Angel Fever

twisted the key in the ignition and slammed down on the accelerator.

“Hold on,” she said. “Alex, just hold on.”

At first he thought she meant hold on because she was driving fast; then he felt the wetness on his fingers and realized that blood had soaked through the T-shirt and was coursing down his arm, warming his skin. “I’m fine,” he murmured, closing his eyes. Weirdly enough, it seemed true. He felt warm, drifting.

Sometime later, the truck’s lulling motion turned to a harsh lurching. Alex opened his eyes reluctantly; the headlights showed another dirt road. Willow jerked them to a stop. Turning on the cab light, she lunged into the back of the truck and pulled out the first-aid kit.

She rooted frantically through it. “What do we have, what do we have…?” Alex watched her, still feeling oddly disconnected. There was blood from his arm on her hands.

He smiled. “You should just use what you’re wearing,” he murmured.

Though she didn’t answer, he could tell she knew what he was talking about: the time she’d been shot herself, and he’d taken off his T-shirt to bind her wound.

Relief sagged her shoulders as she pulled out a large square packet. “This says it’s for binding wounds.” She straddled him on the passenger’s seat.

Alex tried to grin. “Hey, this is getting better and better.”

Willow was close to tears. “Shut up, please just shut up! Oh god, it went right through your arm…” She stretched away to fumble in the first-aid kit again and came back with a brown plastic bottle. “Okay, this is going to hurt.”

She eased off his T-shirt bandage and poured liquid over his arm. He gave a yelp as fire sizzled through him. The clarity was immediate, throbbing with pain. “What the hell is that?”

“Hydrogen peroxide,” said Willow. She doused his wound again; Alex clenched his jaw hard. The pain was like someone gouging knives in his raw skin.

“You just poured peroxide on my arm?” he said when he could speak again. Twisting his head, he saw the liquid bubbling and frothing. “Jesus – I thought you loved me.”

“It’s all I could find,” she said shortly as she tore open the white packet. “And it’s better than getting your arm infected.”

He wasn’t sure about that but didn’t argue. Willow wrapped the bandage around his arm; it was some kind of high-tech netting that stopped the bleeding in its tracks. Then she carefully strapped the whole thing in place with surgical gauze.

“I think that’ll hold,” she said at last. “At least it’s stopped the bleeding.”

Alex reached for her hand, squeezing it. “It’s fine. Thank you.”

“The only painkiller I saw was Tylenol,” said Willow after a pause, her voice stilted. “Do you want a couple?”

Alex shook his head, gazing at the delicate angles of her face. “You know, I can never get over how beautiful you are,” he said.

Her eyes were bright with tears again. “Alex, you—” She stopped short. Reaching up, she snapped off the cab’s light, then lay down beside him, circling his waist with her arm.

The sudden dark was a caress. Pain still beating through him, Alex stroked Willow’s hair, feeling it glide softly past his fingers. “I’m sorry,” he said finally. “I had to see for myself.”

“I know,” she said against his chest. “When I woke up, I just knew right away where you’d gone. I didn’t need to be psychic for that.”

Outside the truck, Alex saw pine trees crowding the dirt road: an old logging route, probably. He wondered when the next time might be that someone would come logging here again.

Maybe never.

“Anyway, it’s true,” he said, staring out at the prickly, moonlit branches. “They’re not linked any more.”

Willow’s arm tightened around him. “I know,” she repeated. “But, Alex, you can’t just…” She raised herself up to look at him, and Alex’s heart clenched at her expression, clear in the silvery light.

Letting out a trembling breath, she touched his cheek. “I love you more than life, Alex Kylar. Do you hear me? More than life. You do not go off and put yourself into danger like that without even telling me.”

He hadn’t thought it was possible to feel worse than he already did. “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I just —”

“What if I hadn’t been able to sense where you were?” she interrupted fiercely. “We are a team, okay? Now, more than ever, we are a—”

Abruptly, she gave a sob, and Alex clutched her to him, awkward and one armed. He could feel her shoulders trembling; her effort to keep control. “When I came to and saw you there, all covered in blood…” she choked out. “Alex, I thought I’d lost you.”

“You haven’t lost me,” he whispered into her hair. He rocked her, ignoring the pain that shot through his arm. “I’m here…I’m right here.”

Finally she wiped her eyes with the heel of her hand. Her voice hoarse, she said, “Promise me that you’ll never go off like that again – that if you’re going to be in danger, you’ll tell me. Promise. I have to know.”

“I promise,” Alex said quietly. He couldn’t believe, now, that he’d actually left Willow alone in the truck. He touched her face, gently stroking away a stray tear. He almost felt like crying himself. “Willow – oh Christ, I’m so sorry.”

She nodded, her shoulders relaxing a little. “Okay,” she said at last, squeezing his hand. “Okay.”

They sat silently holding each other. Finally Willow sighed and shifted back to the driver’s side. “I can hardly even believe what this is going to mean for humanity,” she said at last, almost to herself. “It’s too terrible to…

to fathom it, somehow.”

“Yeah, tell me,” said Alex to the ceiling.

Willow glanced at him, her green eyes sorrowful. Then, with a turn of her wrist, the truck burst into life again. Soon they were back on the highway, speeding through the Rockies with the moonlight gleaming down, the road unfurling ahead like a dark ribbon.

Somewhere in the hills around Golden, the soldier had probably been found by now. With luck, his death would be blamed on the bandits who sometimes broke into Edens to steal supplies. Alex closed his eyes as he saw again the dark, still figure.

The guy’s only crime had been to do his job, and Alex had shot him – he was a “killer” in more ways than one now. He wondered whether the soldier had had a wife. Or kids, maybe, who’d have to grow up without their father now.

Neither Alex nor Willow spoke as the miles passed. Alex’s wound pulsed incessantly under its bandage. He was almost glad for the pain.

6

SEB LAY ON HIS BED reading, all too aware that what he was really doing was waiting. Though it was after two a.m., he was still half dressed.

Even without Willow’s hurried call back to the base, he’d known that she was nearly home – he hadn’t been able to stop himself from checking on her compulsively these last few days. His own forebodings were bad enough; sensing Willow’s inner turmoil had kept him taut with worry. He had to see her as soon as she was back – make sure she was all right.

Seb grimaced and tossed the book aside. Dios mio, when would this end? Exactly how long could he stay in love with a girl who thought of him only as a brother?

His gaze fell on a note from Meghan on his bedside table: I still haven’t seen this harem of yours, you faker! Love, M.

With a small smile, Seb picked up the note and turned it over in his hands. He still wasn’t sure just what he