until it veered sharply across the centerline, lights blinding, speeding up just before impact.
Snatching his dreams away in a heartbeat.
CHAPTER SIX
Silas met Max and Cee Cee in the hospital corridor. “He asked me to call you first.”
“What’s happened, Mac?”
Threading fingers through crisp-cut brown hair, he couldn’t come up with an immediate answer to Cee Cee’s blunt demand. Silas MacCreedy wasn’t easily shaken. His expression revealed nothing, but his mate Nica’s presence and the way her palm stroked his arm, said everything.
“Whoever hit them was driving a stolen garbage truck. Didn’t call it in. Crossed the center line and shoved the hood and bumper all the way to the windshield. I don’t know how he got her out. Nothing but the Jaws of Life could’ve torn off that door the way he did. Ambulance brought them here. I called Susanna. She’s in with them now.” His words trickled down, forcing Cee Cee to ask the final question in a low and steady voice.
“How bad?”
Again, the subtle sidestep. “He asked me to call Rueben. He’s her . . . next of kin. He’ll be here as soon as he can charter a flight.”
“Not his brothers?”
“No.” He looked from her to Max. “Just you for now.”
Too stunned to flinch at the fierce squeeze of Cee Cee’s hand, Max asked, “Did he say why?”
“Said you’d know.”
Unfortunately, he did.
– – –
Colin Terriot sat beside the hospital bed, an IV-threaded hand clutched in both of his. As if trying to conjure up a djinni, he rubbed the polished steel of the ring she wore on her thumb. Registering Max’s presence, his attention changed focus, looking to him, instead, to perform that miracle.
The Terriot prince must have hit either windshield or steering wheel, brow recently stitched, and nose swollen. His stare, instead of welling with grief, struck like a blunt instrument. When he didn’t speak, Max’s followed from clenched fingers along tube-threaded arm to the still features of Mia Guedry Terriot, or what he could see of her beneath the bandages and mask artificially filling her lungs.
“Bring her back. Bring them back to me.”
Because he’d once been in that chair watching his own future ebb away, Max didn’t answer with what they both already knew. Colin’s mate was gone. Only machines preserved the tiny flutter of life within her.
Still, Max circled behind his chair, moving to the head of the bed. With hand to the base of her throat as the only bare skin available, he concentrated, sending a psychic search for a spark from that once-vibrant soul, reaching deep until his temples pounded and a thread of crimson trickled from his nose.
But nothing of her remained. Seeing that answer without him speaking, Colin closed blackened eyes.
Quietly, Max asked, “Did you try reaching her through your bond?”
“Until my ears bled. I hoped . . . I thought maybe . . .” Colin took a steadying breath, damp gaze rising to the ceiling as if for some other divine intervention. “I know she’s not there,” came the final, heavy admission. “My son – Abel Daniel, after my father and her brother, he’s a fighter, but he’s so small. Sonuvabitch.” He fell silent except for quick, tight breaths that finally evened out. “Rueben’s her family, too. I can’t make the decision without him seeing . . .” a hard swallow, “how things are.”
Max squeezed a rigid shoulder. “Anything you need.”
Colin’s stare lifted, glittering not from grief but with vengeance as he growled, “I need to know who and why.”
“It won’t bring them back.”
Colin threw off both hand and gentle truth. “Would that matter to you if you were sitting here?”
If it was Charlotte and his child . . .
That thought tormented as he listened to the fateful beep of the machines. He’d been in that chair, in that same position once before. “No.” Max couldn’t argue. “You aren’t alone in this. Remember that.” When Colin didn’t respond, he added, “Do you want me to call your brothers?”
A quick emotional spasm breached those stoic features. “Not until after I talk to Rueben. Not until . . . a decision’s made.” He braced for argument but received an understanding nod. The breath sighed from him as he rubbed swollen eyes and whispered, “Thank you.”
“I’ll start asking questions. Stay strong,” Max nodded toward the motionless figure, “for their sake, and be wise for your own.”
A slight nod. “Send MacCreedy in. And keep me posted.”
Colin’s attention turned back to the study of features that would haunt his dreams and his conscience for the