His own agony formed a wall around him. Sweet Dove jumped up on the table and shouted at him, but he could barely hear her. She seemed to be asking what was wrong.
“You have to let me go,” he shouted.
“Never. And this time you won’t be able to get away. You’ll die here in this chamber before I ever release you.”
So it was all a ruse, her e-mails suggesting a relationship with him.
She left the table and opened the cabinet on the wall to his left. Her tools. She wasn’t going to wait. She intended to resume their prior relationship right now.
This couldn’t be the end. He had work to do, an organization to bring down, and mostly he had Angelica to save.
Suddenly his mind grew sharp and focused. Only one thought mattered right now: to save Angelica no matter the cost. His own life didn’t matter. Only she did, because he loved her.
His thoughts thinned out, his focus turning inward.
He loved her.
He loved Angelica.
Some of the pain lessened at this thought, and his heart grew full. Tears burned his eyes. He’d never believed he could love, not after all he’d been through. But right now, knowing that she’d had the foresight to bring the double-chains along took him the distance.
He loved her.
He saw it all now, how from the beginning she’d given him hope that his life could truly be different. Each step of the way, as she laid her dignity in the dirt and accepted the role of his slave, as she performed sexually in public when it was the last thing she would have ever done, as she stood up to Sweet Dove in order to keep his former captor away from him, all these things had given him hope.
And he loved her with every broken fiber of his being.
But was it too late?
Was there anything he could do?
Sweet Dove had him shackled and held in place with her preternatural power.
The only thing he knew for certain in this completely hopeless situation was that he had to tell Angelica how he felt.
Angelica?
I’m here. She sounded very faint.
Are you in pain? Dumb question.
Immeasurably.
Reyes’s chest hurt, inside and out. I can hardly hear you.
It won’t be long now.
Angelica, I was a fool. I love you. I need you to know that.
You love me?
With all my heart, I just didn’t think it was possible for me.
I love you, too. Even within his head, her voice caught.
You love me?
I’m crazy about you, Reyes.
He didn’t understand. But you never said anything. I felt sure you wanted to go home, to resume your life, to be with your mom.
That’s partly true, especially about my mom. But the rest was about my fears. Until this moment, I was afraid of staying in your world, but right now all I want is you, at any price. Reyes, I don’t know why I thought I could leave you. I know now that I belong here. But Reyes, aren’t you able to put on the chain?
Sweet Dove has me shackled. I can’t reach it.
Reyes, please try. You have more power than you know.
She wouldn’t last long now.
He grew very still once more and finally said, Sweet Dove has intensified the preternatural charge in the shackles, but I’m going to try to access my Ancestral power.
She didn’t answer for a long moment. When she spoke, her telepathic voice was little more than a whisper. Reyes, I love you. If you can do something, hurry, because Engles just put on the cat’s claw.
As rage poured through Reyes he broke communication with Angelica. He had to do something, had to figure something out right now, or his woman would be hurt by that bastard even while she was dying.
Sweet Dove.
Reyes shifted his attention to her. This nightmare was her doing, always hers. And as an Ancestral she would always have the upper hand.
Even with his arms extended in the rusty chains, he focused on the blood-chain that sat in a heap at his waistband, burning his skin. He took deep breaths and closed his eyes. The last time he’d been on this table, with Angelica on top, dominating him yet loving him at the same time, he’d found his Ancestral power and had accessed it sufficiently to break free.
Tonight there would be no holding back.
With the chain next to his skin he began reaching within himself once more, diving deep, and in a split second found the Ancestral layer that belonged to him as his birthright.
This time he plunged into this power, embracing it all, and for a long moment blacked out.
When he came to, power surged through him as he’d never experienced it before. He called to the chain at his waist and felt it respond. He remained focused on it, and the chain moved faster beneath his shirt. Suddenly, without the use of his hands, the chain flew over his head and settled around his neck.
Ancestral power flashed through him in a heavy wave like nothing he’d known before.
He drew his hands into fists and focused on all four shackles at once.
Sweet Dove shouted, “No!”
With a burst of Ancestral power, he shattered the shackles that had held him prisoner. He broke free of Sweet Dove’s preternatural charge. She’d never be able to entrap him again. Nothing could ever hold him again.
He didn’t stay, however, to have his reckoning with her. Instead he shifted abruptly to altered flight, focused on Angelica, and flew faster than he ever had in his entire life, following the beacon that she’d become.
He found her in Engles’s home, on the platform above the long shallow pool.
The bastard was naked, as was she, her knees split, his body ready to pierce hers, the cat’s claw suspended above her left shoulder.
Engles, staring into Angelica’s eyes and unaware of Reyes’s presence, spoke in a commanding voice. “You’ll die right now, Angelica, with my c**k buried inside you and blood pouring from your body.”
A red film covered Reyes’s vision as he flew to grab Engles beneath his arms. He pinned him tight against his chest and with altered flight flew him straight up to the carved rock ceiling of the room, shifted back to levitation at the last moment, and slammed Engles’s head into the rock.
He repeated this movement over and over, blood and brains flying everywhere until there was little left and nothing to be healed and restored.
At the same time, security alarms sounded through the space.
Reyes dropped Engles to the pool at the far end, flew back to Angelica, and lifted her up in his arms.
He shifted once more to altered flight and headed to his home. I’ll get a healer. You’ll be all right. You have to be.
She gasped several times, and just as he reached his bedroom, she spoke, Power is flowing through me now instead of hurting me. The chains just needed to be together. The pain has stopped. I’m okay, truly. I’m fine. Reyes, you have to listen to me. We must get Sweet Dove’s laptop. Now.