Total pages in book: 165
Estimated words: 159487 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 797(@200wpm)___ 638(@250wpm)___ 532(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 159487 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 797(@200wpm)___ 638(@250wpm)___ 532(@300wpm)
Ravik lunged but Sev was moving too, abandoning the panel long enough to fire his plasma pistol. The shot hit the creature in the shoulder, spinning it sideways, and Ravik finished it with a downward strike that split its skull. The body slid off the platform and vanished into the writhing mass below.
For half a second, Ravik and Sev stood shoulder to shoulder, breathing hard—just like old times.
The thought hit Ravik before he could stop it and he saw Sev glance at him, his blue eyes sharp and pale without the broken oculars. There was blood on his mouth and a bruise darkening along his jaw. Ravik knew he had put both of them there. Something like regret twisted in his chest, but he shoved it away.
“Back to work,” he growled.
Sev’s expression hardened.
“I was working. I only stopped to save our lady.”
He turned back to the panel but his words rang in Ravik’s mind—our lady. As thought Cassie belonged to both of them—as if she belonged between them.
“Fuck you,” he said to Sev, shooting the Blood Kindred a hard glare.
Sev didn’t answer with words but his shoulders bunched and he gave Ravik a one finger salute, which he’d doubtless learned from the humans.
Cassie looked between them, her lips pressed tight.
“I swear to God, if we survive this, I’m locking both of you in a room and making you talk like adults.”
“Bad idea,” Ravik said, cutting down another Infected as it reached the platform. “We might kill each other.”
“No, you won’t,” she snapped. “You’ll be too busy remembering that you’re best friends and you’ve saved each others’ lives multiple times.”
Her words hit too close to home. Ravik snarled in response and kicked another creature off the ladder.
Below them, the herd surged harder—scaly, rotting bodies piling against the tower base. The metal structure groaned with the weight being put on it. Sev’s hands moved fast over the relay, reconnecting cables, stripping wires, and swearing under his breath in the native Kindred tongue.
“Sev,” Ravik warned as the platform shuddered again. “I can’t fucking hold them off forever.”
“I’m almost there.” The Blood Kindred’s voice was tight.
“You said three minutes,” Ravik reminded him.
“It has been less than two,” Sev snapped.
“Feels longer,” Ravik said.
“It always does when one is waiting to die.”
The coldness in his voice sent an icy finger down Ravik’s spine.
Behind him, Cassie made a strangled noise.
“That’s not helpful, Severin,” she said. “So not helpful.”
Ravik almost smiled despite himself. One thing he loved about the little human was the way she handled herself—she had a smart mouth on her that wouldn’t quit, no matter the circumstances.
Then the tower shook so hard that Cassie stumbled. Ravik grabbed her with one arm and hauled her against his side while still holding the shock blade in the other hand. Her body pressed to his—soft and warm and alive—and her scent went through him like a drug.
Need. Fear. Honey. Cassie.
Mine, a voice inside him snarled.
But then Sev’s scent—which was still on her skin—reached his nose. Sharp and altered and golden, it was braided with the warm scent of Cassie’s skin and hair and Ravik’s own scent too.
All three of their scents, all mixed up together. All wrong.
But then why did it feel so right?
No.
Ravik shoved the thought away so hard it made his brain ache. They were going to die here if he couldn’t fucking get his head in the game!
“Signal is active,” Sev said suddenly.
Cassie sucked in a breath.
“Does that mean the Mother Ship can hear us?” she asked hopefully.
“It means the tower is broadcasting our beacon,” Sev said. “Whether the Mother Ship receives it depends on atmospheric interference, distance, and whether my earlier long pulse reached—”
“Sev,” Ravik barked.
His friend glanced up.
“Maybe. Maybe they can hear us.”
“That’s all you had to say,” Cassie pointed out.
And then another Infected reached the far side of the platform. Then another, and another. And a fucking-nother.
Ravik pushed Cassie toward Severin.
“Behind him,” he ordered.
“Ravik—”
“Now.”
This time she listened.
Good.
Ravik stepped to the center of the platform, shock blade raised, while the tower swayed under the weight of the creatures climbing below. He could hear more of them coming up the struts, hear their claws scraping metal from all directions. There were too many, even for him. Even with Sev’s pistol and Cassie’s baton and the Goddess herself watching, there were too fucking many.
But the signal was broadcasting—that was something, at least.
He glanced once at Sev and saw the same knowledge in his eyes—they might not make it. After all the narrow escapes they’d had together, this might be the last one—their final conflict.
The one they didn’t survive.
Sev lifted his pistol and came to stand beside him anyway, the two of them shielding Cassie, who was at their back.
Ravik wanted to tell him to get away. Wanted to tell him he was still furious, still disgusted, still not ready to think about the bite or the memories or the way their shafts had felt pressed together in Cassie’s mouth.