Page 83 of Death Trap

“Watch out,” I shouted.

Before she could spin around, they reached over her, seized me, and yanked me out of the hole so fast, I thought they dislocated my shoulders. As I lay on the cobblestone, I glanced back at the door. The light flashed once more before extinguishing completely, leaving only the uneven stones still smeared with my blood. No sign of the Hell apartment anymore.

We had just made it. Who was I kidding?I’djust made it.

I flopped onto my back and stared up at the inky black sky. My limbs were heavier than cement, yet my head was floating like one of the ships on the bay. At the corners of my eyes, the shadows closed in, and I remembered in my daze the two figures who had pulled me out.

Halflings—they had to be. And that meant they had gotten Tamara, too.

Now they were coming for me.

But I was too tired, too drained to fight them. To even move.

The darkness closed in, and for an almost blissful moment, I thought maybe I had been mistaken and had imagined the shadows. Maybe I was just falling asleep.

My eyelids, now as heavy as the rest of me, closed. A peacefulness enveloped me so tightly, I felt safe, despite everything we had just gone through.

Halflings or not, there was nothing I could do about what was going to happen next. I was a sitting duck. An easy target, and within seconds, they could tear me to shreds. Or if they weren’t really there, I could just drift off for a bit. Regain my strength that way and have enough energy to then consider our next move.

I hovered on the thin edge between consciousness and unconsciousness for a bit, but before I could teeter over, the sound of someone calling my name drifted to my ear.

“Jade.” Spoken with fear and a twinge of anger. “Jade.”

That voice I could never forget. Even though I’d tried so hard for these last couple of months.

But it couldn’t be him… It couldn’t. Of all the places he could be, why would he be here?

“Jade? Get up, Jade. Dammit. Get up!”

Cole?

My eyes snapped open so fast, bursts of colors exploded in front of my vision for a few seconds. My stomach wretched, but when I rolled over to spew out my guts, nothing came up.

Charming.

“Cole?” I whispered against the blur of colors still clouding my vision. “Cole, is that you?”

When the shadows came into view, they were still hovering over me, but no snarls or rotten egg smell came from them.

“Jade?”

Not Cole, but another male’s voice I knew. I blinked rapidly until my eyes focused. Eli’s dark hair and handsome face appeared in front of me. Worry weighed heavy on his expression as he peered down at me.

“Oh, thank God.”

The other shadow leaned in, revealing a very shaken-up Simon in his long black robe.

“Jade…” He sighed heavily, in relief and disappointment. His specialty.

I rubbed my forehead and tried to push myself up to look around them for Cole, but my head whirled and I wavered.

I heard him. He has to be here.

“Careful now. Stay down. You’ve lost a lot of blood,” Eli said, easing me back onto the ground.

“It’ll take a few minutes for your wounds to heal and your energy to be restored, now that you’re out of there,” Simon explained.

It always amazed me how much information he knew.

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