Page 28 of Blood Moon
They moved fleetingly, and I caught a glimpse. A hint of familiarity: dark hair. Warm brown skin. Burly physique. They lurched forward in a bolt, and by the time I could register anything else, they’d vanished.
I was filled with astonishment, but in the next moment, the branch snapped. A shrill sound crawled from my chest as I fell. There was no pleading to the heavens, no time to make a bargain. And Bobby, he’d be devastated when he received the news.
Blackness met me when I landed, plopping hard into a sort of hole. I peeled open my eyes, expecting to take in beaming light and a staircase within the clouds.
Instead, it was the woods. A cluster of trees and broken blue sky. I was alive and safely tucked in the arms of Julian Santos.
The first thing I noticed about him was how bright and wide his stare was. How his brows knitted together with concern. When he moved his lips to speak, I couldn’t make out the sounds that came from his mouth. I was overtaken by confusion and skepticism.
How,howdid he catch me?
It had been Julian at the top of that cliff, running toward me in a fuzziness of color and light. I glanced to where I’d fallen from, finding no clear path down. The best option was to jump. A task that should have been impossible without shattering every single bone in his legs and up his vertebrae.
Julian spoke, his voice soft, delicate. Different than he’d ever been around me. He brushed away some of the hair on my face, fingers scorching hot as he touched me. “Are you okay?”
He measured me intensely, and I followed his eyes as he hovered, pressing in as if trying to dig for what I knew, what I’d seen.
Trepidation loomed between us, and it was difficult to look away from him. But the recollection of the fall hit me again. I wasn’t supposed to survive. I was supposed to be flattened out on the broken path beneath us. I was supposed to be sewn into the undergrowth.
And I wasn’t. Because of Julian.
I opened and closed my mouth, struggling to form words until I coughed out, “How?” I looked at the cliff once more. The fear I’d had. “How?” I said again, my voice still hoarse, but my question was more a plea of desperation as I tried to understand.
Julian didn’t even blink. “Are you okay?” he asked slowly, and honestly, I didn’t know. My body felt foreign to me in his arms, and I wasn’t expecting to be able to walk away from this. When I didn’t respond, he gave me a single nod, and then said, “I’m going to put you down now.” But I tensed, locking onto his arms, clinging to his chest.
He paused, steadying me again.
I was afraid of moving. Afraid that if he put me down, I’d wake up and realize I was dead.
Julian took a breath, his rib cage expanding against my own. It brought a sense of comfort. He smelled of oak, and an earthy musk I couldn’t name. But all I knew was that I was safe. And nothing mattered more than remaining that way.
There was a slight flare in his nose. His arms twitched. A fluttering heartbeat before he gently said, “I want to make sure you’re not injured, that you can stand on your own two feet. But in order to do that, I have to put you down … okay?”
I didn’t respond right away, and he seemed to respect that, giving me time to come around to the idea.
When I finally agreed, he released me, helping me to my feet. A sudden chill met me once we parted, and I gripped at his forearms, seeking stability. He held onto my waist until I felt comfortable to stand without him.
At once, he stepped back, gave me space I didn’t ask for. “How does everything feel?” He inspected me, probably in search of open wounds and broken limbs.
My feet tingled, and my hands were shaky as I wiped my palms on my knees. I was fine. No abnormalities, or even pain, at least not in the moment.
“Okay, I think,” I said, and as I did, a rush of emotions fell over me, my voice breaking. “You saved my life,” I croaked, and I bent over, fighting to breathe. A part of me wanted to curl into a ball while I stared at the base of an English oak tree for days on end. The other part of me, the part that was logically sound, couldn’t comprehend how Julian did it.
“I’m … I’m pleased you’re unharmed,” he uttered. And then, “You shouldn’t be hiking in these woods alone. It’s not safe. You could have seriously injured yourself or died,” he said, his voice evening out.
Julian seemed upset with me—not angry, no. That didn’t fit. Rather, he was disappointed, relieved. An emotion I never expected from him when he’d been so unforgiving about my presence at Lakeland, when a mere twenty-four hours ago, he’d expressed how he loathed me.
But he was correct that these woods were dangerous.
I scanned our surroundings, looking for an enraged bear rummaging between the trees. It had mutilated that poor, forsaken soul. How horrendous. I stumbled back, the shock hitting me like whiplash.
“There … there was a bear,” I said, my words coming out in fragments as I prepared to run. “It killed the man, it—”
Julian’s voice was low and unwavering, his features too calm for my liking. “It’s no longer there.”
“But how can you be sure? It killed a man. Someone is dead.” I heaved forward, feeling faint.
“I saw it, too, and I can assure you that it’s long gone.”
