"I was wondering what kind of girl could have botched up a rescue attempt so badly. Now that I know it was you all along, everything makes sense."
"Go away."
Rome runs his nose down the side of my face, smiling at the way I shiver. "After all thes...
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I KNOW SOMETHING IS WRONG AS SOON AS I WAKE UP. The back of my head feels like it's shrinking, warping my brain into something inhumane and ugly. My eyelids feel heavy. Forcing them to open is painful. A buzzing fills my ears, like the drone of an electric car, and my tongue feels dead and dry in my mouth.
What's going on? Where am I?
There's a weight on my thighs.
Grimacing, I glance down - only to see my mate.
Like a male version of sleeping beauty, Rome lies across my lap. Soft curls of his silver hair drape across my legs, tickling my skin. His lips, a pale pink, are slightly parted as if about to whisper a secret. One of my hands lies right next to his sculpted jaw. If I bring my fingers closer, I could probably brush my fingers along the smooth lines of his face...
"Already awake?" Rome turns his head a bit to the right and kisses my palm. I jerk in surprise, my thighs clenching together. "You barely slept for two hours. I suppose it doesn't matter now that we're landing - "
Landing?
" - ridiculous. To think that I've been searching for him around the globe, and then, he saunters right into our living room."
Our living room.
Memories drop back into my head. Dinner at the penthouse. The shattering glass. The woman with large wings. The helicopter crashing on the marble tiles, injuring Rome and Shadow Cougar. Rome lying across the seats, with a head injury, all because of - because of Grease - Grease, Rome's arch-rival, a thunderous foe who creates monstrous out of nothing but magic and metal.
And then, as quickly as they popped in, the images fall back out of my head. I stare dizzily at my surroundings. What was I thinking about? I forgot. I feel numb.
Something is wrong with my head.
"Rome," I whisper, but my lips feel like they've been glued together.
Where are we?
I force myself to think. Rome said we were about to land, so we're on a plane. No. Not a plane. I squeeze my eyes shut, then open them again. There are no windows, no seats beside the ones I'm sitting on. Bronze and iron tiles expand back and forth, like the lungs of a breathing creature.
Right. This is a bird. We're inside a giant, mechanical, animal.
Grease captured us.
My thoughts spin out of my control. Nausea rises up in my throat. The buzzing drone around us starts to die down. Buzzing. What buzzing? Right. The engine. No, not the engine. It's the bird, the lungs of the bird. Grease. Right. Pay attention, Winnie. We're landing, Rome said. Landing where? And why?
The altitude drops. The walls of my skull grow closer, trapping my brain into a cell of brittle bones. I can't think.
