“You feel that?” I rumbled low.
Duke gave a little whimper, no question, sensing it, too.
I started to wind through the thick pines again, slower that time as I listened for any movement or sound.
Branches scratched against my arms and my heart rate accelerated. I was always fucking on edge because I never knew who might be coming for me.
This felt different than when I sensed one of those random trespassers hiking on my land.
Anxiety bubbled beneath the surface of my skin, awareness coming on that whoever was out there truly didn’t belong.
Adrenaline squeezed my chest, and I reached back to grip the handle of my gun that was hidden under my shirt and strapped into a holster at my back, not pulling it out but ready.
I never got complacent.
Never took the chance.
I followed in the direction of where the sensation was coming from, and I hopped off the path and weaved through the shrubbery.
Adrenaline pumped through my veins as Duke and I angled through the woods.
I hustled down a steep decline, soles of my boots skidding and digging into the damp, dark earth below.
The sound of the river grew. A loud whoosh of the water as it streamed down from the mountain peaks.
I slowed to a creep when that sense became all-consuming.
My skin prickled.
Someone was there.
Pulling my gun from the holster, I knelt low as I dashed between the cover of trees.
My breaths turned jagged and shallow as I edged up behind the trunk of an ancient oak and peered out through the limbs and leaves at the area that opened to the river.
Here, grass lined the bank, and it had a few of the same boulders that I’d traversed on my way down sporadically sitting along the water’s edge.
Through a break in two of the large rocks, I could see movement.
Someone concealed in the barrier the boulders made.
The flash of flesh.
The fall of long hair draped down a bare back.
What the fuck? Did someone have the audacity to take a swim in my river?
I swallowed down the murder that had been itching in my fingers, and irritation rushed in to take its place as I tucked my gun back into its holster.
This was my sanctuary.
Miles between me and humanity because I no longer possessed any of that.
Teeth gritted, I wound out of the cover of trees and moved toward the intruder, though my footsteps were somehow restricted.
It felt like I was sludging through quicksand.
Like time had been set to slow.
