I make, all while checking to make sure Emme hasn’t fallen.
Waves splash against my tail. I’m making headway, just not fast enough. This place will cave inward in one shot and it’s filling faster than we planned.
I jerk my head up, hoping like hell Emme still has room to breathe.
Pure fucking joy has me wagging my tail when I find Emme cowering in a small groove within the wall.
“Bren,” she says.
I can’t tell if she’s crying or if she’s just wet. It doesn’t damn well matter. I’ve never been so happy to see this pretty face.
She clutches my neck, her slender arms giving warmth and love all at once. “You’re here,” she stammers.
Jesus. Her lips are blue, her skin is the color of my ass, and she’s shaking out of control. I change to speak to her, wishing to heaven and back I could just hold her.
“Time to go, baby,” I tell her. “You ready?”
She glances up to what remains of the translucent shield, her gaze targeting a hole just big enough for two. “Not really,” she admits.
I smile. Or at least try to. “Neither am I, but I say we haul ass anyway.”
She chokes back a sob and a laugh, the way she does when she knows we’re absolutely screwed and scared out of her mind, but somehow still believes we’ll make it anyway.
I change back to wolf. The moment I feel Emme settle onto my back I take one last leap of faith.
Together we bust through what remains of the ceiling. And hell, has kicking ass never felt so right.
I’m no longer swimming. I’m propelling myself to the surface like a shark ready to maul anything that gets in my way.
Emme’s little. That means she has little lungs. The pressure of moving this fast could burst them, ’cept drowning will kill her just as fast.
Hang in there, Em. Don’t you give up on me.
My hind legs pump hard, fighting against the instinct to slow and permit my wolf’s essence to finish healing me.
Emme’s hold loosens and her body starts to float away just as we break through the water.
I change, wrenching her into my arms.
The moon basks us under the best damn light I’ve ever seen and I’m holding the best girl I know.
“Yeah,” I holler. “We made it, baby!”
Emme coughs and swipes at her face several times. She blinks away the droplets coating her thick lashes and throws her arms around me.
The shore, it’s not too far away, and the docks are only a short swim away at best. I should start swimming, get her to land and safely back home.
Like a jackass, I don’t move. I tread water and just look at her, smiling till my face actually hurts.
“Bren,” she says, holding me close. “I can’t believe, I mean, goodness. I can’t believe we did it.”
“No, baby,” I say. “You did it.”
The smile she greets me with should be illegal. I maintain my position, taking her all in beneath the moonlight’s haunting glow.
It’s been a crappola of a night. Dawn isn’t far away, and neither are the docks. Still, I don’t move, stealing more time with just me and Emme.
Her angelic face grows sweeter as she adjusts her position. For the first time in my life, I know there’ll never be a woman this beautiful. I lean in, ready to kiss her.
Emme jerks her chin away, panic overtaking her in one vicious strike. Sparkles of blue and green flicker from the bottom of the lake, growing in size, and spreading in cahoots with that sense of evil.
“Bren! Una’s still alive.”
I roll my eyes. “Yup.”
Emme screams when I throw her up and away from me. With a large intake of air I howl, summoning the pack with my call.
A long tentacle grapples my waist. This time, I don’t let it tighten before I change.
My fangs tear through the limb pulling me under. Una, shrieks, her mutilated form, slinking away. I dive after her, needing her carcass floating over Tahoe more than I need my next breath.
I’m almost to the crazy witch when she spins like a top, belting me with the stumps of her remaining tentacles. She sucker-punches me in the chin, stunning me long enough to engulf me with her shredded extremities.
Una tightens her vice-like grip, squeezing out the measly amount of oxygen I have left. I curl into a ball and kick out, puncturing her injuries with my claws.
I fight, snapping my fangs and pummeling her with my limbs. But it takes me biting off