Well into the tree line, he dragged her from his shoulder and pushed her into the waterlogged ground, following her down, pinning her there with his much heavier body. Almost at once the ground shook and the force of the explosion rocked the entire island.

CHAPTER THREE

Dahlia lay trapped beneath the large stranger, water soaking her clothes, her chest tight and burning while the ground trembled with the force of the horrendous explosion. The stranger’s body helped muffle the sound, but she knew her home, her only sanctuary, was gone from her. Overhead birds shrieked in protest and the world was filled with chaos, but deep inside her, she felt absolute stillness. The eye of the hurricane. Dahlia sucked in her breath and began to struggle, pushing at his heavier body. It was like trying to move a large tree trunk.

“You’re in danger, you have to get away from me.” Desperation edged her voice. He was immovable and there was no way to make him understand. She still didn’t understand and she lived with it every day of her life. The energy from the explosion swamped her, filled her, mixed with her grief and her own wild rage. She couldn’t contain it much longer, and anything and everything in close proximity to her was in deadly peril.

“We’re fine,” he said, his voice soothing, calm even.

There was a cadence to his voice that caught at her—touched her. For a brief second the energy seemed to pause, to stop its swirling madness, but then the pressure surged. “We are not fine. Get away from me before I hurt you.” She pushed at the wall of his chest, trying to get him off of her. Already the heat was flowing out of her, washing over both of them, filling the air around them with something unnatural. Something wrong. Dahlia struggled to contain it.

His chest shook, and it took a moment to realize he was amused at her concern. Dahlia hissed at him. “You are an utter idiot. Get off of me right now.” He was laughing. Damn the man, she was desperately trying to save his worthless life and he was laughing at her. She hadn’t wanted to hurt him, but he didn’t deserve her concern. She drove her thumbs hard into the pressure points just above his groin. He sucked in his breath and his hands caught her wrists like a vise.

“I’m not going to hurt you, Dahlia, I’m trying to save your life.” There was no laughter in his voice. None at all. His voice made her shiver. Maybe she’d been mistaken about his amusement. He didn’t look like the kind of man who ever laughed.

“I’m trying to save your life,” she countered in a low tone. She could hear the note of desperation she couldn’t quite stifle. “I can’t explain to you what’s going to happen, but you have to believe me. If you don’t get away from me immediately, you’ll be in terrible danger.”

He had been looking away from her, back toward the collapsed building, his gaze moving constantly, taking in their surroundings, the flight of the birds and bats, everything but her. He looked down at her for the first time, his black eyes meeting hers. Dahlia felt the impact like a blow. Hard. Penetrating. Deep. She couldn’t read anything at all in his expression, but his gaze seemed to burn her as it moved over her face. He eased his body from hers, getting to his feet in one lithe movement, pulling her up with him. “You’re afraid of the energy you create, aren’t you?”

It wasn’t that she created energy, but how to explain the unexplainable? She didn’t create the energy—it found her.

It craved her. Raced to her. Dahlia had never experienced grief or rage at such an unrestrained level. That alone would have been enough of a danger to anyone close to her, but with the violence of death, with the explosion and fire, the energy was far beyond her capabilities to contain it. It was volatile. Unstable. And any moment it would explode in a fiery ball, destroying everything near her.

Dahlia stepped away from him, putting as much distance between them as she could manage while the energy raged and swirled and demanded to be used. The moment she did, the vortex of heat consumed her, burning her from the inside out, robbing her of her ability to speak, to breathe, to even function. The raw heat shimmered in the air, crackling with electricity. She wanted to cry out to him to run, to save himself. She couldn’t bear to be responsible for another death, but he just stood there looking down at her with his ice-cold eyes.

He deliberately stepped close to her, so close their skin nearly touched. “Look at me, Dahlia. Don’t be afraid of what will happen to me. Just keep looking at me.” His tone hadn’t changed. It was still as calm and as tranquil as a pool of water.

The moment he closed the distance between them, the temperature went down. The energy ceased roiling. Her lungs worked properly. She found herself staring into the black depths of his eyes. Cold eyes—cooling her skin, cooling the energy. Dahlia sucked in her breath. “Who are you?”

“Nicolas Trevane. I’m a GhostWalker, the same as you are.”

She wanted to step away from him, but she didn’t dare. He was trapping the energy, or more precisely, he was cooling the raging aftereffects of violence. She’d never been able to do it, no matter how hard she tried. She could channel it, aim it, and send it, but she couldn’t defuse it. His words caught at her, she wanted, no needed, to know more. “I’ve never heard of a GhostWalker.”

“I know you haven’t. Keep looking at me. Breathe with me. Find your center. Think of it as a pool of water. Don’t try to control it; let the water take the brunt of the energy. The waves can rage and reach higher and higher, but the walls will contain it for you. Visualize it, Dahlia.”

“How do you know me?”

“Just do this for me and then we’ll talk. They’ll come back. They know you’re here and they’re not going to go away without making a try for you. They’re pros, and they’ve got weapons that can reach us from a long distance. We need to move fast and that means you have to get rid of the energy so you’re not so sick.”

