And now…
Now it was murky, and if I looked too hard, I was pretty sure I could see things moving beneath the surface.
I shook my head and focused on the way forward, but Phoenix brushed his hand against my arm with a grin.
“Want to go for a swim?” He sounded sopleasedthat he had the story to reference, and I let out a low grunt.
“You know, once upon a time we wouldn’t have been able to come here. Neither of us look like the sort who would have a ton of money.” I looked ahead, to the gate that stood with half-torn-down wire strung across the top of it, like it was meant to keep people out.
It really was a dream location if you were looking for something secure. Phoenix just lifted his head, turning his face to the cloudy skies. There was a storm brewing in the distance, and I could feel it trembling just beneath my skin in a soft threat.
Before the week was up, this water was going to run red with rain.
I slid my eyes back to Phoenix, who was staring at me like he could feel it too. My stomach clenched at the thought of him in the rain, red drenched and vicious. He was already brutal.
What would he do with no inhibitions? With nothing holding him back?
“I’d like to think that even if we’d lived in those times, we’d still take what we wanted. This could still be ours. And fuck—” He grinned as he stepped forward, looping his finger around the edge of my collar before tracing my lower lip. “If you’d really wanted it then, I would have taken it for you. I would have taken this entire place. Now… then… The rain doesn’t matter, Aubrey. I’d still burn the world down to get you whatever you wanted.” Then, like he realized what he’d said, he added, “Whateverwewanted.”
The intensity in his words reaffirmed the fact that I had to figure out a way to get out of here soon… because shit, as much as he tried to cover what he’d said, I knew he meant it. The impending rain was making us both restless, and apparently it was making him honest.
That honesty was more dangerous than the axe strapped to his back, which he pulled free as we came to the gate and shoved it open.
It was gorgeous. Impressive. Maybe a little frightening. It was exactly like it had been described, only gone wild from years and years of the rain feeding the plants. They snaked in front of us, barely contained by the fenced barrier that rose up on either side of the path.
To keep the animals in, I was sure.
Because that’s what this place was. An experience. Animals in cages on either side as you followed the trail up to the house. It was supposed to make you feel like you were in the jungle, but I wasn’t sure if they’d ever meant for it to be this untamed.
“Fuck, some of those flowers look like they’re as big as your head.” Phoenix’s voice was a low, impressed whisper. When I looked back, he was staring around us with a wide-eyed wonder that he probably would have been embarrassed to realize he was showing. I couldn’t blame him, though.
You didn’t see things like this in our city. Most places were full of dilapidated buildings and run-down camps where people were just trying to survive. I’d grown up in a broken-down apartment building that didn’t have electricity.
But this…
It really was paradise.
It was everything I’d thought it would be.
I turned to Phoenix, and the warmth in his eyes wasalmost too much. When I turned away and started toward the house in the distance, he jogged to catch up to me.
“Do you think there’s anything behind the fences?”
My eyes flicked to the trees, and my chest felt a little tight when I answered. “Who knows? We’ll find out soon enough.”
Soon enough was going to be after we got settled. It only took a few minutes to sweep the house and realize there was nothing there. Maybe the gates we’d pushed open had kept the majority of the infected out, though I was pretty sure I’d seen something huge and twisted swimming in the water from the little viewing window in the basement.
I was sweaty, and Phoenix was antsy. I knew it was because of the impending rain.
“We probably need to hole up here until the storm passes.”
Phoenix turned to me with a confused expression. “Why? My favorite time to hunt is when it rains.”
I shuddered. I’d heard stories of that—raiders who came after you during the storm, men and women who didn’t give a shit if they turned more animal than human. We were all children of the rain in the end, long-haul carriers.
They just took advantage of it more than most.
I guess I’d been hearing stories of Phoenix all along.
