Dangerous Tides (Drake Sisters 4)

"Hurry, Sarah," Hannah urged her.

"Why would anyone want to kill Jonas?" Abbey asked.

Kate held Hannah's hand tightly. "We're not going to let him die."

"Libby, are you up to this?" Sarah asked, glancing in the rearview mirror.

Libby lifted her chin. "Jonas is family. No way is anyone going to take him away from us. Drive faster, Sarah."

They all felt the same sense of urgency, of impending doom. They'd been feeling the darkness creeping in, holding them in its thrall, but it was an insidious feeling with no direction, no seeming strength until it struck without warning.

Sarah raced along the highway, the cliff on one side, the mountain rising on the other, speeding through the hairpin turns to get to Jonas before the ambulance. They saw his Jeep, so familiar to all of them, upside down, crumpled and ruined. Jonas lay a few feet from the wreckage up on the embankment, sprawled out behind a large rock.

Hearing a car coming, Jonas attempted to roll over. He was still exposed. He had fallen over, unable to keep upright even in a sitting position. He had hoped the killer would come in close, to finish him off, but only the wind surrounded him, rifling his hair and touching his face with gentle fingers. He heard Hannah's voice calling to him to hold on and he felt Elle touching him, gripping his arm as if she could physically hold him to the world.

Now as the Drake sisters' voices grew louder, more anxious, he tried to roll over again, out of the sniper's line of sight. He always told the Drakes he wasn't psychic, but he had a hell of an instinct for danger and he knew the killer was still close by.

Hannah's face swam into focus. There were tears in her eyes, running down her face. Sinking onto the ground, she lifted his head gently and propped him in her lap. "We're here, now, Jonas, you're going to be fine."

He tried to warn her, but he started choking on blood and turned his head so she wouldn't see. He could feel the sisters surrounding him with heat and energy. Overhead thunder-clouds blew up fast and furious, leaping straight up like a tower.

A bullet plowed into the ground close to Libby. Jonas brought up his gun and tried to shove Hannah towards the relative safety of the nearby ditch. Elle spun around facing the direction of the killer, throwing her hands into the air. Above them, the sky crackled with electricity and on the other side of the road, below the cliffs, water smashed into rocks with a terrible fury.

Jonas coughed and fought to breathe. His lungs were filling with blood and he was drowning. Without Elle holding him to her, he knew he was slipping away, fast reaching the point where even the Drakes would be helpless to pull him back. The gun fell out of his hands, his fingers too weak to hold the grip. Desperate, he looked up at Hannah.

"Elle! Elle, we're losing him," Hannah cried, hunching her body protectively over Jonas. "Help us."

Elle hesitated a moment, fearing for her sisters' lives, but the call to save Jonas was too strong. She turned back to Jonas.

A sheriff 's car skidded to a halt, shielding the circle of Drakes from the road. Jackson emerged, gun drawn, face set, eyes as cold as ice. "Backup's coming, Elle. Take care of Jonas."

Two more police vehicles arrived, one from the city of Fort Bragg and one highway patrol. They used their cars as a barricade to help protect Jonas from the gunman. Obviously the shooter determined he was outmatched because there was no more gunfire. Other officers arrived and spread out to do a search.

The residents of the small towns up and down the coast nearly all had scanners and they would come immediately to see if they could help. Many were reserve for the sheriff or fire departments, helping one another when most aid was far away. Jonas was popular and the instant word got out that he was shot, they would come fast and there would be many of them.

Jackson pushed into the circle, kneeling beside Jonas. Blood was everywhere, soaking into Hannah's clothing, seeping into the ground beneath the sheriff and sprayed across the boulders behind them.

"Can you save him?" Jackson asked without preamble, his face set in hard lines.

Libby held her hands an inch away over his body and closed her eyes, feeling for his injuries, mapping them out, seeing them even more clearly than if she were reading an X ray. She swallowed hard. Four bullets had torn through his body, damaging organs and ripping through veins and one artery. She had to fix that fast or he was gone for certain. One lung had collapsed.

The internal damage was severe. This was going to be very bad. The worst damage and the most dangerous was to the pulmonary artery, the main supplier of oxygen to the lungs. Blood was already filling Jonas's lungs and beginning to suffocate him. If Libby waited for the ambulance to take him to the hospital, it would be too late. There was no way they could repair the artery fast enough to save Jonas--the damage was too severe.

