Chapter Two
“Don’t stay too close to him when he wakes up, love. He may be feral.”
Brant was battling to open his eyes. His body didn’t feel right, and his lynx felt like it was still sleeping, or more correctly, still unconscious. Worst of all, his brain was slow to function as he tried to remember what had happened. However, the male voice he’d just heard was familiar... even if he couldn’t quite place it yet. It was familiar, but it wasn’t the one he wanted to hear. Kat. The name exploded in his throbbing skull, all that had happened coming back to him like a punch in the sternum. Roaring, his body seized, desperately searching for her when he realized he wasn’t in the bakery anymore. He was in bed, in a room. In Sanctuary. And Ian was just a few feet from him, standing in front of Sera, protecting her with his body.
A wise move as a shifter who had been unconscious could be a real danger for the people around them, especially if there was blood loss involved. Slowly remembering the details, his arms went to his chest where the bullets had hit and only saw bandages.
“Kat...” Still not completely himself, it was the only word he could utter. All three people in the room relaxed a little when it was clear he wasn’t going to shift and attack them in the next minute.
“I think he’s all right, Ian. Let me check him out.”
Brant now recognized Sera’s soft voice. Ian’s mate was more than a simple witch, but it was magic that interested her and was her real passion, and she poured over old books continuously. Ian had told him once that it was a real challenge to get her out of her study and that at some point, he feared that with all the reading she did, her eyes might start bleeding.
Immediately, Brant remembered Kat’s face, with trails of blood streaming down her cheeks as she looked at him. Where was she? Panic rose inside him at the thought of her at the hands of the three men. He tried to rise, but his body wouldn’t cooperate.
“Brant, lie down! You are far from well... you almost died, my friend.” Ian’s hands were gentle but unyielding as he pushed him back on the bed.
“I can’t. I need... Kat. Where is Kat?”
Sera looked at Ian who shrugged. “Hunter was the one who found you. Someone had called, saying they heard gunshots. You were lucky he was the one that took the call... seeing a man still alive with three shots in his body would have created questions that couldn’t be answered.”
Brant vaguely remembered the human man, a cop at Easthallows, who knew all about them and Sanctuary since he’d helped save Sera not so long ago.
Sera came to sit on the other side of the bed. “Hunter brought you straight here. We feared for your life.”
“How long have I been out?”
“Twenty-four hours.”
Panic seized him. Brant couldn’t stay here, wounded or not. Gripping Ian’s arm, he looked into his friend’s eyes. “I need to go, they took her, they kidnapped her.”
It was too late now for secrets. Brant was ready to live with the consequences, even if it meant never seeing her again, as long as he got her back, safe and sound.
Ian lessened his hold to take his hand. There were questions in his golden eyes, but he didn’t ask them. Instead, he nodded. “Okay, calm down. I’ll help. Tell me what happened.”
Brant exhaled, reassured that he at least had Ian on his side for this. He started retelling the feeling he’d had earlier in the night and how it may have been related to Kat. How he’d run to the bakery to see her being captured by three men and how one of them shot him. He didn’t say much about his relationship with Kat, but it must have colored his story, the tone of his voice, as Sera took his free hand and squeezed hard. Ian listened intently to every word, Sera by his side, never breaking contact with him.
When he was done, everyone stayed silent for a moment.
It was Sera who spoke first. “You say that Kat is a telepath? You’re sure about that?”
Brant nodded and saw Ian glance at the witch, and it didn’t bode well. “What?” This time, when he sat up, Ian didn’t keep him down.
Sera sighed. “It’s not possible to just be a telepath.”
Brant blinked. “Are you bullshitting me? I’ve seen her skills firsthand, she can read minds.”
Sera rounded her mate to sit down on the other side of him. “Calm down, Brant. We believe you. We will help you, but Kat seems to be more than a simple baker and that may give us a clue as to what happened.”
Ian stepped back. “Asher went with Hunter, so they could make sure there was nothing that would indicate you had been there. He will get their smell and Valeria will be able to detect any potential magic that remains before erasing it. Have you seen those guys before?”
Brant shook his head and forced his body to move. Ian released him, and he almost regretted it, as his body screamed from changing position, but he kept moving.
His clothes were nowhere to be seen, and probably ruined by blood. When he was steady enough, he recognized the room as one on the ground floor. He had a room in the Sentinel quarters, but the thought of walking all the way there was almost too much for his wounded body.
Someone cursed behind him, but he didn’t care. His hand was on the doorknob when he felt a familiar surge engulfing his body. Sera.
The sensation wasn’t comfortable at first, as if his injuries were pulling and expanding, but it soon calmed down. In a matter of minutes, the worst of the pain was gone and when he pulled at his bandages, he could see that even though the skin was an angry red where the bullets had hit him, the blood had stopped oozing. With any luck, and his shifter’s constitution, within twenty-four hours there wouldn’t be any sign of the attack. But Kat didn’t have twenty-four hours. It may be too late already. The unimaginable thought sending shivers down his spine. It was a possibility he didn’t want to consider at all. As he was examining his fading injuries, clothing materialized over his body. Another trick from the witch.
