Psy & Changelings 10 - Kiss of Snow

on the electronic readout above her head.
    Her eyes fluttered open. So deep and intense was the brown of her irises that it was difficult to distinguish pupil from iris even when she focused on Judd’s face. Her lips parted, as if she’d speak, but her throat emitted no sound. Squeezing her hand, he reached over to snag some ice chips off a trolley to wet her throat.
    “Arrow,” she said in a hoarse whisper, but there was no fear in her, only defiance.
    “Former.” Perhaps he should’ve waited, but he had to get the information while she was conscious and lucid. “We need to know if you discovered anything about X-Psy that would help save one about to go critical.”
    Confusion. “X?”
    “Cold fire,” he said. “X-fire. Remember. ”
    Not even a glimmer of recognition and he knew the Ghost had been right. Alice had asked for her own memories to be erased. It had to be the reason why she’d ended up in cryonic suspension rather than assassinated, her abductors needing time to work out how to retrieve the data. However, he refused to give up—she’d been in stasis for so long. There was no knowing how it had affected her mind. “The burning ones,” he said, using every key word he could think of. “Fire. Flame. Synergy.”
    An instant of piercing clarity. “Find the valve.”

Chapter 52
     
    HAWKE FELT EVERYONE in the infirmary sag with relief when the first of the healers from the other sectors arrived. They’d asked to come before the conflict, but SnowDancer couldn’t risk putting all its healers so close to danger. But now, they were needed, and nothing could keep them away.
    It cost him, but he didn’t leave until the healers pronounced that the injured had been stabilized enough that he could take a break. He headed straight for the woman who was the beating heart of him. The tent Drew had rigged over Sienna’s unconscious body was empty, their packmates having left when they sensed his approach.
    It was as if she’d been waiting for him.
    “No.” It was a whisper so quiet, even most changelings wouldn’t have heard it. But Sienna was Hawke’s, had always been his, whether she’d known it or not, whether he’d accepted it or not.
    “Yes,” he murmured, dipping his finger in a bottle of water and rubbing it over her lips. “Yes.”
    A shake of her head, but her lips parted, searching for more. He trickled some into her mouth, making low, deep sounds of encouragement in his throat. “Come on now. Open those pretty eyes for me.”
    “Dark.”
    He didn’t know what she meant by that, but driven by his wolf, he leaned down to nip at her lower lip. “Hawke,” he said. “That’s the word you need to be saying.”
    Lines formed between her eyebrows.
    “Hawke,” he repeated, squeezing her hip. “Hawke.”
    “Hawke.” It was a sleepy murmur as her eyes flickered open. That cardinal gaze displayed a wild burst of unadulterated happiness for one stunning instant before it was wiped away by shocked horror as she scrambled up into a sitting position. “What did you do?” A mental door slammed shut with such force it shot pinpricks of light behind his eyelids.
    Snarling, he gripped her jaw, “Don’t you dare try to block me.” His wolf began to batter at the wall it couldn’t see but could feel, tied as they were by the mating bond, a bond that would never allow that kind of distance.
    The barrier broke in an avalanche of emotion, tangling them up until he could sense her in every part of him. Taking in a shuddering breath, he clasped her head between his hands and said, “Try that again and I’ll paddle you.”
    Her eyes narrowed. “Don’t you talk to me like that.”
    The laugh came from somewhere deep inside him. “Good morning to you, too, sunshine.” Then he kissed her. And kept on kissing her until she bit down hard on his lower lip. “What?” he growled.
    “Air.”
    The gasp gave him the impetus to rein himself back. “Judd said your family is okay.” Hawke hadn’t asked too much more, especially when the former Arrow told him what Alice Eldridge had said before lapsing back into the same comalike state she’d been in since entering the den.
     
     
    REMEMBERING the wrenching sensation that had torn at her before she lost consciousness, Sienna closed her eyes and stepped out into what should’ve been the LaurenNet.
    It wasn’t.
    She blinked, shook her head.
    “Sienna.” Lips on her jaw.
    She thrust a hand into his hair. “Stop distracting me.” Yet