“We can reverse whatever was done to her.” Garrett didn’t know how, but he had the best doctors in the world at his disposal, and if they couldn’t do it, he’d find other doctors. In fact, he’d hunt down who hurt her in the first place and force them to tell him how to heal her. “I’m not letting her go.”
“I wouldn’t expect you to let her go,” Logan allowed. “Quick question. Say you fix her. Say her enhancements come back, and she’s full-on healthy and available and is no longer triggered to take off your head. For years, you’ve had an image of your mate in your head. Is it Dessie?”
The fact that Logan just sounded curious and not judgmental kept him from being punched in the face.
“Oh, it’s Dessie.” His marking pounded on his palm. He’d never felt as drawn to a female as he’d been with Dessie, and she matched the mate he’d dreamed of in every aspect, including trying to cut off his head.
“G? There’s a chance you’ll have to watch her grow old and die. That sounds like true hell to me.”
“Yeah.” Garrett looked over his shoulder at the sleeping woman. Her pink lips were slightly parted, and her hair was a curly mess across the blanket. Next to Sam, she looked small and fragile, and every possessive instinct in Garrett’s body rose to the surface. The beast at his core, the one he tried so hard to control, snapped his chain and waited. On alert and ready to fight. “She’s mine, Logan. No matter what.” It was a vow, and he meant it to his soul.
So be it.
* * * *
After a dream-filled night that fortunately didn’t feature any hell worlds, Dessie spent the day being poked, prodded, and scanned. The Queen of the Realm was a menace with a needle, and the only thing that cheered Dessie up was the fact that Emma took plenty of Garrett’s blood as well.
After a nice lunch of tacos, she sat on an examination table, while he frowned from a seat next to the table. “Why are you taking more blood?” he asked, his voice rumbling with an obvious effort to refrain from snapping at his aunt.
The queen, her intelligent eyes sparkling, withdrew the needle. “Stop being a baby.” She slapped a bandage on him.
He winced and pressed his other hand over the bandage. “Geez. Fine. Again, why my blood, Em?”
The queen strode on white tennis shoes over to a marble counter and started organizing vials. “You’ve slept together, briefly transferred the mating mark, and I want to see if there’s any change in your blood. Plus, since Dessie seems to be enhanced, the fact that I can’t find proof of that in her blood is driving me nuts. Maybe there’s a reaction in yours.” She looked over her shoulder at him. “I’m also studying what I can of the Seven, since you altered your very biology with that ritual.”
Garrett’s frown shortened Dessie’s breath. “Em. I didn’t agree to that.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Emma said cheerfully. “Your blood is your blood. If I’m examining it, I can’t just take out the anomalies, can I?”
Dessie shifted on the plush white table, her legs hanging over the end. She’d borrowed a pair of Janie’s jeans along with a white sweater, and she loved the black boots that had been included. Her face heated. “Does everyone know we were intimate?”
Emma grinned and turned back to her whirring machines. “Well, you were both naked when you tried to kill him.”
Oh. That was right. “I see,” Dessie murmured.
A lab tech entered and handed Emma several printouts before hurrying away, his long black hair in a cool-looking braid.
“These are your latest brain scans.” Emma flipped through the papers and then stilled.
“What?” Garrett asked.
Emma read further and then looked at Dessie, her brow furrowed and her eyes soft. “The tumor is expanding quickly now.” She read some more. “It contracted a day ago but now is increasing in mass and spreading its tendrils at five times the speed of what your earlier tests showed.” Shaking her head, she walked to the counter again. “That doesn’t make sense. When she attacked Garrett and Logan, the tumor shrank. But now it seems to have been activated somehow.” She turned and paced to the door and back, her gaze unfocused.
Did the queen even remember anyone else was in the room? Dessie pressed a hand to her temple as if she could slow down the tumor. Why was it growing faster? Did that mean she had days instead of weeks left? She looked for help, seeking Garrett’s gaze.
His eyes were a silvery blue with a deep blue rim around the iris. Was there no end to the colors of his eyes? “Emma?” he asked.
Emma stopped in midstride and looked at them both. “All right. I’m thinking some sort of chemical is released when Destiny sees the Seven marking, and that chemical both urges her to kill and somehow shrinks the tumor. But now that the chemical has receded, the tumor has taken over.”
Dessie opened her mouth and shut it. There was nothing to say.
Garrett stood, his body covering the entire doorway. “So we have her attack me again.”
Emma grimaced. “We may have to do that, but I don’t like it. It isn’t good for Dessie’s brain to be triggered and then sedated.” She tapped her finger on her lip. “We’d need a controlled environment, and I’d like for her to be under a scanner at the time, if possible. I’ll need to do blood work during and after, so you’ll have to be restrained, Dessie.” Her lips turned down. “I’m so sorry about this. It’s your choice, of course.”
Dessie felt like throwing up. “I want to fight this tumor.” She stretched her ankles. “I also need to fight this marking on my neck and figure out how to stop Ulric from pulling me into his world.”
“Hope is meeting with you after dinner tonight,” Emma said. “She’s fought Ulric before, and between the two of you, I think we can come up with a plan.” She paused and turned to face Garrett. “Although, if I know my nephew, there’s already a plan coming together. Garrett?”
