“Very.”
“I’ll take those odds.” Emma had lost all sense of time. Was the reading supposed to have started already? Leah must have been losing her mind.
She fetched her bag from the floor and tossed it up before taking Darren’s outstretched hands, letting him pull her toward him.
It wasn’t as graceful as she’d have preferred—legs kicking uselessly against the wall, her side catching on something sharp. Pain bloomed across her skin, but she clenched her teeth, scrambling onto the elevator roof beside him.
Darren watched her in the faint light. “You okay?”
“Yeah.”
The shaft above was a narrow, shadowy column, cables stretching into darkness. Vertigo tugged at her as she tilted her head back.
“That’s our way out.” Darren pulled her attention back, nodding toward a set of thick metal doors. The seam between them looked merciless. “Ready to give it a go?”
She squared her jaw. “Absolutely.”
They dug their fingers in, prying the doors apart with a mix of brute force and sheer optimism. The mechanism fought them with a screech that set her teeth on edge. But the gap widened—just enough to glimpse the corridor beyond. Inch by inch, they forced it wider.
The lift shuddered beneath them. Emma gasped, suddenly aware this might not have been a great idea.
“Alright, time to go,” Darren said, tension lacing his voice. “You first, Emma.”
They clambered out in a tangle of limbs, Darren close behind her as they scrambled out on the floor.
Emma let out a shaky breath as she got to her feet. The metal doors slid shut behind them with an unhurried finality and then—as if deliberately taunting them—the machinery whirred to life.
The elevator resumed its descent as if nothing had happened.
Emma’s mouth fell open. “Are youkiddingme?”
For a moment, they both just stared at it.
“I think this supports my theory that you insulted it,” Darren said.
Emma shook her head. “My next book is going to be a horror story about an elevator possessed by Satan.” She brushed her hands over her thighs, sending a cloud of dust into the air.
Darren exhaled, giving her a quick once-over. His eyes caught on her side.
“Emma, you’re hurt.”
She looked down. “Oh, shit.”
Her blouse had a long tear from the hemline up to her ribs. Underneath, a thin red line shone against her skin. Not bleeding, but angry. It stung when she twisted.
Darren took a step forward, hands twitching toward her. “Let me see.”
“It’s fine,” she blurted, tugging the ruined blouse over the cut the best she could. She had zero time or mental capacity for letting Darren Cole play doctor in an abandoned hallway. “Just scratched. The blouse is another story, though. I can’t show up at a bookstore reading like I’m trying to reinvent the 90s midriff trend.”
Darren didn’t miss a beat. “Hoodie or T-shirt?”
She blinked. “What?”
He shrugged. “Not many choices to offer, I’m afraid. But I have a vintageBack to the Futuretee underneath. Should look nicely oversized on you. Unless you prefer the hoodie?”
Emma stared at him, debating her options. Trying to ignore the fact that both of them meant wearing Darren Cole’s clothes against her own skin.
The hoodie was the instinctive choice. One layer away from his body, less personal, less...him.
