Sun Catch Her (Book 1: Three Rivers Deep series) COMPLETE

BOOK TWO PREVIEW | PROLOGUE | A

PROLOGUE: ALEX

Gasp for me! Scream for me! Yes, that's it!

I held her in place, gently, to allow her thrashing body to do all that it would do as everything came rushing back for her. Legs and arms spasming, heartbeat fluttering like a frantic bird trapped in the ribcage beneath my palms, pressed firmly against her breastbone. My life-saving pumping of moments before had stilled when she finally regained consciousness.

Head thrown back. That's it, my darling. Scream for me! Let it all out, Aurora! Expel my breath from your lungs. The air I forced in to animate you once again.

The arm. Yes, it was in a bit of a wretched state, but it could be fixed, made whole. Though little comfort that would be to her now as the immediate pain of it had stolen all intellectual thought. Aurora's fathomless blue eyes were not seeing me. There was something off about them. Something not normal. Of course the great light given off by the energy blast would have left her dazed and temporarily blinded, but still...there was something not right about her eyes' appearance. Unseeing, and yet seemingly focused on something that no one else could ever behold.

She was fighting me now. This pip of a girl, small of stature, slender limbs, pallor pale like waning moonlight as it meanders through the ink black spread of her mussed hair. She pitted her surprising strength against my own. She planted her teeth in my wrist as she bucked wildly, desperate to be free of me, all the while she hugged her broken arm, the hand flopping limply at the wrist. Her cries went low, becoming the wails of a wounded animal when I wouldn't allow her to break away.

Piteous snatches of her sobs reached the surrounding hillsides and echoed back. Located as we were on a cliff in a remote, forested section along the night-darkened waters of the Allegheny River, there were no nearby houses, no one within direct hearing distance. And yet the sound did carry. It traveled between the tree-thick hills, so that when her wails of agony finally reached the closest town, they would be plainly heard and recognized for what they signified: a person in trouble. Although no one would be able to guess the origins of these cries. The authorities would be dispatched; they would come searching.

We needed to get off this rock.

"Aurora!" Micah's harsh bellow when he finally came to.

The devvi that played the role of Aurora's steadfast guardian was sprawled out on the ground nearby, where the blast had apparently blown him back. The lightning male up righted and dragged his haggard self, arm over arm, over the abrasive, stone-chipped terrain to where I knelt with her. She didn't seem to hear him yelling for her. Those oddly focused eyes were wild with the desperation of her injured situation. The sharp grip her teeth had on me had pierced my flesh. Yes, I was definitely bleeding now.

"Aurora," Micah called out again when he was finally close enough to place his hand on her one knee, trying to keep a hold when she sought to kick him off. She was even winning in her blind struggle against his well-muscled grasp, her panic-driven strength sending her squirming away from his gentle, but firm grip. "Little one, we're okay. Calm down."