Dangerous Tides by Christine Feehan Page B

understand, they were bound, one to the other, in those gifts.
    She heard her own sob of despair, her plea for understanding and apology to her sisters for her inability to stop. She caught the edge of the door hoping to give herself time to think, time to stop, but her feet moved of their own volition carrying her to the side of the gurney. Light spilled out of her body, burst from her fingertips as she approached Tyson.
    Libby looked down at the pale, blood-streaked face. Her heart lurched. It was definitely the Tyson Derrick she remembered, although his piercing blue eyes were closed, black lashes forming two thick crescents over dark circles. His jet black, wavy hair spilled over his forehead, strands sticking in the blood. His shoulders were even wider than she remembered; his arms denned with muscle. Her breath caught in her throat and for some strange reason her heart accelerated.
    Tyson Derrick was the only man who ever managed to get under her skin. Libby was used to deference and respect working in her field. She was brilliant and knew it. Only one man had ever bested her grades. Only one man talked down to her, sometimes so rudely she cried herself to sleep at night. It was silly, but she could never quite get him out of her mind. She thought about him more than she cared to admit. It shouldn't matter that he didn't respect her as an equal—but it did. She hid the knowledge away deep where no one, not even her sisters, would ever find it, ashamed that she could be attracted to a man who treated her so carelessly, one she didn't even approve of.
    "So much blood. So much pain," she whispered. He looked mangled, his face gray and stretched. It wasn't right. Tyson Derrick was a man needed in the world of medicine. He saw things others didn't and he was tenacious in looking for answers.
    Libby touched her fingertips to either side of his head.
    Libby! Stop ! Elle and Hannah yelled the command in her mind, desperation in their voices. The cries of the others—Sarah, Kate, Abigail and Joley—echoed through her mind and faded away as the heat built in her body.
    Energy crackled around her. She took a deep breath to focus. Most of the time she relied on standard medicine, but already that place inside of her, a well of energy, of light, was shifting and opening, the force coursing through her every cell, filling her up.
    It was too late to pull back. A compulsion seemed to have gripped her, a need she couldn't fight, to save this one man even at the risk to her own life and sanity—even at the risk to those she loved. It was insane, but the necessity was as elemental as breathing. She let the light and energy pour from her body into Tyson's.
    Pain burst over her, through her, stabbing at her head, her chest, her insides until she thought she might pass out. She forced air through her lungs, breathing deeply to ride above the pain. Heat moved through her body, down her arms to her hands and into his brain, carrying with it raw energy and light. Blood trickled from the corner of her mouth, streaked her face, her arms. Stones seemed to settle in her chest, crushing her lungs.
    Libby began to lose focus. She stumbled back from Tyson just as he began to stir. The heart monitor leapt with activity as did the EEG. Tyson's eyelashes fluttered. He blinked rapidly, looking up at her.
    Ty knew he had to be dreaming. Sometimes, when he felt completely and utterly alone, her face came to him. Libby Drake. Like now. Perfect. No one else had such perfect features. He let himself just soak her in, his gaze fastened on her oval face. Her skin glowed in exactly the way he remembered it. Alabaster pale, so soft he wanted to reach out and run the tips of his fingers over it in a caress. Her lips were full, almost pouting. Kissable lips that conjured up way too many erotic fantasies, even when she frowned at him in disapproval. He thought about her lips far too much, even during the most exciting times when he was on the trail of an elusive