That's when the bank exploded.
33
Jack
From five miles away, I felt the blast's percussivethud. I yanked my steering wheel to the left, made the U-turn on two wheels, and sped into town, praying out loud and making promises to God.
"I will go to church with Tess, if that's not her. Please don't let it be Tess. Please. I'll eat vegetables. I'll give more money away. I'll doanything, anything at all, just don't let it be Tess."
When I slammed on the brakes half a block down from what remained of the bank, the closest I could get, I was out of the truck and running toward the smoke and rubble so fast I nearly tripped and fell flat on my face.
"Please let there have been nobody in there, please, please, please," I kept mumbling, but I heard the ambulance sirens screaming as one or more of them approached, and my heart felt like somebody had stabbed me with a dull spear.
"Tess!" I roared, and even over the cacophony of noise at the scene of the explosion, several people turned to look at me. I saw Susan kneeling on the grass of the town square thirty feet from me, at the edge of where the rubble started. She looked up at the sound of my yell, her face streaked with dirt and her hair wild.
But she was smiling.
"Jack!" She waved me over and said something else, but I couldn't hear her over the noise. I ran toward her and leapt up and over a group of people clustered together, because I didn't have time to worry about hiding the abilities I had even in human form, and hit the ground still running.
When I reached her, I skidded to a stop because Tess was lying on the ground, eyes closed, her face dead white beneath the grit and dirt from the explosion. I fell to my knees and started to pull her up into my arms, but Susan put a hand out to stop me.
"Be careful, in case she has a spine injury," she said firmly, and I realized I'd been pushing her away without even realizing it.
I nodded, swallowing hard, and then shouted for help.
"The ambulance is almost here," the sheriff told me. "Look, there it is now."
She stood up and waved it over, and people made way for it to reach us. The medics—a balding white man and a younger Asian woman—jumped out and rushed over to Tess, and I stood back to let them work, my heart in my throat.
What could they do, though? Tess needed a healer. I should …
I should …
I didn'tknowwhat I should do. What Iwantedto do was roar out my rage to the sky, but that would help nobody, as I'd learned the hard way during the war.
Instead, I took a small step back to give the medics more room and finally took a moment to study the destruction.
"Bomb?"
Susan, who'd moved to stand next to me, nodded. "Has to be. Or some magic more powerful than any I've seen before. Maybe like a Fae queen might wield? Any chance this Viviette is giving us a warning shot?"
I thought about it but reluctantly shook my head, watching the medics with Tess. "I don't think so. She has to adhere to the terms of a Bargain, and giving us 'until dusk in five days' had the sound of one. But who else would do such a thing? Was anybody else hurt?"
"No, luckily. The manager was just driving up. Evidently, Tess got here early and tried the door—Mr. Peterson saw her—and that's when the bank blew up. You may want to thank your friend, though. He probably saved her life, and he's banged up, too."
I looked in the direction she indicated and saw Logan, bent over with his hands on his thighs, his entire body shuddering with the force of his cough.
"He flew up as an eagle, grabbed her in his claws, and yanked her away from the bankas it exploded!It would have been much worse if he hadn't been there."
I didn't like where my mind was going. "He justhappenedto be there?"
"Jack. If he hadn't, we might have lost her."
I took a step toward Logan, determined to beat the truth out of him if I had to, but just then Tess sat up and coughed. I crouched down next to her and took her hand in mine.
"Tess? Are you okay, sweetheart? We need to get you to the hospital. Or to a healer. Or to Atlantis. Now!"
The EMTs looked at me like I was crazy. "She doesn't need to go to another continent, sir. She's going to be just fine. Only a few scrapes and bruises, and she inhaled some smoke and dust. We'll fix her right up in the ambulance."
