Then, to her horror and confusion, he extended his left arm and sliced one talonlike fingernail deep into the flesh above his wrist. Blood spilled from the wound, dripping wetly, scarlet raindrops falling to the wood planks below him. He thrust his finger into the open cut, digging into the muscle and tendons of his arm.
"Oh, Jesus. What are you doing?" Revulsion squeezed her senses. Her instincts clamored with the warning that something awful was about to happen--maybe even more awful than the horror of her captivity with this nightmarish being who'd taken her prisoner hours ago to feed off her blood.
"Oh, my God. Please, no. What the hell are you doing?"
He didn't reply. Didn't even look at her until he'd withdrawn something minuscule from within his flesh and now held it pinched between his bloodied thumb and finger. He blinked slowly, a brief shuttering of his eyes before they pinned her in a hypnotic beam of amber light.
"Life or death," the creature hissed, those ruthless eyes narrowing on her. He leaned toward her, blood still dripping from the self-inflicted wound in his forearm. "You must decide, right now."
No, she thought desperately. No.
A rushing surge of fury rolled up from somewhere deep inside her.
She couldn't hold it down. Couldn't bite back the burst of rage that climbed up her raw throat and exploded out of her mouth in a banshee scream.
"No!" She raised her fists and pounded on the hard, inhuman flesh of the creature's bare shoulders. She thrashed and raged, railing at him with every ounce of strength she could summon, relishing in the pain of impact every time her blows landed on his body. "Damn you, no! Get the hell away from me! Don't touch me!"
She beat her fists against him again, over and over. Still, he crept closer.
"Leave me alone, damn it! Get away!"
Her knuckles connected with his shoulders and the sides of his skull, blow after blow, even as a heavy darkness began to descend on her. It felt thick around her, a sodden shroud that made her movements sluggish, her thoughts muddled in her mind.
Her muscles slackened, refusing to cooperate. Yet still she pounded on the creature, striking slowly, as though she were throwing punches in the middle of a black, tar-filled ocean.
"No," she moaned, eyes closed to the darkness that surrounded her.
She kept sinking deeper. Farther and farther into a soundless, weightless, endless void. "No ... let me go. Damn you ... let me go ..."
Then, when it seemed as though the darkness that enveloped her might never release her, she felt something cool and moist pressed against her brow. Voices speaking in an indiscernible jumble somewhere over her head.
"No," she murmured. "No. Let me go ..."
Summoning the last shred of strength and will she possessed, she threw another punch at the creature holding her down. Thick muscle absorbed the blow. She latched on to her captor then, grabbing at him, clawing at him. Startled, she felt the crush of soft fabric bunching in her hands. Warm, knit wool. Not the clammy, bare skin of the creature who'd broken into her cabin and held her prisoner.
Confusion fired a warning shot in her sluggish mind. "Who ... no, don't touch me ..."
"Jenna, can you hear me?" The deep, rolling baritone that sounded so near her face was somehow familiar to her. Oddly soothing.
It beckoned to something deep within her, gave her something to grab hold of when she had nothing but fathomless dark sea around her. She moaned, still lost, but feeling a slender thread of hope that she might survive.
The low voice she somehow needed desperately to hear came again.
"Kade, Alex. Holy shit, she's coming out of it. I think she's finally waking up."
She sucked in a hard breath, gasping for air. "Let me go," she murmured, uncertain she could trust her feelings. Uncertain she could trust anything now. "Oh, God ... please, no ... don't touch me. Don't--"
"Jenna?" Somewhere nearby, a female voice took shape above her.
Tender tones, sober concern. A friend. "Jenna, honey, it's me, Alex. You're all right now. Do you understand? You're safe, I promise."
The words registered slowly, bringing with them a sense of relief and comfort. A feeling of peace, despite the chill terror that was still washing through her veins.
With effort, she dragged her eyelids open and blinked away the daze that clung like a veil to her senses. Three forms hovered around her, two of them immense, unmistakably male, the other tall and slender, female. Her best friend from Alaska, Alexandra Maguire. "What ... where am ..."
"Shh," Alex soothed. "Hush now. It's all right. You're somewhere safe. You're going to be okay now."
Jenna blinked, worked to focus. Slowly, the shapes standing around her bedside became human. Half sitting up, she realized her fists were still full of the wool sweater worn by the larger of the two males. The immense, fierce-looking African American with the skull-trimmed hair and linebacker shoulders, whose deep voice had helped pull her out of the drowning terror of her nightmare.