Page 85 of Bird on a Blade

“Almost there, my perfect prey,” he says, tucking a loose lock of hair behind my ear. “I know it hurts. I know you’re cold.”

I nod, curling my fingers around the wounds. There’s no threat of me bleeding out—Sawyer knows where to cut. But they still hurt like hell. And I am frozen solid.

“I’ll make sure you don’t get lost.” He tilts his head across the clearing. “Now run. Make it look good.” Behind his mask, his eyes catch the moon and gleam. His voice drops into a rough, dangerous growl. “Bleed for me.”

And despite the cold, the pain, my aching muscles—my panties are soaked.

I stumble backward, kicking up glittering flakes of fallen snowas I cut across the clearing, leaving footsteps and trails of blood in my wake. The snow hasn’t quite stopped completely; the last few flakes that drift through the air look like stars.

With the cuts on my arm and the heavier layer of snow on the ground, I can’t run nearly as fast. Worse, the damp is seeping into my shoes, making my feet burn with cold. It’s a relief when I make it to the tree line, where most of the snow is caught up in the tree’s branches, forming a cathedral of white overhead.

I shamble along, running and stumbling, and Sawyer follows. My limping footsteps will help sell the story, which is what I tell myself as I push forward. My entire body shivers; my lip throbs where Sawyer bit me, a reminder of his kiss. And the cuts on my arm burn nearly as bad as my feet. The blood seeping through my fingers is hot and sticky, and it pours down my arm to splatter across the forest floor. A trail of deception.

Every now and then, I hear a crack in the woods, and I glance over my shoulder to see Sawyer lurking behind me in his mask, his bloody knife at his side. He urges me on, knowing what’s waiting for me at the end of this chase.

The end of one life. The start of another.

It’s not long before the woods clear out and the river appears up ahead, a black expanse against the brilliant white of the snow. I make it to the rickety old pier and stop, leaning against the railing. The wind here is as sharp as Sawyer’s blade.

“Keep going, perfect prey.” He stops just behind me, his hand on my hip. “Only a little further now.”

I look over at him. At some point, he took off his mask, and Sawyer, my Sawyer, gazes down at me. He presses his forehead to mine, eyes closed. I expect him to kiss me, but he doesn’t. He just breathes me in.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Remembering the way you look right now.” He straightens up and steps back. The wind whipping off the river pushes his hairaway from his forehead to show his heavy, furrowed brow. “How you looked when you gave up everything for me.”

I smile through my shivers and my pain. “It was always you, Sawyer. Even when I couldn’t see it.”

Something flashes across his face. Happiness, I think.

Then he leans in and kisses my forehead. Presses his mouth to my ear. “Go. It’s time to drown.”

I laugh at that—would Sawyer Caldwell ever kill by drowning? But I turn from him, and I run the length of the pier in one burst of strength, shaking my arm so the blood splatters across the wood. At the end, waiting for me, is a small, cozy boat. He’s fixed it up with a thick flannel blanket, a silver Thermos I don’t remember ever seeing. A First Aid kit.

I stop and look out at the shimmering mountains. The snow like falling stars. The endless, velvet cold.

And then I jump, somehow landing on both feet in the boat, somehow not tilting the whole thing over. I grab the blanket and slump down on the little seat, wrapping it tight around my shoulders. A few seconds later, Sawyer follows, moving slowly and carefully. He hands me the Thermos.

“Hot cocoa,” he says. “With marshmallows.”

I laugh, delighted. “You’re kidding me.”

“Absolutely not.” He smiles up at me, his expression almost shy. “I knew you’d be cold. I just hope you like it.”

He watches me as I take my first sip. I do like it. It’s dark and hot and sweet. Just like him.

As Sawyer rows us away from the pier, I sip at the hot cocoa, shivering wildly beneath the blanket. The wind is brutal on the water, but Sawyer moves quickly until we catch the current that will take us half a mile downstream, where his truck is waiting. Where our future is waiting.

“Let me see your arm.” The boat pushes along on its own, and he kneels in front of me, carefully guiding my injured hand out from under the blanket. My entire body vibrates from the cold,but his hands are as warm as fire. He pushes the sleeve up, tugging gently against the cuts. Even in the dark, they look angry and cruel. I know they’ll scar, but I don’t mind. They mark me as his.

We don’t speak as Sawyer dresses my wounds, cleaning the blood away with witch hazel and then wrapping them in bandages from the First Aid kit. When he finishes, he kisses my blood-streaked palm, then rises up enough to kiss my blood-streaked mouth.

“Is this really what you want?” he whispers.

I cup his face, trembling in the cold. It feels like the end of the world, all this darkness, all this cold, all this blood.

But all I can feel is hope.

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