Page 81 of Into the Fire: After
Sharp in my heart.
Shadows and blood. Blood like shadows. Dripped down onto a forest floor that breathed like a beast below me.
Enemies above. Enemies below. Enemies around. Enemies inside.
Where do you run and hide when the ground itself isn’t safe?
Where is safe. What is safe. Lie. Fiction. Fantasy.
Brea
Nooneshouldlookso stressed while they slept. Taryn lay curled up on the patio couch beside me, the sleeves of her sweatshirt pulled down over her fisted hands, chin tucked against her chest, brow furrowed. She looked like she was sheltering from a bomb blast, not dozing on a chilly fall night.
Brooks sat on the opposite sofa, drowsy but still awake.
“Still feeling like we’re in an anti-climax?” I asked softly.
He placated me with a halfhearted smirk. “Hell, I’d kill for anti-climax about now.”
I looked back to Taryn. My light. My life. She’d been my salvation not so long ago. When my life had been an inescapable cage, she’d picked the lock and set me free.
Now she lived in a cage I had no earthly clue how to open.
“For what it’s worth,” Brooks said, jolting me from my thoughts, “Lin’s beating himself up in the bond right now. He feels awful.”
I sighed, moving to sit next to him. He wrapped his arm around my shoulders immediately, pulling me against his warm torso. “I don’t want any of them beating themselves up.”
It was bad luck that we were navigating how to live as a pack at the same time as how to process all theeverythingthat had happened to us. If it were as easy as being in love, we’d be golden, because the love was there. Deep, abiding love. The kind that made each of us willing to suffer or die for the others. We’d each proven that in one way or another.
Being a pack required more, though. We were still learning each other’s dynamics, how to best support and uplift each other, how to solve problems, how to be angry with each other and how to come back together afterward. It was enough to stretch any person thin.
Add in the mystery ingredient oftrauma, and no wonder we were all ready to snap.
Brooks rubbed his palm up and down my arm. “We’ve been through worse,” he said. “We’ll get through this.”
Oh, how I loved my sweet, sunshine beta. “We better.” I rested my head on his shoulder. “Because I’m not willing to give any of you up.”
Caine
SunriseoverFarendalewasa sight to see. Lin had finally drifted to sleep a few hours before, and I’d passed the rest of the dark hours traipsing between him and the group on the roof, making sure everyone was safe and well.
Well, well-ish.
Brooks and Brea cuddled together on one sofa, and Taryn lay in a fetal position on the other. She was the only one to stir as the first sunrays crawled over the patio. She sat up and stretched, squinting her eyes as she caught sight of me. “Morning,” she mumbled.
I approached her, resting my hand on the back of her head. “Morning, sunshine.”
She screwed up her face. “I thought things were supposed to feel better in the morning.” She sighed. “I still feel like shit.”
“Well, that may be you, or it may be Lin in the bond,” I said quietly to avoid rousing the others. “Becausehe’sfeeling like shit.”
“What? No!” she said, jumping up. “It’s not his—he didn’t—dammit!” She stormed past me and disappeared through the rooftop door. I followed after her, ignoring the sounds of Brea and Brooks rustling behind me.
I entered the apartment just a few steps behind Taryn, yet she’d already koala’d herself to Lin’s front.
“Imsorryimsorryimsorry,” she repeated against his chest.
His face was buried in the crown of her hair. “It’s okay, love. I’m sorry too.”
