Page 37 of Black Hand
“One …”
It felt like my heart was breaking. I could literally hear it.
“Two …”
His gaze locked on mine and his face softened under all the weight he was holding.
“Th—”
“Hey guys?” Alice cut him off and yanked on my arm. I almost dropped the part of the roof I was holding on top of us both because of it. “I know how we can escape.”
She was more alert, the initial shock she’d been under wearing off. Or maybe survival instincts had kicked in. One could never be sure when it came to the human. Then she spoke again and I understood what it was that made her look at Dominic and me with a fierce expression on her face.
“These fuckers killed all my animals.” Her voice broke and my gut clenched. “I’ll get us out of here if you promise to kill them all.”
“Deal, human,” Dominic answered eagerly, and he looked at her as if she was his savior. “Lead the way.”
“Follow me.” With a firm nod, Alice let go of me, and turning on her heel, she ducked under wooden beams, brick, and plaster avoiding the flames like a pro.
“Three!” the shifter snapped at me and moved.
I jumped away from the pressure, yanking my arms to my chest when the large part we were holding pressed heavily on me. My shirt tightened and I was sharply tugged until my back slammed into a firm, solid chest. Arms like steel bands tightened around me, and I was spun around to face Dominic, the top of my head barely reaching his nose.
“To you, sacrificing your life might be an everyday occurrence, Brooklyn.” His voice was low and so full of emotion it was choking me. “Don’t you ever ask me again to agree to something like that. Understood?”
My head nodded jerkily because I was too stunned to speak.
“Hey kissy face, are we leaving or are we getting a tan in the flames first?” Alice whisper-yelled so she could be heard over the roaring fire.
“You are waiting for us, human?” I almost choked on my tongue when I heard Dominic tease her. “I thought you’d be halfway to Chicago by now.”
“And leave you to get lost? Not a chance. You’ll be my hitmen now, and you’ll kill those fuckers one by one as soon as we get out of here.” She had no idea how close she’d hit the nail with the hitman part. Not about Dominic, but me. “This way.”
The salt circle was broken in multiple places, and I guessed that was the reason Alice could walk through it as if nothing was holding her out a few minutes ago. We were her shadows weaving in and out through destroyed rooms that she knew like the back of her hand. Alice was one surprise after another, and the longer I was around her, the more I learned about her. The fates must’ve favored me when we’d crossed paths.
“They’ll wait for us to try and escape,” I told Dominic, but the human heard me too, which made me frown.
“We are going down.” She stabbed a finger toward her feet. “Not up.”
The basement where I hid her came to mind, and a shiver clawed at my spine. I’d rather face the entire Syndicate and the raging inferno than go underground. Never again. My mind screamed in protest. Then a large hand wrapped around my icy-cold fingers, warming not just my skin but my whole inside. Glancing up, I saw Dominic looking at me over his shoulder.
“You will not be alone.”
Biting on the inside of my cheek, I gave him a nod.
“Here,” Alice called, pointing at a place on the floor toward the back of the house. “There is a trap door under there.”
Dominic started lifting fallen pieces of the house and throwing them haphazardly wherever he could. I moved closer to help, but hearing Alice cough from all the smoke didn’t sit well with me. She was helping too, dragging wooden parts with one hand while covering her mouth and nose with the other. The trap door came into view and the shifter ripped it off so he could open the fused seams. He jumped first, and after lowering Alice to him, I jumped into the dark pit.
My boots made a squelching sound as they sunk into muddy soil. The stench of moist dirt and mold was so strong my eyes watered, and I wondered if I didn’t prefer the fire to the smell of a freshly dug grave. Cold swat drenched my skin and my heart was beating frantically in my throat so I kept swallowing in hopes to push it down where it belonged. I knew it’ll be a long trip down this underground tunnel with my anxiety to the roof. The human was first to rush to wherever this claustrophobic place led to.
“What I want to know, human—”
“It’s Alice and you know it.” She spoke over him.
“…is why you have a hidden tunnel under your home,” Dominic finished undeterred.
“My dad believed the government would come to break in our home and take us all to camps because they were doing DNA research to breed us with aliens,” she said it all in one breath and so naturally it left us both stunned.
