Page 33 of Under Fyre

Theopendoor.

Charlotte.

I jump off the bed, swiping my hands over my face. My feet pound into the carpet, over the cool hallway floor. The kitchen tiles are ice.

A gust of icy wind drives in a few flakes of snow through the open kitchen door.

My bare feet slap loudly on the kitchen tiles as I race through the kitchen and out the back. The yard is empty, as is the passage beside the house that leads to the street.

There’s a narrow gate there. Closed.

Grit, small twigs, tiny stones dig into my soles as I sprint down that passage. I rip open the gate, coming to a halt in the street with my breath fogging the air in front of me with desperate white puffs.

Nothing.

She’s gone.

My heart clangs inside my chest like someone banging on a steel drum. I spin around, searching through the shadows and the sparse, falling snow.

That’s when Arrow barks again.

I know that bark. I’ve heard it before.

Danger.

I’m running, turning the street corner a few seconds later.

“Hey,” Charlotte says, and then claps a hand over her mouth, her eyes going wide.

I’ve never experienced such a surreal moment before. I don’t know what I was expecting, but to see Charlotte calmly heading back to my house, Arrow pulling on the leash with her tail swishing happily…

That wasn’t it.

“What are you doing out here?” My throat feels too tight, like the cold air has solidified inside.

When Charlotte says nothing, I come up beside her and wrench Arrow’s leash from her hand. “You can speak,” I tell her gruffly, and quickly scan the houses nearby.

She’s naked under my trench coat—anyone who happens to look out of their window to see what Arrow’s barking was about will notice too.

“And cover yourself.”

She grabs both halves of the coat and pulls them closed, wrapping herself in the thick fabric. “Arrow needed to, you know,go.”

“Shegoesin the backyard.”

“Well I didn’t know that, did I?” Charlotte’s eyes are downcast—I can’t tell if she’s lying.

It makes no sense. Why not just run, if that’s what she’d been planning?

“Why was she barking?”

Charlotte snuggles deeper into my coat and casts me a sidelong glance. “There was some guy in the road. Guess she doesn’t like strangers.”

A guy? This time of night?

“What did he look like?”

She rolls her fucking eyes at me. “I dunno. Just some guy.”

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