“Hudson—” I reach for his hand where it’s clutching my thighs, his arm beneath my knees, and cup my hand over his. “What are you doing?”
He shakes his head, doesn’t answer. More trees explode with every step he takes, the timberland around us turning to nothing, bark and roots and leaves just disappearing with each long stride. He’s destroying an entire forest in the blink of an eye, in an absolute and perfect rage.
“Hudson,” I whisper. “Please don’t be like this. There’s nothing you can do.”
Dozens more trees explode around us at that, and then finally, finally, he comes to a stop in the middle of a clearing he just made, a hundred trees—maybe more—gone with just a thought.
One corner of his mouth ticks up in a teasing grin. “Jeez, Grace, your belief in me is overwhelming as always.” But the humor never reaches his normally bright blue eyes, now turned nearly gray with the riotous storm of his emotions.
“It’s not about believing in you. It’s about the fact that I can feel your father’s venom moving through me. You can’t fix that.”
He squares his jaw. “You don’t have a clue what I can do.” He doesn’t say it to be mean. I know him now. He’s trying to convince himself.
“Maybe not. But I know—” I break off as another fresh wave of pain surges through me and I gasp. I must have been in the eye of the tempest earlier, and now the pain is buffeting against me in growing agony. I’m out of time.
“You don’t know anything,” he answers harshly, his storm-tossed eyes wet with more emotions than I can keep track of. “But you’re about to.”
124
Long Time, No Sea
“Give her to me,” Jaxon demands for the third or fourth time since Hudson picked me up, but it’s obvious Hudson couldn’t care less what Jaxon wants.
He keeps his eyes on mine for several beats, his gaze searching my face as I fight against the pain. I can tell he wants to ask me if I want to go. To Jaxon.
And he would hand me over. One word from me, and he would step aside. But I don’t even know what he’d be stepping aside from. We’ve barely tolerated each other for two weeks. And I was mated to Jaxon until two hours ago. So obviously I want to go to Jaxon.
But I don’t say anything. I can’t. Right now, I don’t know what I want.
Another wave of pain rolls through my body, and this time, I can’t swallow my scream.
“Don’t fight it,” he tells me in little more than a whisper. “Let the pain roll over you. Absorb it instead of fighting against it. It’ll make the next few minutes easier.”
I don’t argue with him—the pain is too overwhelming for that now—but I want to ask how he thinks I can just surrender to it when it feels like every nerve ending in my body is being dipped in lava…at the same time.
Before I can think of a way to explain that, Hudson leans over and deposits me gently—so, so gently—into Jaxon’s waiting arms.
It feels like coming home.
Despite how worn out he is, Jaxon takes me with ease, holding me steadily against his chest for long seconds before carrying me a little away from Hudson and Macy. Then he sinks down onto the snow and cradles me in his lap.
“It’s okay,” he whispers as he strokes my still unruly curls back from my face. “You’re going to be okay.” But I can see in his eyes that he knows the truth. Unlike Hudson, Jaxon understands that I’m already gone.
He doesn’t like it, but he gets it.
Next to Hudson, the ground makes a sound like it’s screaming, and we all turn to watch him turn the snow to vapor as he splinters the rocky ground in front of him wide open.
“What are you doing?” Macy demands. “I thought you were going to help Grace. I thought—”
Hudson holds a hand up and she freezes, which is ridiculous because he won’t hurt her and yet totally understandable, considering she just watched him vaporize a stadium and a shit ton of trees all in the space of ten minutes.
As we watch, the dirt that was frozen beneath the snow explodes up and out. But Hudson barely pays it any attention as he digs deeper, deeper, deeper. The sounds get worse, the ground grinding against itself as he literally carves through granite with a thought.
“What’s he doing?” Macy whispers.
“I have no idea,” Jaxon answers, still watching his brother with bewildered eyes.
I don’t know, either, but I know that whatever it is, it’s his long-shot idea. And because I can’t stand the thought of hoping, of thinking that Hudson might somehow find a way to save me only to have my hopes dashed at the last possible second, I turn to Jaxon, who looks as exhausted and traumatized as I feel.