The Breakers Ultimatum (YA Urban Fantasy) (Fixed Points Book 3) Read Online Free Page A

to dispel then, and that was a quicker way of clearing it out. I promise you, every time since then, he’s done nothing more than hold your hand.”
    A rush of relief flooded my mind, but it was immediately followed by curiosity. “What do you mean every time? How much shade could I have possibly produced today?”
    Echo’s eyes narrowed. He looked to Casper, still sleeping on the chair, and then back at me. “Oh, you haven’t spoken to him at all, have you?” He put his hand on my shoulder and looked at me like he had so often, like he was about to tell me something I wouldn’t like.
    “Echo, what is it?” I asked; my mind racing to a million different, and equally horrible, hypothetical situations.
    “What happened to you was very severe. It took time for us to wrap our heads around what was happening, and even more time for you to stabilize.”
    “Echo, what are you saying?” I said through nervously clenched teeth.
    “It hasn’t been a day, my dear. You’ve been unconscious for well over a month.”
     
     
     
     
     
     
     
     

Chapter 3
Bad News, Sweetheart
     
    A month? A month?!
    I looked around frantically, like there might be something in the room that would discount what Echo had just told me. I couldn’t have been unconscious for an entire month. There was no way.
    “Cresta, it’s fine, you’re fine,” Echo told me in a slow calming tone. Of course, that didn’t do much good. He wasn’t the one who had just lost a month of his life. He wasn’t the one who was so sick or broken that it took more than thirty days to get him ready to even walk around.
    What had I missed? I hadn’t been in the Hourglass a full day before my entire life fell apart. The thought of what might have come and gone in a month’s time made my blood run cold. And Owen-...
    God, I was supposed to go get him. I was going to save him, and now the Council had had him for a month. He probably thought I abandoned him, that I had taken that stupid promise I made seriously and that he’d never see me again. My heart broke into a thousand tiny little pieces as I threw Casper’s sheets off of me.
    I pulled at previously unseen wires that ran across my body; wires to monitor my breathing, wires that stuck across my legs, and a tube that- to put it delicately-made it possible for me to go to the restroom. Echo turned his head as soon as I threw the covers off.
    “Cresta stop. Let me get Dahlia in here to help you.”
    “I’ve waited long enough,” I answered, pulling the last of the wires off of me. I swung my legs off the bed and attempted to stand. My legs were jelly though, and I went careening to the floor.
    “Fate’s hand,” Echo muttered, and quickly made his way to me. “You’re going to have to take it slowly. It’s been awhile since you’ve been on your feet.”
    He knelt down to help me, but I pushed him off. I needed to do this on my own. “I got it,” I answered. “I just wasn’t expecting it, that’s all.” Using the bed frame for support, I pulled myself up and let my feet and legs get used to the idea of holding my weight up. I could see Echo aching to help steady me. Casper, for his part, snorted a little and snuggled back into his chair.
    That boy really could sleep through anything.
    Once I felt comfortable, I let go of the bed; surprised at how quickly I got back into the habit of moving around.
    “Cresta, take it slow,” Echo warned, but I wasn’t interested in listening. Anything could have happened in the month that I had been out of commission- anything but one. The people around me had not seen fit to save Owen. If they had, he’d be here now; waiting by my bed for any sign that I might wake up. I knew that as well as I knew my own name.
    Looking over at Casper; still sleeping peacefully, Echo’s words about him suddenly meant something very different to me.
    He hasn’t left your side, not even for an instant.
    “When he wakes up, tell him thank you,” I told Echo, looking over