“Get out,” Eli barked. “Now.”
“I’m not bailing on you,” Maddox said.
“I’ve got a minute forty-five left,” Eli said. “I’ll get Sylvie out on my own. You go. We don’t have time for anything else.”
“I don’t like this,” Maddox said, the hesitation in his voice crystal clear.
“Doesn’t matter,” Eli said. “You know what you have to do. Get the fuck out of here. We’ll either be out in a minute seventeen, or you’ll have to make some calls.”
“Fuck, fuck.” Maddox’s voice retreated. “You’ve got this,” he called to Eli. “See you up top in a few.”
“Eli, go with him. I don’t want you to die with me.”
“You’re not dying, Sylvie. And I’m not leaving you.”
My chest beeped again. Did that mean there was a minute left, or thirty seconds left?
“Eli, I love you.” I heard my voice, watery with tears.My cheeks were wet with them as I begged. “Please, Eli, you have to go. Don’t do this. You have to go.”
“I’m not going.” And then: “Got it.”
There was a click. One last beep, and then the straps were gone, and I slouched forward. He slid an arm around my back, another under my knees, and stood, bolting for the stairs.
“Hang on, baby,” he said as he ran.
My shoulder slammed into the doorframe, but we kept moving, his leaps up the stairs like flying.
Then the building shook, and a wave of pressure hit us, knocking Eli to his knees. I came down hard on the concrete steps, the back of my head striking the edge in a painful bounce. The other bomb.
The treads of the stairs dug into my back, Eli’s length spread over mine, his weight pinning me.
The air went acrid and hot.
I had a second to hope Maddox had gotten clear. Another to wish we were out along with him.
My lungs burned, the building creaked, and with a rumble, the light I could sense around us was snuffed out, and Eli groaned in pain.
Chapter Twenty-Six
SYLVIE
My head throbbed and my eyes stung. Every time I drew in a breath, my throat burned, and I had to fight off a racking cough. But I was alive and so was Eli, so that was something. I blinked into the darkness and turned my head on the pillow, the soft cotton sateen of the sheets in my safe house bedroom cool against my face. My bedroom, not Eli’s.
Through the dark, I caught a glimpse of a female body in the chair across the room. Miranda or Wren. They hadn’t left my side since I’d been discharged from the hospital against the doctor’s recommendations. We’d only been there for twenty-four hours, the longest the doctor could convince Eli that we should stay under observation.
I didn’t remember much after the explosion. Getting knocked out did that. I had flashes of the ambulance—the paramedics talking over me, checking my vitals—then more of that at the ER. The CT scan. Someone coming in over and over to ask my name and if I knew where I was. I knew the answers to all of their questions, so I assumed my head injury couldn’t have been that bad, aside from the pain.Except that I couldn’t seem to stay awake for longer than a few minutes at a time. And whenever I tried to force myself to think, everything just got fuzzy. The doctor told me that was to be expected and would get better soon, and that I would be back to normal before I knew it. I was still waiting.
I hadn’t seen Eli since…well, really since before the explosion. I’d been blindfolded when he’d taken care of the first bomb and shielded me from the second. I’d heard him promising he wouldn’t let anything happen to me. And he hadn’t. And then I’d heard him in the hall outside my room at the hospital, arguing with the doctor or the nurses. With whoever was standing between him and getting us discharged.
They told me the bomber had gotten away. Maddox was okay, and he went after him, but didn’t catch him. The bomber was still out there somewhere, and I was still an unchecked to-do on his list. Eli didn’t like the security at the hospital. The second the doctor determined my brain wasn’t bleeding or broken and my lungs were working—despite the smoke we’d both inhaled—Eli had thrown himself full throttle at getting us both discharged.
I was back at the safe house with strict orders to stay in bed for a few days, and Miranda and Wren were here to make sure I was safe. While Eli was out…I didn’t know where.
My eyelids weighed a million pounds. I let them fall. I must have drifted off again, the pain in my head and the fuzziness taking me down in the dark. Later, I rose through the fog to see that the bedside light was turned on. Miranda leaned over me, her dark red hair in two tight French braids, her gray eyes concerned as she scanned me.
“Still a little pale. How’s the head?” She nudged mycheek to the side so she could check the bandage at my temple. “Still have a headache?”
“Yeah,” I managed to say. It was difficult to get the words out through the pounding in my skull.
