Page 142 of My Undead Love Life

I blinked before I realized I was taking short, shallow breaths behind my scarf, not enough to fill my lungs. Panic had crept in so quietly I hadn’t noticed it had been fucking with me.

“I’m okay.” I tried to take a deeper breath.

“You’re not.” His blue eyes filled with concern.

“Keith—”

“Breathe slower.”

Mad glanced back at me. So did Oxi. Luck did, too, and he tripped again because of it.

“I’m fine,” I said again.

Keith’s brows furrowed. “I know you are. Breathe slower anyway.”

I forced myself to inhale through my nose, slow and careful, then exhale against the damp fabric of my scarf.

Once.

Twice.

And finally, the burning in my chest eased a little. Not much, but it was enough.

“Good girl,” Keith murmured.

Heat streaked through me despite the cold. Then, the wind hit hard enough to shove snow into my eyes, and the moment vanished.

We kept moving. The world narrowed to my boots lifting and falling.

Crunch.

Drag.

Crunch.

Drag.

The road disappeared beneath the snow, and I couldn’t even tell when we left the road altogether. A line of trees hunched along the left side of us, their branches heavy and white. Beyond them, empty fields stretched out in every direction. No houses or barns or cars that hadn’t been drifted over and abandoned months ago.

Nothing.

Oxi was right. There was fucking nothing out here.

My fingers curled and uncurled inside my gloves, but I couldn’t feel the motion anymore. My toes were beginning to feel strange, too, pain and numbness trading places with every step.

Mad slowed at the front and pulled the map out just enough to look at it, shielding it with his body while the wind tried to rip it from his hands. Keith moved beside him, both of them bending over the paper while snow collected on their shoulders.

“Shit,” Mad muttered.

Keith’s voice was barely audible over the storm. “We passed the marker.”

“The marker could’ve been buried.”

“The creek should’ve been before the tree line.”

“It could be frozen over.”

“Or we drifted too far north.”