Page 78 of The World Undone

One more pump and I came into my hand, not even annoyed that I hadn’t had the foresight to grab a shirt or tissue first.

I cleaned myself up with my sweatpants before tossing them over the side of the bed. I’d do laundry later. Now that my raging hard-on was taken care of, I wanted another few hours of sleep.

But the universe had a different idea.

A single, sharp ray of light pierced through the window across from me, shining right in my eye like that was its only purpose.

I groaned, trying to slide back into a more blissful dream.

Ten minutes of chasing sleep and I still couldn’t catch it. Fucking hell, it was early.

I turned around, pressed my eyelids tight, praying to the gods for a few more hours of sleep. Hell, I’d be happy with twenty minutes.

Because when I woke up, it would mean that today was here. The day of our mission.

And while it had felt good, these past few weeks, to slip back into protector mode, to focus on a target, to have a purpose, I wasn’t ready to admit that this was our best shot. Wasn’t ready to admit that I’d failed, in all those hours spent poring over every document Evelyn and Levi had ever obtained from council, to come up with a better plan. One that would keep us all together. One that would keep her safe.

She’d stayed with the vampire last night, lucky fuck. He was the one who’d get to go with her on our mission too. But when Wade and Eli pressed him on it, presenting a logical argument as to why she should stay with one of us last night, he got that faraway look in his eyes, shrouded in darkness.

It was a look that made even me a little wary around the guy.

I’d nodded, and told them to fuck off. Darius might not be my favorite person in the world, but if there was anyone capable of bringing him back to himself, it was Max.

I would know.

Between her steady, calming presence, and Bishop’s ability to keep me busy, I barely even saw the visions of my dead teammates superimposed onto this reality anymore.

I still had nightmares every night, and still didn’t quite feel like myself, but over the last few weeks, the lasting marks of the drude had started to disperse.

My jaw clenched when I thought of Sarah.

She was still locked in that agony, alone and untouchable.

Shame burned low in my gut when I thought about her locked in that room, the last surviving victim of the drude’s attacks.

At first, I couldn’t bring myself to visit her, couldn’t stomach the sight of her pain, knowing intimately the depths of it.

Then, with the mission, I’d grown busy, letting myself get sucked back into protocols and planning.

With a sigh, I threw the blanket off of me and got ready for the day.

If my brain wasn’t going to let me soak in these last few bits of sleep before the hellstorm that was coming today, then it seemed only fitting that I go visit the girl I’d been avoiding for weeks.

“Max with you?” Rowan asked, emerging from a backroom as soon as I stepped foot in the medical center. “She should be sleeping. Resting up before today.”

I cocked a brow at him. He was going on the mission with her, and I knew for a fact that the guy had been sleeping fewer than two hours a night. When he wasn’t with his sister, prepping for today, he was holed up in this building, taking care of as many people as he could.

He was good at it.

“Ro? Something wrong?” Arnell emerged behind him, shirtless and hair rumpled as he quickly scanned the room for obvious threat. “Atlas?”

I nodded towards the room where Sarah was kept, but didn’t bother saying anything else. The one good thing about what I’d been through was that people stopped expecting small talk and niceties from me.

Not that they really ever did before either.

Ro grunted then tossed me a key before shuffling his boyfriend back into the room where they’d probably set up a cot to catch a few minutes of sleep during their vigil.

The med center had calmed down some and was unusually quiet today. Everyone was mostly asleep.

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