"Hannah and Elle, you'll have to help me with this fast." Hannah and Elle both could heal to some extent, not with Libby's power, but she needed them. "Jackson, keep everyone else away but tell the paramedics he'll need blood when we're finished. Lots and lots of blood."

"It could get ugly," Elle cautioned. "We aren't in Sea Haven and people from all these towns know Jonas and don't know us."

"Just get it done. No one will bother you," Jackson promised.

Libby could feel the desperation in her sisters--in the gathering crowd as they arrived from nearby towns, some already weeping. The mob was growing larger and she caught a glimpse of the ferocity on Tyson's face as he arrived, striding toward them with determination. She closed her eyes, took a deep cleansing breath and focused everything she was--everything in her--on Jonas.

The pain hit with the force of a hurricane, a terrible intensity that took her breath and robbed her of her ability to think. She heard the collective gasp from her sisters and forced herself to rise above the agony, to take them with her. She needed their strength and focus, the tremendous circle of energy they could generate together. She called up the light and energy that was always there, always waiting, from somewhere deep inside her. It welled up and poured through her to Jonas. Her sisters connected; Hannah, nearly as strong even in healing as Libby; Elle, equal to Hannah, a force to be reckoned with. Sarah, Kate, Abigail and Joley sent their energy, their strength surging into the three sisters as they healed Jonas.

Libby focused on the worst of the injuries, the artery in desperate need of repair. She'd been right, Jonas would have died if they'd waited to transport him. He might die now, his wounds were so severe. She breathed away the fear and concentrated on the mess in his chest and abdomen, the two worst wounds. She felt Hannah and Elle with her and it was a comfort that she wasn't alone trying to fix such a massive destruction of a human being.

As if in the distance she could hear the wail of the ambulance as it arrived, as the people around them divided into two camps. Matt Granite, Damon Wilder and Aleksandr Volstov stood shoulder to shoulder with Jackson, preventing anyone from getting to the mortally wounded sheriff and interfering with the Drake sisters and their work. Inez from the grocery store joined them, followed by Donna from the gift shop and Gene Dockins and two of his sons. Matt's brothers joined the growing circle around Jonas, followed by Mason and Sylvia Fredrickson.

Tyson couldn't believe his eyes. The sheriff, lying wounded, covered in blood, desperately needed immediate medical attention, but he was surrounded instead by the Drake sisters. Even though Libby was a doctor, reputed to be a damned good one, the belief that she could heal the sick and injured was so ingrained in her, they were delaying getting Jonas real help. He was furious to think that besides Libby, several of the officers and many of the townspeople of Sea Haven appeared to be completely brainwashed. The atmosphere reeked of mass hysteria and a good man was going to die because of it.

Sam came up to him, pushing his way through the crowd of people. "What's going on, Ty? The scanner went off, but I didn't get all the particulars."

"Someone shot Jonas," Tyson answered in a low tone, "and I don't know why they aren't getting him to a hospital."

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"It just adds to our growing legend of the infamous Drake sisters," Sam said. "Regardless they get the glory. If he lives, they saved him, if he dies, well, they tried."

Ty glanced at him sharply. "I thought you believed in them."

"Come on, Ty! Magic? You really think Libby can heal a man shot full of holes? If she could, she'd be a national treasure. Drew Madison would have been healed of cancer when he was a kid."

"Keep your voice down, Sam, this crowd could turn ugly," Ty cautioned.

"You know it's wrong, they're just looking for more attention. Sea Haven loves the idea of the magical Drake sisters, but this is real life and they're going to kill Jonas."

Tyson frowned warningly at his cousin as he tried to push past a deputy, but the officer wouldn't budge.

Sam shoved at Tyson, forcing him almost nose to nose with the man as tempers around them rose. "What the hell are you thinking, Jackson?" Sam demanded. "That's Jonas there. Do you think he'd allow you to die for a theatrical performance? Get the hell out of the way and let the paramedics see to him. Have you all gone crazy? Matt? Mason?"

Tyson put his hand on Sam's shoulder to calm him. "Getting upset isn't going to help anything. You have to allow the paramedics to transport Jonas." He turned toward the deputy, his voice very quiet. "Jonas could die without proper medical attention. He needs it now."

"Not could die," Sam snarled, his voice carrying in the night air, "will die. Whatever these con artists are doing, it isn't worth Jonas's life."

Several others from the surrounding towns added their own loud dissent to Sam's and the paramedics tried to push their way through the line.