But her fierce concern made him feel good. For the first time in years, a woman had his back.
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Thankful y, he turned his face into her neck and slipped into the dark.
*
*
*
“Behind me,” he ordered, his mouth dry, his voice strained. “They attack from behind.”
The girl stumbled to obey, fil ing her hands with stones from the path.
He admired her courage. But it was his duty to protect her.
His responsibility.
He turned to face the wolf—
Testing.
Tightening his grip on his knife, he braced to take its charge.
It sprang. The world exploded in a blur of heat, claws, teeth, eyes. He staggered, thrusting, thrusting, felt the blade sink in and the sickening
Pain ripped his arm. His vision blurred.
A hoarse cry. His? Hers? A flash. The air stank of scorched meat and burning hair and blood.
He struggled to tug his knife free, fought to breathe. He couldn’t move. Buggering hel , he couldn’t move his arm.
He groaned.
“It’s al right,” she said.
He struggled to warn her, but his cry was an incoherent croak.
“Ssh,” she soothed. Her hair fel thick and pale as straw around her quiet face. “It’s just a dream.”
Justin opened his eyes to find Lara bending over him.
Shock momentarily robbed him of speech. His head 3 0
V i r g i n i a K a n t r a
throbbed. His arm tingled with the pain of returning circulation.
He blinked at her, disoriented. “Not blond.”
Her lips curved. “Only in your dreams. Disappointed?”
“No.” He struggled to lift his arm, to touch the ends of her hair. “Pretty.”
“Thanks. How are you feeling?”
“No hospital,” he mumbled. Hospitals meant bureaucracy and forms and questions. The last thing he needed was Homeland Security inspecting his passport, demanding a copy of his birth certificate.
“Shh. We’re not going to the hospital. Try to get some rest, okay?”
He sighed and obeyed, weary and relieved.
But a question niggled at the back of his brain and pursued him down into the dark.
Who was the woman in his dream?
3
Th e h i g h be a m o f t h e i r h e a d l i g h t s s c r a pe d the drive, throwing into sharp relief the marble eagles at the gate and the precepts of the Rule inscribed in stone: scire, servare, obtemperare. “To know, to save, to obey.”
rockhaven school, announced a discreet sign to the left of the entrance. est. 1749.
Lara’s heartbeat quickened.
The tires whispered to a stop in a pool of floodlight within range of the cameras: one mounted on the gate, two artful y hidden in the landscaping. The governors didn’t let respect for tradition interfere with the need for security.
Lara rol ed down her window, careful not to disturb Justin’s head on her lap.
A red light blinked. The mechanized iron gate swung silently open. Gideon drove through.
She let out a breath she hadn’t been aware of holding and settled back in her seat. Almost there. Almost home.
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The first time she’d approached Rockhaven in the back of a car, she’d been a victim, a child, sick, sweaty, and scared half to death, with almost no memory of who she was or where she came from.
Her kind might live as humans, but they were not born as human infants. That status was reserved for the Most High.
Created as children of the air, the nephilim were sentenced to earth for overstepping the role dictated by Heaven. For intervening, always with the best of intentions, in human affairs. For violating humans’ free wil . The
