There would be no time to run for help. He could not hope to carry her back to Val Cache quickly enough, and she needed more attention than he could give.
And he could not bear to leave her. He knew the risk of concussion was great, Joey might slip away from him and never waken unless he used every ounce of his will to keep her.
Luke closed his eyes and brushed his lips over Joey’s, pressing his cheek against her forehead “Joelle. Listen to me, Joelle. You must wake up.”
He waited an agonized, endless moment for her to stir, to respond to the insistence in his voice. Then he shifted so that her head fell back onto his thigh and gathered her face in his hands. “Joey. Wake up.” Every instinct screamed denial as he shook her, lightly at first, and then with growing urgency. “Joey!”
She was silent. He knew she was slipping away, torn from him by that deadly rival who lured her with promises of peace and rest. His breath caught, and a sound escaped him that penetrated his fear. A sound that had never passed beyond the place deep in his heart, buried and savagely guarded, since childhood. When he felt the moisture gathering in his eyes spill over and the first drop fell, to tremble like a living crystal on Joey’s cheek, something within him broke.
“Joey.” He forced the words out past the raw pain that made them crack and waver. “Joelle, don’t leave me.” He tasted the strangeness of his own tears on her face as he kissed and caressed her. Her skin was cold and lifeless, the pulse in her throat so distant that he could feel her retreating with every beat.
With sudden fury the desperate helplessness that paralyzed Luke shattered and reformed within his heart, his muscles tensed with the need to change, but he did not submit to it. Instead, he drew on the spirit of the wolf within, drew on the determination to survive. The weakness left him, and the cold rage that was neither entirely wolf nor man locked it out.
His voice was a deep growl as he gripped her face between his palms.
“Wake up, Joey. Now. I won’t let you go.”
He thought he heard the slightest change in the shallow cadence of her breathing, and it fed the savage determination.
“I won’t let you leave me, Joey. You’re mine.” The words grated in his throat like ground glass.
“Understand this, Joelle, as long as we live, we are bound. And I’ll do anything to keep you. Anything. Even if it means following you.”
She trembled It was almost imperceptible, almost something he could have dismissed as imagination. But the bond between them was too strong, his need too great. He slapped her, no more than a love tap, it shocked him to use even that much force against her, but he did it again. And then again, as he spoke.
“Do you want that, Joelle? Because I’ll come after you wherever you are. If you don’t fight now and come back to me, we’ll lose everything. Both of us. It’s your choice, Joey. Your choice. ” His last words were little more than a hoarse whisper—but they were enough.
This time the movement was unmistakable, her lips parted, her blue-veined lids fluttered so that dark lashes danced against the deep hollows beneath her eyes. She gasped in pain that he felt as if it were his own, so closely were they bound at that moment, he lifted her up and held her gently to his chest and rested his mouth on hers as if to breathe all the power of his double life into her.
Her body convulsed, and her eyes opened to fix unerringly on him. “Luke?” The sound was faint but gloriously lucid, Luke held primitive exultation in check as he warmed her with the heat of his body. “I did something stupid again, didn’t I? I’m sorry.”
Luke almost laughed, so great was his relief, but he nuzzled her ear and cheek to hide the emotions that warred inside him. “Joey. Joey.”
No other words would come. He felt her lift her hand, stroke his hair lightly, her breath caught again in unmistakable distress.