The energy between us shifted, and the teasing look in his eyes made the room feel too warm. Whenever I was around him, I didn't feel like I was just going through the motions anymore. I felt alive—and as much as I hated to admit it, we didn’t have the time to indulge in this...whatever the moment was trying to be…so I used humour to defuse the tension. “You might look all tough on the outside, but you’re just a giant ball of smoosh, aren’t you?”
He huffed a laugh and tucked his knife in his belt, directing his attention to the window. “Maybe you bring it out in me.”
“Maybe,” I agreed, stepping up beside him.
Cruz gave me a sideways look that lasted a beat too long, and just when my heart had begun a distracting pitter-patter rhythm, he broke the connection and pressed his face closer to the glass. “We need one of those strips of material,” he said, sliding the window open.
While I reached into the pocket of my cargo pants, he moved in behind me and swept my ponytail to one side. A shiver passed over me as he unzipped the main pocket of my backpack. I tried my best to hide my reaction, but I had a feeling nothing would get past him. He pulled out one of the bottles of alcohol we’d collected earlier, and the sound of him dragging the zipper closed filled the quiet.
My breaths were coming too quickly for someone who wasn't currently doing anything strenuous, but the way he touched me had all my nerve endings coming to life. He took a minute to prepare the bottle with a vodka-soaked scrap of fabric then slanted me a look. “Ready to light it up?”
I swallowed and nodded, unable to maintain eye contact with him for long. His knowing look confirmed my suspicion that he was able to read every expression on my face, and it left me torn between embarrassment and amusement. I pulled the firelighter from my rear pocket and depressed the trigger. The flame flickered, and for one fleeting moment, something innocent and sweet passed between us.
Cruz wrapped his fingers around my wrist and guided my hand to the mouth of the bottle. The fabric caught fire, and he released me, leaning out the window to throw the bottle along the length of the building. I watched his muscles shift and flex just before the sound of smashing glass rose to greet us.
He ducked back inside and lowered the window. “Time to run.”
The lightness had left his expression and my heart rate kicked into gear again. I shoved the lighter back in my pocket and rushed to the door with him, excited to take another step closer to freedom. Instead of being cautious and continuing with the measured movements I’d perfected since we started, I barged out into the hallway like an idiot without even stopping to look, listen, orthink.
I hadn’t even drawn a weapon in readiness.
Before Cruz could finish warning me to slow down, I smacked straight into a wall of heat and muscle and cried out in surprise. The shock of stopping so violently hit me first, quickly followed by the smell. Body odour and stale weed. A solid, sweaty body covered in a black tee and jeans. Dark, scraggly hair.
Not one of the dead.
He recovered before I did and shot a hand out to grab onto my ponytail, yanking me off to the side of him like a stray, feral cat. “Here she is,” he said, his voice calm. His grip tightened in my hair, and he pulled me close enough to press something sharp against my side. “We’ve been looking for you, darlin’.”
“Let me go,” I forced out through gritted teeth. I tried to twist away from him, but the pressure of the sharp object increased and fear streaked through me. I felt it in my bones, in my muscles, in every frantic thump of my heart. A scream rose in my throat, but I closed my mouth just in time. Making any noise would only attract the kind of attention wedidn’twant. We had no backup, no crew coming to save us. It was just Cruz and me.
Cruz stopped in the doorway and took in the scene. When I saw his expression... the look in his eyes... I let out a breath and my tension eased upjustenough to handle the situation without losing my mind.
“Why don’t you stay over there, mate?” the man said to him. “Then you won’t have to watch me snap your girlfriend’s neck.”
“Take it easy," Cruz said. His attention shifted between me and the man. When his jaw tightened and his eyes took on a feral glint, I almost felt sorry for the man beside me.
Cruz wouldn’t waste a precious bullet on him. Gunfire would only bring the others running, and we needed all the ammunition we had left for our final sprint to the car. He had another idea in mind, so I paid attention and waited for cues…
And somewhere hidden in the terror, I found a thread of steel that I grabbed onto and pulled. And pulled. Gathering threads until my panic faded into the background and logic pushed through.
The gang hadn’t chased us around the city all afternoon to kill me the second they got their hands on me. They had plans for me. Theywantedme, even if it was for a deplorable reason—and that fact alone made me valuable. This man needed to avoid a physical confrontation with Cruz so he could take me back to their base, but Cruz understood what was going on, too. I could see it in his eyes.
They wanted me alive.
Preferably uninjured.
The more I allowed that thought to grow, the more it fuelled my anger and inspired me to stop waiting around for Cruz to fix this for me.
The man tightened his grip on my ponytail and dragged me backward, pulling hard enough that I stumbled while I tried to keep up with him. A breath wrenched from me, and I grabbed his wrist to stop him from tearing my hair out. He moved within a few steps of the stairs that led down to ground level and paused, his breaths harsh while he ran through his options. If he wanted to take me with him, he had to stop Cruz from coming after him. He couldn’t control both of us and get to where he needed to be at the same time.
Cruz strode toward us with murder in his eyes and his hatchet hanging from his clenched fist. I still had a free hand and two weapons in my belt waiting to be put to use.
Without another thought, I yanked out my knife and slammed it straight into the man’s thigh. The sensation of skin and muscle giving beneath my blade felt different from all the times I’d taken down the infected, and bile rose in my throat as I ripped it free and felt warmth spurt against my leg. If he didn’t bleed out from the wound itself, the infection from a knife that had plunged into so many of the dead would surely finish the job.
I’d just killed a man, only he wasn’t dead yet.
He bellowed and released his grip on my hair, then reached for me again because he knew he’d just lost his leverage. I could see it in his eyes, feel it in his desperate movements. His fingertips brushed the sleeve of my t-shirt as I dived to the side. Cruz went after him, and I watched with my heart in my throat as he shoved his shoulder into the man’s solar plexus and sent him flying down the concrete steps. The man came to a hard stop at the bottom, thunking against the unforgiving concrete. Neither of us knew if it would be enough to keep him down.
“Come on.” Cruz and I hurried down the stairs and stopped at the bottom. My attacker stirred and opened his eyes, and Cruz bent over him to smack his hatchet handle into the side of his head. He collapsed onto his back unconscious.
