His eyes hold mine. Steel-blue, unyielding.
“Keeping you alive,” he says.
“By stealing my phone?”
His jaw tightens. “Hand it over.”
“Why?” I hiss.
He doesn’t raise his voice. That’s the worst part. “Because whoever’s hunting you doesn’t need much. A ping. A call. A few seconds.”
I’m still breathing hard when he holds his hand out again, palm up.
Patient. Deadly.
“Phone,” he says.
I glare at him. “You can’t just…”
“Your life is more important than a phone,” he cuts in, voice low and final. “I’m not arguing with you about this.”
My breath comes sharp.
He reaches, not rough but not gentle either, and he gets it. His fingers brush mine and heat crawls up my arm like my nerves are wired wrong.
I’m ready to fight him.
Then he flips the phone over. It’s an older model, the kind with a case that actually comes off. He pops it free with practiced ease, and pauses.
He slides the memory card out and holds it toward me between two fingers, like it matters.
“Take it,” he says.
I blink, thrown. “What?”
“Your photos,” he says, eyes on mine. “Your videos. Whatever you’ve got on there.” His voice stays hard, but something in it shifts. “I’m not taking that from you.”
My throat tightens.
I take it with shaking fingers, like it might shatter.
Only then does he crack the window and toss the phone out into the grass.
The thud is soft. Final.
I stare at the spot where it disappears, rage and relief tangling in my chest until I can’t tell which one hurts more.
“You threw my phone!” I shout, lungs burning. “Are you insane?”
Knox closes the window like my outburst is just noise. “Yeah.”
I clutch the tiny card in my fist, my whole life reduced to something the size of a fingernail.
He looks at me, expression carved from stone.
“You can hate me,” he says. “But you’re breathing.”
A beat hangs between us.
