Drake Sisters 05 - Safe Harbor

her arm around Libby and physically pulled her away from her sister. "Tyson's right, Libby, we can't take any chances. She's better—stronger. That's all we can do today."
    "She's going to live, Jonas," Sarah assured him when he would have protested.
    Jonas wanted to snarl at Tyson, throw something at the machines as Libby was helped from the room. Her color was gone and she stumbled, obviously weak. The older Drakes helped Nanci as well, although she didn't look as quite as bad as Libby.
    Hannah didn't move. Other than that one flutter of her lashes, she hadn't improved.
    Elle touched his hand. Kate kissed him. Abbey brushed her fingers over Hannah's and his joined hands. Joley stood beside the bed weeping.
    "How could this happen, Jonas?"
    "I don't know, honey. I honestly don't know."
    "But you'll find out. You'll make certain whoever is responsible will never get near her again, right?"

    "Prakenskii took the knife away from him, and in the struggle, her attacker was killed."
    Joley lifted her tear-streaked face to look at the Russian.
    His face was gray, tired, carved with deep lines. "Thank you again. Did you know him? Recognize him? When you touched him, did you get a sense of why he would attack my sister?"
    "I felt his fear. That only. It poured off of him."
    Jonas frowned. "He fought you. I was watching the broadcast. He fought you and kept trying to go for her."
    Joley made a small sound of distress—of protest.
    "I'm sorry, honey," Jonas said. "This isn't something you need to hear. I'll talk with Prakenskii later. You're both exhausted. I'm going to stay with Hannah. Why don't you regroup?"
    "I'll see you to your hotel," Ilya said, making it a statement. "Do you have your security people with you?"
    She nodded. "You can't wade through the reporters."
    "We'll get you out," he said firmly. "Come, Joley. You need to rest."
    Jonas kissed and hugged her before turning her over with a small bit of reluctance to Ilya Prakenskii. The man had undoubtedly saved Hannah's life, yet Jonas feared his motives. He was the bodyguard of one of the most powerful Russian mobsters and was feared from Europe to the United States.
    "Her signs look better," the nurse said when they were alone, distracting him from his speculative thoughts. It was quiet and there were no flashing colors or feel of power.
    After the impressive display he felt let down.
    He glanced at the nurse in her blue scrubs and name tag, her hair pulled back. She looked neat and efficient. He hoped she was competent, too.
    "What exactly did they do? There's a definite change in her. It doesn't make sense, but she looks as if she could breathe on her own."
    Jonas remained silent as the nurse consulted with the doctor, and over the next few hours, Hannah was allowed to breathe more and more on her own. It was a huge relief when they finally took her off the ventilator, the first sign that she might live.
    Jonas brought Hannah's fingertips to his lips and bent forward until his head lay on the mattress beside her body. He had never been able to stand hospitals, not after his mother had been taken from her room, never to return. The sounds and smells were the same. The machines seemed alive when he closed his eyes and listened, as he had so many years ago. Praying. Praying for a miracle, just as he was doing now.
    He had no feel for the passage of time. Sometimes he whispered to her, other times he slept. The nurse hovered close, watching over Hannah. He kept his head down and allowed himself to doze, drifting off until he was somewhere between sleeping and awake, somewhere his mother stared at him with pain-filled eyes and a man stabbed Hannah viciously with a knife while he stood behind a wall, pounding with his fists, trying to beat it down and get to them.
    Jonas jerked awake, as a different nurse entered the room. He looked around for Hannah's regular nurse. He liked and trusted her.
    The woman glanced at him and then averted her eyes, maybe, he thought, because he looked so damned distraught. He wanted Hannah to show dramatic signs of responding to the healing by the Drakes. Shouldn't she have sat up and demanded dinner or something? Ripped off the bandages and smiled at him? Instead she lay sleeping as if in a coma, her heart and lungs still being monitored.
    He tried to breathe away the tightness in his chest, sending the nurse a false smile. "I thought Katherine was Hannah's night nurse." Was Katherine the right name? The nurse had introduced herself