Page 80 of Rupture

The engine’s pitch dropped to an idle, then silence.

“We’re clear,” Ethan said.

“Thank Christ,” Luca muttered, unclipping his harness with a groan. He stretched, bones audibly popping. “If I seeso much as a speck of dust moving on its own, I’m torching this whole damn desert.”

The docking clamps protested, metal grinding against metal. Outside, voices barked orders, boots crunched over the hard-packed earth, equipment clattered.

Rose blinked, the blazing white scouring her skin after the abyss of the Dragon’s Breath. Was Thea here? Had she made it to this world of heat and noise, so violently opposed to the suffocating confines of the Io?

A barb of unease pricked up her spine. A loose thread she couldn’t quite grasp.

Rose exhaled sharply, pushing the thought away. The bombs were disarmed. They had brought the Io crew to safety.

That’s what mattered.

She climbedout of the shuttle, her legs unsteady.

Nik and Cade were outside moving through the medical team like predators among sheep, their fitted black tactical gear a crisp contrast to the paramedics’ loose white clothing. Had it really only been days since she first met them? Time had stretched, distorted in the darkness below.

A paramedic caught her elbow as she stumbled on the sunbaked ground.

“Easy.” He motioned to the nearest waiting ambulance. “Let’s get you checked out.”

The desert sun stabbed at her eyes and fine red sand caught in the breeze hissed against her skin. But the dry, searing heat?So good.

She tilted her face upward, soaking it up. Only now didshe acknowledge how deeply she’d doubted she’d make it back alive.

“Hey.”

The voice snapped her attention sideways.

Finn.

He pushed forward, eyes locked on hers. “I’m going with her.”

The paramedic opened his mouth to argue, but Finn’s expression shut him down before a word escaped.

Goosebumps formed on her bare skin. It wasn’t justwhathe said—it washowhe said it. Like there was no question, no reality in which he wasn’t by her side. Heat woke low in her belly, obliterating the hollow fear she’d carried for days. She had fallen for this rugged wolf in the dark. But here, in the brutal light of day, there was no hiding from her feelings.

This was real.

The paramedic hesitated, then gave a clipped nod and stepped aside.

Finn climbed in after her, the doors clanging shut behind him. He settled beside her. She leaned into him, pressing her ear against his chest. The steady thump of his heartbeat moored her to reality. Safe. She was safe.

They all were. Weren’t they?

The next fewhours dissolved into a series of fractured moments. They were driven to a single-storey hospital painted pale yellow. Vital signs checked, questions answered, forms signed. After the hospital cleared her, a driver transported her and Finn to a hotel on the outskirts ofthe town while the rest of the wolves mobilized back to their camp at the Dragon’s Breath entrance.

She climbed out of the car on unsteady legs with Finn while the driver hurried inside to confirm rooms. The late afternoon sun had softened to amber, casting long shadows across the hotel’s facade but heat waves still distorted the air.

Pale stone walls rose in elegant arches, white muslin curtains billowing from the windows above her head. In the cool gloom of the hotel’s reception area, she waited with Finn, letting her eyes adjust. Heavy wooden doors adorned with intricate ironwork opened onto a square courtyard. The high-pitched chirp of small birds drifted through the open doorway, mingling with the gentle splash of a central fountain. Flowers dangled from terracotta pots. Shocking pink, vivid purple. Bright colors vibrant with life.

“Dr. Wyndham.” The receptionist, a tall man in a crisp white dashiki, held out a key with a red tassel. “Your room is prepared.” His English carried a musical lilt.

Rose took the key and the white envelope he handed her. The message inside was brief. Margaret would arrive tomorrow.

She showed the note to Finn.

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