Page 124 of Elas

I hate everyone who’s ever given him a reason to be afraid.

My nostrils flare and my ears twitch as I dig into my senses. The usual clinical smell of this place has an undercurrent of one I recognize but can’t identify. Leather, of course, but it’s mixed with something almost sweet. There’s no question they’re headed in our direction, and the clomp of boots on asphalt tells me they march on the road outside. I wedge a chair under the door handle, then drag the couch against it.

“Elas? What’s happening?”

His voice is so fucking small. I stop and focus on him, cupping his cheek and getting closer so he doesn’t miss a word. There’s no time to sugarcoat the situation, and my heart breaks as I watch the fear in his eyes grow.

“I’m afraid we’ve overstayed our welcome, baby, and right now I need you to listen to me. You can do that, can’t you, doc?” He nods, nostrils flared. “Stay behind me at all times. Everything I say, everything I tell you to do, you do it. Do you understand?”

“B-but—”

“Tell me you understand!” I hiss, grabbing him by his biceps as his eyes go even wider. “Keep close behind me, and if something happens to me, you run.”

“El, no,” he whispers, but I give him a small shake to snap him out of it.

“Yourun! Just like we talked about. You get to the SUV, and you drive through that long stretch of fence as fast as you can. The impact will hurt, but you can push through it. You have to keep going.”

“Don’t make me leave you,” he begs, and I pull him in for a rough kiss, knowing we don’t have the time to spare. “I can’t leave you. This is my fault… all of this is my fault. I’m sorry, El. I love you, I’m sorry, I—”

“We don’t have time for blame, baby. We have to go now.” A choked sob works from his throat, but he nods. Bars cover the window from the outside, but it’s our only exit. Making as little noise as possible, I slip the pane from the frame and glance at August over my shoulder. “Are you ready? We have to move fast.”

He nods again, chin trembling, as I wrap my hands around the bars and listen. The exterior door to the barracks opens, and I wait for it to close before mustering all my strength into one mighty shove. Metal creaks and groans as the bars separate from the wall outside, and I throw them to the ground as I force August towards the window.

Startled voices rise from the hallway as he climbs through, and the door jostles as someone shouts my name. I don’t even glance back, barely squeezing my bulk through the window and landing beside him in a cloud of dust. I take his hand and run, sprinting to the next building and pulling him behind it. We move as silently as possible along the wall, but it blocks my view and forces my ears to take over. Footsteps change from the heavy thud against concrete to the padded thump against the dry soil, moving in multiple directions.

They’re trying to flank us.

We make it to the largest outbuilding, closest to where we parked. I stare at the SUV, easily three hundred feet away, and curse myself for not moving it closer. Being found out was always a possibility.

This was always a risk.

A stampede of footsteps fans out, and I close my eyes as I try to think. We could make it to the fence on foot, but the open fields that surround this place would be our downfall. There’s nowhere we could hide that they wouldn’t find us. The barren wasteland would be our grave.

The SUV is our only option. I turn to August, his chest heaving but eyes focused. “We have to run, baby,”I whisper as quietly as possible, reaching up to drag my fingers along his cheek. “Remember what I said. You run, sweetheart, and you don’t look back. No matter what, you don’t look back.”

Fat tears well in his eyes, but I don’t give him a chance to respond. I take his hand, relishing the perfect way we’ve always fit together, then wait for the optimal opening. I take a breath, then another, and we dash off into the night. A deathly silence stretches with only the thud of our feet on the ground before a furious yell breaks the stillness, and they’re on us in a stampede of sound and motion.

Two hundred feet.

Dirt explodes from under my feet, each impact ricocheting through my body as my screaming muscles push me beyond my limits. Sweat stings my eyes and my lungs feel like they’re full of thorns, but we don’t slow down. We can’t. I shove August ahead of me, forcing him to keep my grueling pace and making myself a barrier between him and the threat.

Metallic clicks of a gun’s mechanism warn me a split second before a deafening gunshot explodes into the night, the bullet so close it whistles past my ear. A hair to the left, just a few inches, and I would’ve been down. August would’ve been theirs. Adrenaline scorches through my veins as we move even faster.

One hundred feet.

White hot fire lances through my shoulder, a scream trapped in my throat as the bullet tears through my flesh. The world tilts, and August falters, but we can’t stop.

“Go!” I shout, my teeth clenched against the searing pain as the rising surge of their anger crashes aroundus. Barked orders and furious shouts command them to shoot, and gunfire rains down on us like hail.

Fifty feet.

Another shot misses.

Thirty feet.

Agony rips through my thigh as a bullet shreds muscle and shatters bone, the impact sending shockwaves through my body. A deafening roar of pure, unadulterated terror and rage bellows from me as my knees slam into the ground. Fear like I’ve never felt incinerates me from the inside, my eyes never leaving his body.

August is there.

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