I nodded.
When he held his arms open, I walked into them and let him pick me up.
It was windy when we got outside, dead leaves drifting across the broken pavement. Cain took us back the way we’d come, humming a song that vibrated through his chest into my legs.
We were halfway to the outskirts when a flash of that familiar, ugly sensation crept through my veins. “Cain. Stop. They’re here.”
He stopped walking and tilted his head up at me, raising a questioning brow.
The feeling slithered away, as quickly as it had come. Had I imagined it?
“Who’s here?”
“The Corrupted.”
“The…what?”
I frowned down at him. “The Corrupted.”
He shook his head. “I don’t know what that means.”
“Of course you do,” I said. Was he teasing? Everyone knew what they were.
He laughed, but there wasn’t any humor in it. “I really don’t.”
I thought he was teasing me, and irritation began to flicker in my gut. “Those things that are infected with the virus?”
His brows furrowed. “You call them the Corrupted?”
Didn’t everyone? “What do you call them?”
He shrugged, and my entire body lifted with the movement. “Just…the infected. The dead. Dead walkers, dead runners.” Then he seemed to realize something, and his eyebrows knitted together as he stared up at me. “Wait, what do you mean they’re here?” He tensed, his hand moving to hover over the machete hanging from his hip. He scanned the street, eyes darting over every inch of the deserted landscape. The furrow in his brows deepened. “I don’t see anything.”
“I thought I felt them, but I don’t anymore.”
His gaze shot to mine. “What do you mean, you thought youfeltthem?”
“I’m a hound. I can feel them when they’re close.”
The muscles in his arms flexed as he tightened his hold. “What? That’s what you meant before when you called yourself a hound?” A muscle in his jaw started to tic. His eyes flashed briefly to my muzzle.
Had I done something wrong? Did he not like hounds? Or would he…would he take me back there? Chain me up again? Use me like Hunter and Hayes had?—
“Hey, whoa, breathe. It’s okay. You’re okay. We don’t have to talk about this if it upsets you.”
His deep voice broke through the sudden panic, and his big palm on my thigh began stroking back and forth.
“Put me down,” I said, breathless, still on edge. I needed to be able to run if I had to, to?—
Cain carefully set me on my feet, keeping his hands beneath my elbows, holding me steady. “I know you can walk, but if it hurts at any point, tell me, okay? I don’t want you doing more damage.”
I took a step back, suddenly feeling too small, too vulnerable.
It was quiet for a few moments, the only sound the hum of insects.
“Can you tell me what you meant?”
His voice was soft. Gentle. Careful.
