Lara’s grin was downright nasty and Zed wanted very badly to wipe it from her face. “You’re too late. I’ve got what I want from her. She’s just a shell now. She didn’t even know what hit her, that was the sad part. She never even considered weaponizing her powers did she? Silly hippie bitch. That’s what pacifism gets you.”

“Shut up,” he growled, a berserker’s rage filling his chest as he inched closer.

Lara was struggling to stay on her feet and now it was his turn to smirk.

“You took too much from her, didn’t you? You can barely stand?” he asked, inching closer. “Dani says that’s dangerous, taking too much in without an outlet. You should have thought of that.”

Dani’s head jerked, just barely, toward the sound of Zed’s voice. He buried the urge to crow. Come on, baby, he thought, come on, concentrate on my voice and wake up. Be my self-rescuing princess. Come on.

Lara rolled her eyes. “God, you’re worse than the rest of the assholes in this town, do you know that? You think you’re smarter than everybody, which is really easy when you’re surrounded by idiots. You all think you’re so damn special because you managed to make a life here in this backwater shithole. Do you know what it’s like being stuck here when you’re used to living in civilization?”

Lara turned away from Dani completely to focus on Zed, and he welcomed it. Dani’s eyes fluttered open behind Lara’s back, and he nodded to her while Lara ranted about how difficult it had been to live in Mystic Bayou. Dani frowned up at her captor, making what Zed could only describe as her “cut a bitch” face.

“Look, lady, I don’t give a shit how much you hate it here. I’m taking my Dani back,” he told her. “And if that means throwing your ass in the swamp, that’s what I’ll do.”

Dani’s eyes drifted closed again but her hands began to move in a circular motion over her chest. Lara was so caught up in yelling at Zed, she didn’t notice Dani’s movements.

“You want this empty sack of skin?” Lara snorted. “Fine. She’s basically a vegetable. No more scintillating conversations you barely understand.”

“Shut your filthy mouth before I close it for you.”

Lara sneered. “You would never hit a woman. Your stupid redneck code of honor would never allow it.

“I’m not gonna hit you,” Zed told her, nodding toward his gal. “But she will. And she is pissed.”