“I was planning to hand out business cards.”
“Nate.”
“I got it.”
He vanished back through the brush.
I looked down at Destiny.
She was fading.
Not unconscious yet, but slipping. Her lashes fluttered. Her breathing stuttered. Blood slid from her temple into her hairline. Dirt clung to her cheek. Her burned palm was starting to blister.
I shouldn’t have touched her more than I had to.
I knew that.
Knew it like a law written in bone.
But when her head lolled to the side and she whimpered, something in me broke rank.
I slid one arm beneath her shoulders and the other under her knees.
She gasped when I lifted her.
“Sorry,” I said, meaning it.
Her body curled instinctively toward my chest, seeking warmth or safety or just the nearest solid thing in a world that wouldn’t stop spinning. She weighed less than she should have. Heat and tremors moved through her. Her hair fell over my arm in a dark river, soft even tangled with dirt and smoke.
Precious cargo.
That was the stupid phrase that hit me.
Not girl.
Not problem.
Not Edge’s daughter.
Cargo.
The kind you took bullets for because losing it was not an option.
I hated myself for the thought.
Then held her tighter anyway.
She pressed her face weakly against my cut. “You smell like rain.”
“There’s no rain.”
“There was last time.”
My feet stopped for one heartbeat.
She remembered.
Not all of it. Maybe not even clearly. But some part of her remembered me the same way I remembered her.
