Blindside Read Online Free PDF Page B

darkness.
    “I thought you didn’t use your powers.” Fighting for breath and focus, she dragged Mendoza back, his wrist a taut thick wire in her rapidly numbing fingers. She could let go, face Mac and fight, blast him with power…. “Come on, Pavlic.”
    Mendoza twisted again, and her shattered focus allowed him enough leeway to jerk her off balance. Mac pushed into the barrier, splintering her energy in a burst of heat, edging into her space, crowding her with that big fighter’s body.
    She should have clocked him while she had the last reserve of power. Instead she held the last shreds of shields tight around her skin, morphing the light surrounding her body to make her appear even bigger. Her cape snapped with the wind, the edges reaching out as if begging Mac to touch them.
    “Let go, you fuck.” Another twist and Pavlic wrenched free, the blade she’d dropped once more between his fingers. No time for strength or cop defensive tactics. She had enough power to keep the knife out of her gut, but not to stop the tip from slicing. Blood, cold and vile, stung her skin.
    She faced Mac, raw, without shields. Just her. Just him.
    Mendoza ran with loud thuds marking each step, the ground shuddering with impact. No hope in getting him with Mac, solid and dark and cold, standing in her way.
    “You don’t have to do this.” Calm voice, assured and steady. She didn’t take the time to reply.
    A hook aimed at his jaw found nothing but air. Mac’s palm closed warm and somehow gentle, on her wrist.
    “We don’t need to do this,” he said, and Lana had only herself to blame when she spun backward in an attempt to break his hold and opened herself to rookie basics.
    An arm around her waist, large, solid, and muscled. She reveled in the momentary flight before spilling back on the ground, lifting her knees as leverage to send him sideways, her foot shoved at the solid ridges of his chest.
    One hand held hers, skin over leather. His free palm closed over her boot. She should’ve pushed the steel reinforced tip into the hollow of his throat. Shoulda, coulda, woulda.
    Pushing didn’t do much good. Before she had the chance to kick, Mac flipped her on her belly, his weight subduing her in a match of strength.
    She took a breath, gauging her options. The helmet knocked softly against the ground, the noise reverberating in her head. Her knees were trapped under his weight, her arms useless in reaching back to strike him.
    Silent, he sat with his weight pushing on her knees, holding her helpless. Waiting.
    “You’re bleeding.”
    “I’ll live.” She jerked, much like Mendoza, praying her flexibility would hold. He drove her bent leg farther up, bowing her body. Words, harsh strips of satin, left his mouth, a prayer or a curse, she didn’t know. She used the momentary reprieve to twist out of this tangling of limbs, rolling away from all that solid heat to leave him with her cloak crushed in his fingers.
    The dim lights from the old world lamps caressed the angles of his face. Without her power, she had nothing to conceal her shape from that cool gaze, those granite features.
    A long testing step back. Mac stood, a black shadow from her past. She couldn’t seem to calm her breaths while nerves and arousal pumped alongside with fear, her body yearning for those wide hands touching her again.
    “You shouldn’t have come back.”
    “I want to help you.”
    Mendoza was long gone, probably mobilizing however many cops he could get ahold of for protection. Adrenaline was slowly ebbing, leaving her skin prickling with sharp kisses of pain. The night seemed cooler now because she had no cape to warm her.
    “I don’t need help, Narc.” A challenge thrown between them.
    “Rook. Yes, you do.” Her alias was a sensual lash out of that sculpted mouth. “Powers don’t make a hero.”
    “You gonna tell me people do?” She choked on tears and laughed instead, a smoke bomb warm and light between her fingers. “I’m not a