Page 128 of Hunting Pretty

He’d come to my rescue.Mydemon.

A rush of relief came over me as I watched from where I huddled against the tomb, scraped knees chilled in the wet grasses.

The sound from his snarled mouth wasn’t human. He was out of fucking control.

His blade glinted in the lamplight.

He was going to kill Pierre.

All at once I felt myself returning to my body as if in a crashing wave.

Pierre knew something. He knew the name of the person who sent him.

Scáth stabbed his knife into Pierre’s chest.

“No!” I scrambled across the path, my head throbbing terribly. “Stop!”

I shoved Scáth off Pierre. And he let me.

Maybe it wasn’t too late?

I knelt beside my bleeding attacker, my hands pressing against the blood-soaked wound in his chest, trying to keep him conscious, to keep him talking.

His breaths came in shallow gasps, his eyes glazing over.

I leaned in closer, my voice shaking.

“Who sent you?” I yelled. I needed him to stay with me. “Tell me!”

He coughed, a wet, ragged sound, blood staining his lips. His eyes flickered to mine, and a twisted smile crept across his face, even in his pain.

“…won’t stop…” he rasped, his voice barely audible, “…coming for you…”

A chill ran down my spine, my heart pounding in my chest. He knew who hired him, who was trying to stop me from digging into Liath’s death.

He knew who took Liath.

But he was slipping away, his breaths growing weaker. I could feel the time ticking down, feel the answers slipping from my grasp.

“Who?” I demanded, my voice breaking. “Tell me their name!”

My breaths came in desperate little gasps as I stared down at him, willing him to give just one last gurgling gasp for air.

I just needed one name.

Just one fucking answer.

I searched Pierre’s half-opened eyes for any sign of life. With a spike of panic in my heart, I found them glassy and distant, the broken capillaries a far more vivid color than his irises.

He was gone.

“No!” I screamed, my voice tearing through the quiet, raw with fury and desperation. I pounded the ground beside him, hopelessness sinking into my bones.

He was dead.

My lead was dead.

And now I had nothing.

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