Page 212 of A Love Like Venom

Fiend curses at him furiously. “You fucking moron! One more minute we stay here andweare dead. They will kill us as soon as they see us. Is having her really worth your life?”

Razor contemplates for a moment too long, glaring at Reed and I the entire time. In the distance they’re footsteps grow louder. Time is ticking for him as it is for us.

“Razor!” Fiend presses, grabbing his shoulders urging him to get up.

“This isn’t over,” he promises me.

“No, it’s not,” I agree. Because the only way this will be over is with all of them dead.

Gunshots blaze through the air. I watch as Razor and Fiend begin their escape. They dodge bullets as they run as fast they can. Fiend fires shots back. The one handgun useless against the men of Vipers MC.

I close my eyes and hold onto Reed with all the strength that I have left. I’m terrified of what will happen if I let go.

“Stay with me. Please,” I cry. The only response I receive is his short ragged breath. “Please. I loveyou. Stay with me,” I plead with him.

He shifts slightly next to me and whimpers. “I don’t . . . think . . . I can,” he chokes out along with more blood.

“They’re over here!” I hear Oak call out to his brothers. He sounds distressed, worried, afraid. I imagine he would. He’s probably going to lose his best friend.

They’re footsteps come hard and fast. I hear them gaining.

“Live for me, Reed,” I say to him desperately. Even as I ask him to live for me I can feel myself slipping. My head feels woozy. Like I am submerged underwater and drowning. I can no longer feel my limbs. Everything has gone numb.

Another faint kiss is pressed to the shell of my ear. It’s so soft that I barely feel him graze the skin.

Maybe this is what the stars had planned for us all along. Maybe this is our fate. The both of us were born in tragedy. It would only be fitting for our deaths to be the same.

He exhales and I inhale.

I exhale and he inhales.

We give each other our very last breaths both hoping that it will give life to the other.

“I love you, Reed.” I exhale and I wait for him to inhale. I wait for what feels like an eternity but it never comes.

It never comes.

Alice

Ican feel it before my mind can even register what it is I’m feeling.

It’s more than pain.

It’s as if the entire half of me has gone missing.

I’m not whole.

For what feels like the first time in a very long time I take a breath. As I do the first gasp of air burns my lungs with something fierce. I want to exhale. To release the burning sensation in my lungs but I can’t. I can’t exhale because I know with every fiber in my weakened being that he isn’t here to receive it. So, what’s the point? What’s the point in breathing if he’s not here?

The longer I hold my breath the more it stings. Tears press at the back of my eyes giving me much needed moisture. God, they feel dry and grainy.

An insistent beeping sound increases by the second. It accelerates the longer I hold my breath.

And it dawns on me that I am in fact not dead.

I’m not dead.

Then why do I feel like I am?

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