Page 111 of Walking Red Flag

I never caught up to the pink bitches.

Which was okay.

I mean, I had issues with my depth perception. I was allowed to be careful and cautious.

What I hadn’t expected was how slippery the snow was.

Not only slippery, but cold.

My feet were numb by the thirty-minute mark.

By the hour mark, when the first break in the trees came, I could finally see people again that weren’t the runners.

But, like all the other runners, I kept running and smiled when we hit a water station that was finally out in the open.

I headed for the end of the line like I always did, stopping to get a water from the person holding it out with two hands.

“Thank…” My voice trailed off as I looked up at the man holding the water and gasped.

I threw myself at that man and wrapped my arms around his neck, a keen coming out of my throat when I did.

“Hey, baby.” Cutter circled his arms around me. “Get your water and keep running. I’m freezing my balls off here.”

I giggled and pulled away, then reached for the water that he’d managed to hold steady despite my throwing myself at him.

Taking two quick gulps of both, I winked at him and kept running, my heart so damn full that it felt like it would burst.

Sure, logically, I knew that he needed to be at home taking care of business.

But my mind wasn’t logical.

It was quite illogical, really.

And the fact that he was here…

I kept a smile on my face until the next time I saw him.

And not only him, but my brothers as well.

“Y’all are all here?” I squealed as I waved like a maniac.

This time I couldn’t get close to Cutter or my brothers, but it didn’t matter.

I was freakin’ happy.

It didn’t even dim my spirit when I saw Mark, Gibson and Jacinda standing a little farther down from my family.

My audiobook saved the day, though, when I hit mile twenty.

By that point my head was spinning and pounding with each step of my feet.

Not even seeing Cutter, Dima, Nastya, Shasha, Maven and the rest of their crew could penetrate it.

I was done.

When I saw the six-mile mark ahead of me, I breathed a sigh of relief.

Almost done.

---