Page 99 of Freestyle
She doesn’t argue when I slide one arm beneath her knees, the other around her back. She just sinks into my chest like she belongs there.
I carry her the short distance and ease down beside Nix, shifting so she’s wrapped between us, my arm around her shoulders, Nix’s good hand finds hers, his thumb brushing gently over her knuckles.
Nix’s voice is quieter now. Not weak, not shaky—just… subdued. Like even he can’t joke his way through what he saw.
“It was freeze branding,” he says, breathing shallowly. “Liquid nitrogen. I saw the setup right before I threw the punch. It was some DIY nightmare; canister, coil, the whole deal. Like he’d practiced.”
My jaw locks.
Freeze branding.
Not heat.
Not fire.
Something cold enough to kill nerve endings. Something calculated, and she felt all of it.
Rowyn’s curled against my side now, head tucked under my chin, her breathing finally starting to even out.
“It was always going to be all three of us,” she whispers.
Phoenix exhales first, like the truth finally found room in his chest. His hand squeezes hers gently, and then he glances at me with that infuriating, familiar smirk that’s somehow softer than it used to be.
“You hear that, Captain? Looks like destiny upgraded to a group plan.”
I bark a laugh. Half breath, half disbelief, and shake my head as I look between them, between home and fire, between the boy who’s always known me and the girl who makes me want to know myself better, and for the first time in my life…
I don’t feel split.
I feel complete.
Remy runs up and looks at the scene. “I called the paramedics. They’re on the way. I called your dad too, Gray.” He’ll clean this mess up where it won’t touch the three of us. At least he can do that right.
I relax against the fountain, holding Row and Nix in my arms.
Twenty Six
Rowyn
Thesterilescenthitsfirst.
Antiseptic. Bleach. Too clean to feel safe. It scrapes the inside of my nose like sandpaper, and makes my stomach turn.
Then comes the sound, a steadybeep-beep-beepkeeping time with the slow, rhythmic thud in my chest. It’s not loud. Not urgent. But it’s relentless, reminding me that I’m still here, still tethered to this body. Still fighting through the fog that clings to the edges of consciousness like thick smoke.
Everything hurts.
Notsharp, not screaming. Just a dull, blooming ache in my thigh and a heavy tightness in my chest, like I’ve been buried beneath something I barely clawed my way out of.
I blink.
The lights overhead are dimmed, thank God, but I still squint against the silvery haze of the fluorescents. The ceiling tiles blur and settle again. I can hear the slow tick of a clock, a soft shuffle of movement.
Then a touch.
Warm. Familiar. Anchoring.
Fingers lace with mine, bigger than mine, rougher. I turn my head toward the source of heat, and there he is.
