Page 55 of Witch Untold
I glare at him, bitter venom biting the back of my tongue even though a moment ago I’d been under the same misconception. “No. She’s not gone. Not yet. If she was, then I’d be gone too. She’s my anchor to this world.”
Hope flares in their eyes.
Yes, they see it now.
There’s time.
Time to bring her back.
But how?
I focus on our connection. On the bond between us that goes further than malevolent and witch. The bond that connects our hearts. There’s a desperate yearning deep inside me, an ache that only she can assuage, a desire only she evokes.
I latch onto it and tug.
“Come back to me, Cora. Please. I need you.” But it’s more than need. It’s that word. The one she used. It makes sense now. “Cora, I…I love you.” I whisper the words against her lips and then I kiss her cold, lifeless mouth. “I love you so fucking much.”
“Jasper, she’s gone,” Elijah says. “I don’t understand why you’re still here, but she’s gone. They drained her.”
I shake my head, lips still pressed to hers. I won’t accept that. I won’t let her go. I can’t.
My eyes heat and I squeeze them shut, dislodging the moisture that blooms there. What is this? What’s happening to me?
Her mouth parts beneath mine and her breath filters past my lips. I pull back and look at her face. Is that color in her cheeks?
“Cora?”
Conah falls to his knees beside us and takes her wrist. “There’s a pulse. Fuck! It’s weak but it’s there.”
“Cora?” Elijah strokes her forehead. “Cora, can you hear us?”
Her eyelids flutter open. I look into her beautiful cornflower-blue eyes and the knot of agony in my chest loosens.
“Cora?” I stroke her cheek. “Say something.”
She blinks and licks her lips. “I’m gonna kill those sons of bitches.”
Fire ignites in my chest.
That’s my girl.
* * *
CORA
We materialized outside the police station to a ground littered with dead ice walkers. Their pale skin was covered in a network of black veins, mouths puckered and shriveled.
This had to be the effect of the venom from the Sons of Adam.
The guys had filled me in on the original vampires’ purpose. It didn’t stop me from wanting to kill them, but realistically, there was no way to do that. They’d taken what they needed to kill the ice walkers because they wanted to go home, not because they gave a damn about humanity. But still, they’d served a purpose.
They had what they needed.
They had their power back.
My blood had restored them to their former glory so they could do what they’d been brought here to do.
They didn’t need me anymore, and we didn’t need to be here. I’d save my rage for something I could successfully unleash it on.
