the front of the
motorhome momentarily threw me for a loop. I hadn't felt Addison stop
the vehicle, which meant that it couldn't be her.

"Here.
It was in that load of gear that was dropped off just before we left
the garage."

Ruby's
voice was the most welcome sound I could imagine hearing at that
moment.

"Thank
heaven. Get them charging, it's the—"

"I
know, the switch on the top…charging."

The
whine of the charging paddles nearly drowned out Addison's yell from
the front of the RV.

"Tell
me what's going on. Is she going to be okay?"

"Your
turn, Adri. We're doing everything we can, Addison. Ruby, I need the
gel."

Something
cold and wet splashed onto my cheek as I finished my second breath
and then Donovan was pulling me backwards as Ruby leaned in.

"Clear!"

The
thumping sound of the defibrillator discharging was jarring, but it
was nothing compared to the way that Dom's body bounced on the carpet
as the electrical jolt caused preternaturally strong muscles to
instantly contract. Ruby had positioned herself so as to get nearly
her entire bodyweight resting on Dom's chest, but even with that she
was still thrown back into Donovan and me with enough force that I
hit the wall behind me.

James
stepped forward and steadied the two of us as Donovan placed his
fingers on Dom's wrist to check whether or not the shock had worked.
A second later that question was answered as Dom started breathing on
her own again.

I
collapsed to my knees as James let go of me and wrapped his arms
around Dom. It seemed impossible that we'd come so close to losing
Dom such a short time after Alec being shot. Part of me wanted to
rage against our string of terrible bad luck, but I was careful to
keep my mouth shut.

James
seemed convinced that Dom was fine now, but I wasn't so sure. People
didn't just stop breathing for no reason. I was pretty sure that we
hadn't seen the last of the fallout from me having pushed Dom to try
and heal Alec.

**

I
lost some time after Dom's brush with death. For several days
everything felt like it was completely up in the air. Dom was still
alive, but she could barely get out of bed. Andrew on the other hand
woke up a few hours after we put Dom in the bunk below him. He was
still weak and more than a little disoriented, but he was awake,
which was definite progress compared to when he'd first been carried
onto the RV.

Donovan
was having a hard time tracking down a suitable replacement for the
communication equipment that had stopped working after the sniper had
shot Alec. Apparently it wasn't as off-the-shelf as I'd thought. Even
the fact that it was more or less restricted hardware wasn't the full
extent of the problem. The real holdup was trying to get the
equipment to interface with the custom software or firmware—or
some kind of ware—that was a key part of the magic that made
everything work.

It
meant that we were still dreadfully out of contact with Tasha and the
rest of our people, which was bad, but it was also the only thing
that saved me as I spiraled into a kind of dark haze like nothing I'd
experienced since my panic attacks had stopped.

It
was all that I could do to function well enough to stop rumors from
starting on the few times that we stopped the convoy to refuel or
grab something to eat. Everyone in our RV knew I was struggling, and
I was pretty sure that Mallory knew that something was up, but the
rest of our people seemed to still be on a high over the fact that
we'd managed to get out of Denver without having to fight the
Coun'hij.

I
tried to smile in the right places and ask after their welfare. I
didn't do an especially good job of it, but everyone seemed to think
that I was just preoccupied over all of the things that still needed
to be done to keep the rebellion from falling apart.

It
really was a critical time. I needed to be cementing my control over
our people—preferably over all of our people, but at the very
least the shape shifters in our group. It was only a matter of time
before people started asking after Alec again, and when they did it
wasn't going to reassure them in the least that he was still
bedridden. Even without knowing that Alec was being attacked by Dream
Stealer, people were going to start panicking if Alec didn't make an
appearance soon.

I
knew all of that, but just couldn't seem to make myself function
beyond the bare minimum required to keep the wheels from coming
completely off. Donovan didn't say anything recriminating, but then
again he didn't have to. I could feel his eyes on me no matter where
I went inside of the RV.

I
tried early on to apologize to Dominic for nearly getting her killed,
but I couldn't really get the words out, not like I wanted to, not
with James standing protectively nearby. It wouldn't have made much
difference if I'd managed to say what I'd wanted to say, not given
how out of things Dom was, but maybe it would have made me feel a
little better.

As
it was, it was just one more failure to be thrown across my shoulders
and carried forward into a future that was going to be nothing more
than more failures until the weight of them finally crushed me. More
than ever I wished Alec were around to talk to. I needed to be able
to talk to someone else who really understood what it meant to have
the ultimate responsibility over so many lives.

At
some point after we got Dom's heart started again I moved completely
into the master bedroom. I could still feel Donovan's worried eyes
looking my direction, but it made things a little bit easier. I cut
my interactions with the rest of the pack to the bare minimum. Food,
when I remembered that I needed to eat, a shower each morning, and a
status report from Donovan each day to find out how close he was to
getting a new set of communications equipment in. I simply couldn't
manage anything more than that.

I
started sleeping a lot too. Not just more than was normal, more than
was probably healthy, but in that too I didn't seem to be able to
stop myself. Mostly I fell asleep while sitting in the chair next to
Alec's bed. Usually it wasn't even something that I meant to happen.
I'd be sitting there trying to convince myself to get up and go out
where I could interact with the rest of the pack and then the next
thing I'd know, I was waking up from a six-hour-long nap that left me
feeling not at all rested.

After
the second time that happened I started to worry that maybe I was
being attacked by Dream Stealer. I tried to blame it on the fact that
I was only catching snatches of sleep here and there. I even tried to
explain it away as the result of sleeping fully dressed while sitting
up in a chair, but after it happened a third time, I realized that I
was doing the same kind of thing that Alec said happened every single
time Dream Stealer went after someone.

I
had to know. I changed into some shorts and a tank top and after
making sure that Alec was okay I lowered myself down on the bed next
to him and closed my eyes. If I woke exhausted yet again, then I was
going to go straight to Donovan and tell him that he couldn't trust
me anymore, that he needed to lock me up until they managed to kill
Dream Stealer…if they managed to kill Dream Stealer.

Right
before I finally drifted off to sleep I reached out and took hold of
Alec's hand. I was asleep within seconds of touching him.

I
knew I was dreaming again. It wasn't just the fuzziness of my
surroundings, it was the way that just as I'd dropped into slumber
I'd felt like I was dropping down a long, dark chute. For the
briefest of moments, as I felt myself start to be sucked down into
the dream, it almost felt like I was dying. I landed in the dream
with my adrenaline flowing and my heart pounding.