Sick wasn’t the word she would have used. The overflow of violence incapacitated her. It was only his presence that prevented a seizure and unconsciousness. She knew her body, knew the load it could take, and she was far, far over the limit.

Nicolas took her hand. She immediately felt panic-stricken and yanked it away, rubbing her tingling palm along her jeans. “Don’t touch me. People never touch me.”

“They don’t touch me either. I’m sorry, I should have warned you what I was doing.” His tone was very patient and made her feel like a desperate child. “I want you to feel the beat of my heart. We have to slow yours down. I know you have no real reason to trust me, Dahlia, but if we don’t get this under control, we’re going to have to fight our way out of here and we’re outgunned and outmanned.”

Looking down at her, into her enormous black eyes, Nicolas felt like he was falling forward into a labyrinth, a trap, somewhere deep and beautiful he’d never managed to travel in all of his wanderings. Dahlia was a surprise, and few things surprised him. There was immense power in her small body. He could feel it swirling around the two of them, feel it inside of her. Dahlia Le Blanc was all about energy.

He reached for her hand again, this time slowly, gently, letting her get used to the idea. His fingers slid over hers, almost in a caress. Her gaze locked with his. Her body reacted, shuddering, wincing. He kept eye contact, not letting her look away as he brought her palm over his heart. “We’re all part of the universe. Each of us shares energy. Slow your heart rate down. Think about it, concentrate on it.”

Dahlia swallowed hard and blinked up at him, all too aware of his muscles beneath his shirt. Aware of his heart, slow and steady. Aware of the heat of his skin. Heat was everywhere, surrounding them. Welling up inside of her like a deadly volcano. But she was also puzzled by the way he was keeping the violent energy at bay. “I’ve tried meditation, it doesn’t work for me. The energy consumes me. It gathers like a force inside of me. I attract it the way a magnet attracts things. And then I can’t contain it and people get hurt.”

“You can harness the energy though, can’t you?” Nicolas kept his voice very calm. They were running out of time. She had to get back in control so they could move fast. At least she was listening to him. It was most likely the shock and grief and the sheer surprise of finding someone who could contain the energy for her.

“Not when it’s like this. There’s too much energy, and it’s too powerful. It finds me—I don’t make it happen. It comes from an outside source. Actions. Emotions. Who even cares? I’ve studied meditation, Eastern philosophy. It can’t be controlled. It has to dissipate some way.” Why was she listening to him? Letting him touch her? She felt almost mesmerized by him. All the while the energy churned and boiled and waited, lurking like some terrible monster looking for a victim.

There was a strange push and pull effect on her with Nicolas Trevane. She never stayed long in anyone’s company, and already she needed her space. She was sick and dizzy and overwhelmed with grief and fearful of his safety. Yet he held the energy at bay. She recognized power in him. It was far subtler than her raw strength, but it was enormous for all its subtlety. And she couldn’t look away from the intensity of his gaze, no matter how hard she tried, or how much she wanted to.

“If you have to find a way to disperse the energy, Dahlia, we’ll do it together. Energy, even violent energy, can be directed.” Nicolas could see the signs of overload.

Grief was living and breathing in her. Taking her well past the point of thinking rationally for herself.

“Can you do that?” She didn’t altogether trust him. She didn’t trust anyone. Not Jesse, not even Milly and Bernadette, but that hadn’t stopped her from loving them. She felt lost and alone and had no idea what to do, but there was something solid about Trevane. Perhaps his calm. Or the power he so obviously was comfortable wielding.

“We can do it. Follow my lead.” Nicolas kept all anxiety from his voice. His skin was prickling, a sure sign of trouble. The hit team was probably dropping men back into the swamp and coming at them from all directions. There would be more violence and more death before he managed to get her away safely.

Dahlia did as he said simply because she couldn’t think of anything else to do. She concentrated on his breathing. Listened to the sound of his voice, the deep timbre, velvet soft and captivating, almost hypnotic. He built the picture of a deep, clear pool in her mind. The waves raged, wild and out of control, reaching endlessly to escape, but he kept building the walls of the pool higher and higher.

Dahlia felt better, less sick, but she knew he was fighting a losing battle. The energy was alive and looking for a target. Trevane was definitely holding the energy within the walls of the pool, but it was growing in strength, continually seeking a way to harm someone.

“No it isn’t. The energy isn’t alive, Dahlia. It may have the aftermath of violence within it, but it doesn’t have personality. It needs an escape, like water boiling in a kettle. We just have to provide it.”

“You’re reading my thoughts?” The idea was terrifying. She didn’t have the kind of thoughts fit for public reading.

“I’ll explain later.” Now the hair on the back of his neck was standing up. “We’re in trouble, Dahlia. We’re being hunted. If you want to live, you’re going to have to trust me to get us out of this.”

Her gaze moved over his face, assessing him. Assessing her choices. Slowly. A long inspection. “You’re a killer.”

She made the judgment just like that. Harsh, without any softening.

Nicolas refused to wince. Refused to look away. He met her steady gaze with one of his own. The ice was there. The distance between him and the rest of the world. He damn well wasn’t going to apologize for what he did. “Yes.” If she wanted to name him a killer, he would accept it. Let her deal with what he was if she wanted to live.