Funny, he marveled, this was how you made steel. You took iron, applied tremendous heat, and cleared away all the impurities. What was left was pure, undiluted strength.

Like when two groups of fighters eliminated needless conflict and banded together to form a unit against their enemy that was capable of far more than they could ever have accomplished separately.

Continuing on, he thought he heard Jane’s voice behind him. And he did. She was talking to Manny, trading information.

V thought for a moment she would notice that he was walking away and come after him. But she didn’t.

And again, he thought as he limped to the office and headed for the tunnel alone, he was not surprised.

SIXTY-SEVEN

“Wake up, my love.”

As a deep voice entered her ear, Layla’s eyes popped open and she sat up in a chair—which brought her face to face with Xcor.

“You’re alive!” she exclaimed. Except then she looked at all the wires and the IV tubing that had been disconnected and was hanging loose from him. “What the hell are you doing out of bed—”

“Shh,” he said. “Come on.”

“What?”

“We’re leaving.”

“Wha—”

He nodded and stood up straight. He was covered with bandages, still in a hospital gown, and pale as a ghost, but the look in his eye told her that he wasn’t going to listen to anything she had to say.

They were, in fact, leaving.

“Where are we going?” she asked as she got to her feet.

“To the little ranch house. There’s a car waiting for us.”

“But shouldn’t you stay here where there are doctors—”

“I just want to be alone with you. You’re all I need.”

As he stared down at her, a feeling of love spread throughout her body. “I can’t believe you’re alive.”

“It’s because of you. On so many levels.”

A brief flashback of her and Tohr giving him CPR robbed her of speech. But it didn’t take away her ability to hitch herself up under her male and help him to the door.

The corridor was empty, nothing but a doggen with a mop and a bucket getting rid of bloodstains to attest to the injured.

“Where did your soldiers go?” she asked as they started down for the parking lot. “How long was I asleep?”

“Hours, my love. And all were treated and released. Dawn is about thirty minutes away.”

“Are they going to be okay?”

“Yes. All of them, and all the Brothers, too. The medical staff here are amazing.”

“Oh, thank La—” She stopped herself. “Thank goodness. Fate. Everything.”

It was then that she noticed a figure standing way down the hall by the exit, and as they closed in, she realized it was Tohr.

When they finally stopped in front of the Brother, the two males just stared at each other. And that was when the similarities between them became truly evident to her. Same height, same build, same jaw … and those eyes.

“Thank you for saving my life in that alley,” Tohr said roughly.

“And thank you for saving mine on that operating table,” Xcor intoned.

The two smiled a little, and then grew serious.

It was then that a chill went through her—one that intensified as Xcor unhitched his arm and leaned into the Brother.

As the males embraced, she realized with dread … this was it. This was going to be her and Xcor’s last day together. That was why he was so determined to leave the clinic, and that was why Tohr was helping them.

Also why the Brother looked at her with such compassion when the two males stepped back from each other.

Tohr opened the exit wide and waited off to the side.

No one said anything as she and Xcor proceeded to Fritz’s Mercedes. Even the butler was grave as he got out and came around to open their door.

Layla ducked down and slid across the seat, and then Xcor followed suit and Fritz shut them in.

Xcor put the blackout window next to him down and lifted his dagger hand as the car was put in drive—and Tohr returned the gesture as they headed off, the good-bye as permanent as the ink in one of the Sacred Scribes’s volumes up in the Sanctuary.

It doesn’t have to be this way, she yelled in her head. We can make this work. Somehow, we can …

But she knew she was fighting a battle that had been lost nights ago when Xcor had given his oath to Wrath and the agreement for the return to the Old Country had been set.

Looking down at her hands, because she didn’t dare meet him in the face, she whispered, “I heard you were so brave.”

“Not really.”

“That’s what Tohr said.”

“He is being generous. But I will tell you, my males fought with great honor, and without them, the Brotherhood would have been lost. Of that I am well sure.”

She nodded and found herself biting her lip.

“My love,” he whispered, “do not hide your eyes from me.”

“If I look at you I will break down.”

“Then allow me to be strong for you when you feel that you are not. Come here.”

In spite of his injuries, he pulled her into his lap and wrapped his arms around her. And then he was kissing her collarbone. And her throat … and her lips.

That now-familiar heat rose again, and when he eased her up and over his hips, she split her thighs to straddle him and was glad the partition was up for their privacy.

Shifting around awkwardly, she took one side of her leggings down and moved her panties out of the way as he pulled up the hem of his hospital gown.

“I’ll be careful,” she said as he grimaced from pain.

“I won’t feel anything but you.”

Xcor stood his erection with his hand and she slowly slid herself onto it.

“My love,” he breathed as his head fell back and his eyes closed. “Oh, you make me whole.”

With aching gentleness, his hands slipped under her shirt and cupped her breasts, and she eased herself into a rhythm on him, wrapping her arms around the headrest, putting her lips to his.

As the stop and the start of the car going through the gating system commenced, a sweet, sad orgasm rolled through her body … and took her heart along with it.

It felt as though the end of them had come just at their beginning.

SIXTY-EIGHT

The following evening, as Layla walked up from the ranch’s basement, she felt like she aged a hundred years with each step of the ascent.

Xcor was already at the stove, cooking eggs, bacon, and again, running another entire loaf of bread through the toaster.

He looked across at her. And the way his eyes went over her still-wet hair and the sweatshirt she’d put on and the jeans she’d found in the dresser, she knew he was memorizing every detail about her.

“I wish I were wearing a ball gown,” she said hoarsely.

“Why?” he said. “You look incredible right now.”

She lifted the hem of the sweatshirt and read the letters on it. suny caldwell. “A bit of a mess, really.”

Xcor slowly shook his head. “I don’t see your clothes, I never do, and a fancy dress wouldn’t change that. I don’t see wet hair, I feel the strands between my fingers. I don’t see pale cheeks, I am tasting your lips in my mind. You offer me all my senses at once, my female. You are so much more than any one thing about you.”

She blinked away her tears and went to the cupboard. Trying not to lose it, she said, “Will we need plates and forks and also knives?”

It turned out they required none of any of that.

After he was done preparing the food, they brought it over to the table … but it just sat untouched, going cold and scentless. And she knew when they were really starting to run out of time when he began to continuously check the clock.

Then it was over.

“I have to go,” he said roughly.

As their eyes met, he reached across the table and took her hand. His stare was luminous, for he was so emotional as well, his navy blue eyes glowing with both sorrow and love.

“I want you to remember something,” he whispered.

Layla sniffled and tried to be as strong as he was. “What?”