Panic has me in such a tight grip that I can’t really think. I wrap my arms around me and bend to press my forehead into the soil.
Every worry from the past week flashes past in my head, getting stuck on repeat so I see the same things over and over and over again.
“Nadia?”
I should answer. He probably thinks I’m having hysterics. Maybe I am. Maybe this is exactly what that means.
All I know is when I open my mouth, I can’t say anything. I snap it shut. If I leave it open, I’ll howl, and I don’t know right now if I can stop.
His footsteps come closer, and I can’t… I just can’t… I bolt to my feet again, running without knowing where I’m going. My shoulder slaps into a black birch, hard as a punch. Flakes of its charcoal-texture skin rub off on my tee shirt, but I don’t stop, just turn to avoid the next and sprint in a new direction.
The dense bush hinders me at every turn, slapping my face with leaves, poking my body with branches. Piles of dead bracken and live silver ferns make my feet slip and slide. I twist my ankle, hobble for a few steps, then get back up to pace.
My lungs are on fire as they draw in each new breath. I half expect to see a curl of flame with each exhalation, a puff of smoke.
A stitch settles into my side, the muscles of my diaphragm screaming at me to stop.
I can hear Malakai behind me, and I panic, thinking he’ll catch me, he’ll stop me, he’ll drag me back to the car and I’ll have to sit there beside him, thinking of how every time he touches me, he’s thinking of his girlfriend and why didn’t I even think to ask what he was doing, why he was escaping?
There are fools, there are idiots, there are suckers, and then there’s me.
Even with his light feet, he makes enough noise for me to know he’s gaining. I twist and head in a new direction, turned around so badly I don’t know if I’m heading deeper into the brush or back to the car.
My heaving lungs aren’t getting enough oxygen to fuel my panicked flight. Stars dot across my vision, then turn dark, black holes that suck all the colour from the day.
“Nadia.”
I swivel, just escaping his outstretched fingers but it takes three of my steps to match one of his. I can’t stay out of reach. Not for long.
I drop, curling into a ball, directly in his path.
His long legs hit me, the blow searing a strip of pain six inches wide across my hip and back, then I spring to my feet as he goes flying. I turn, my slight frame finally an advantage. Zipping back in the opposite direction.
What if he’s hurt? What if that thump as he hit the ground was his head hitting against a rock? Or a felled stump. Or whacking against a tree trunk.
I twist, trying to look over my shoulder while I continue running and my foot snags on a fern, catapulting me forward to land almost flat, my hands only just saving my face from disaster.
Even prone, I continue to scrabble forward, using my elbows, my knees, my feet to gain inches along the forest floor.
Then a hand seizes my ankle, dragging me backwards like a creature from beyond the grave in a horror movie. Another fixes on my knee, then the first moves to my hip.
I try to flip over but he kneels on top of me. His hands move to hold my forearms against the ground, not hurting but not giving me any room to manoeuvre.
“You ran,” he rumbles in a deeper voice than I’ve heard him use before. “You ran… and I caught you.”
CHAPTERELEVEN
KAI
Nadia fights me,whipping her head to the side and snapping her teeth, trying to bite. I ease my full weight onto her, revelling in the sensation of her bucking underneath me. The twist of her hips as strains to shift position.
I know she didn’t run to provoke this contact. My end game didn’t factor into her mind at all.
She freaked out at my news, my casual misuse of the word girlfriend.
An overreaction that would delight me if I weren’t scared I’ve broken whatever connection we were building.
When she stills enough, I lift off her briefly, turning her face up before settling my weight on her again. Forearms pinned above her head. Staring into her wary eyes. Her glance enough for me to know she’s unsure if I’m going to hurt her.
