“HEY!”I roar, taking off after them.
Branches whip across my arms.My boots sink into mud, pulling and sliding.Rain blinds me, but I keep running, chasing the shadow darting between trees.
He’s fast.Trained-fast.
He knows the terrain, moving quiet as a ghost even with the storm burying his tracks.
I push harder.
He slips down a slope and disappears behind a deadfall.By the time I scramble after him, he’s gone swallowed by the dark.
A growl rips from my chest, primal and vicious.
“Come back!”I shout into the storm.“You wanted me?COME FUCKING GET ME!”
Nothing answers.
Just thunder.
Just rain.
Just my own pulse pounding in my skull.
I turn back toward the truck breath heaving, soaked to the bone and see Kelly through the fogged-up window.
Her face is pale.Her eyes wide.Her hand pressed to the glass like she can anchor me from inside the cab.
My legs move on instinct.
I wrench open the door and climb inside.Her hands reach for me immediately.
“Are you hurt?”she breathes out.
“No.”
She grabs the front of my jacket and pulls me toward her— Not to kiss me.Not to cling.
But because she needs to check, needs to see with her own eyes that I’m okay.
Storm water drips off me onto her sleeves.
Her fingers shake.“Riot, I thought.”
“I know,” I murmur, voice low and gravel rough.“I know, sunshine.”
At the nickname, she lets out a tiny sound a soft, broken exhale that hits me harder than any punch I’ve taken.
“You can’t run into the dark like that,” she whispers.
“Like hell I can’t,” I mutter.“If someone’s hunting us, I’m not waiting for them to get brave.”
Her voice cracks.“But if something happened to you.”
I press a hand to her cheek, forcing her eyes to meet mine.
“Kelly.Listen to me.”
She swallows.
