Kiss Across Chaos (Kiss Across Time #10) - Tracy Cooper-Posey Page 0,82

feel a part of her radiating outward. She poured herself into the stream and sent in onward, her heart aching.

Nothing came back to her. There was no answer.

I’ll take you back. Taylor’s mental voice was sad.

No! Jesse could feel the protest knocking against the inside of her mind. Let me try again.

This time, she didn’t have to puzzle her way through how to do it. She threw herself out across the timescape. If she had been light, she would have blazed with the power in her. If she had been sound, anyone who heard would have been deafened.

Jesse? Even Aran’s mental voice was weak.

Yes! Aran, you must hear me. You have to go back.

Back?

You have to fight. Do you remember getting hurt? The knife?

…yes. Then more strongly. Yes. And even though she could not really see or hear in that place, she knew that Aran was coming closer. Drawing to her.

Jesse braced herself. Now she knew why Taylor had warned her to forget that Taylor was there. Now she had to bare her soul.

You must go back, Aran. For me. You have to embrace the pain and live. Because I love you and I want you back.

He didn’t answer her in words. But she felt him envelope her. She was showered in a love so powerful that it radiated through her and warmed her. Her heart swelled. Her mind sighed. Peace spilled through her.

Humbled and happy, she opened her heart and answered him and he reflected her answer a hundredfold.

Jesse… he whispered, and the word quivered and throbbed. Then, I must go back.

Yes, she agreed softly.

His presence separated from her. Drifted away.

You’ll be there?

Every moment, she promised him.

Then he was gone.

Taylor came closer and swept Jesse’s presence along with her…

…and suddenly, they were back in the living room, both sitting on the floor, with Sydney standing over them, her hands on her hips.

“Thanks for the headache,” Sydney said dryly, pressing her fingertips to her temples.

Taylor winced as she got to her feet. “Small price to pay.” She held out her hand to Jesse. “You’ve got a promise to keep,” she said softly.

Jesse let her pull her to her feet and moved through the house to the surgery.

Brody waited at the door. “You spoke to him.” It wasn’t a question.

“How did you know?” For as far as Jesse was aware, Brody was not and had never been a jumper, as Neven had been before he was turned.

“Because Aran stabilized about two minutes ago.”

“Suddenly,” Veris added from over his shoulder, as he used a syringe to inject something into Aran’s IV.

Alex pulled a wheeled cart loaded with instruments around to the side of the bed closest to Aran’s wound. “Move your ass, doctor,” he told Veris curtly. He looked up at Jesse and gave her a small smile. “All that is left is to stitch him up, now.”

Brody squeezed her shoulder.

Jesse moved further into the room. “I promised I’d stay with him.”

“Then you’d better stay with him,” Rafe said and stepped out of the way. “Here.” He shepherded her to the head of the bed. “Veris can be Alex’s scrub nurse for the closing of the wound. He’ll backseat drive, anyway. He might as well be useful while he’s running his mouth.”

“Calumny,” Veris muttered, but he was watching Alex widen the wound with a sterile instrument, so he could work inside it.

Rafe moved over to Brody and tugged on his sleeve. “Let’s give ‘em elbow room.” He pushed Brody and Taylor out of the surgery and closed the door.

Jesse stayed in that spot for the three hours it took to close the wound, while Alex worked deep inside Aran’s gut, up through layers of organs and tissues and muscle fibers, to the skin itself.

Veris did backseat drive, but Alex didn’t seem to mind the suggestions. Perhaps he was used to it. The two conferred in a clipped medical shorthand and sometimes Alex even shook his head, as they worked steadily.

Jesse didn’t remember reaching for Aran’s limp hand, but found she was holding it. She didn’t look away. She had seen wounds aplenty.

When the wound was closed and stitched and Alex had pulled Veris away, Jesse was finally in the room alone with Aran. She pulled the blanket up over him, then dragged the wheeled stool closer to the bed and settled on it, her aching back and legs twinging. She picked up his hand and waited.

Chapter Nineteen

Aran woke seven hours later, although Jesse didn’t know how much time had passed right then.