Page 13 of Swept for Forever
Black and white fur filled my vision. And I felt a wet nose close to mine.
Stiff-Neck’s dog!
My heart jerked back to life. If the dog were here, then he might not be far behind.
This is it.
My leg throbbed, my shoulder pulsed, and all I had were useless limbs and a rising dread. But the dog wasn’t growling. She was nosing my leg, sniffing the blood, then coming back to nudge my face.
“Lulu,” I rasped. I was pretty sure that’s what he’d called her.
She perked up at the name.
It was still just the two of us. She kept circling, restless. Maybe the man had ditched her. Or maybe she had more sense and ditched him.
Then she looked toward the top of the slope with her ears alert and her nose lifted, reading the air like only dogs can.
And she bolted.
“Lulu! Wait…”
She didn’t look back.
I sagged into the dirt, pain rolling over me in waves. My throat felt like dust. The river—I could almost taste it in the air. So close. But I couldn’t get to it. Couldn’t get anywhere.
My strength drained fast. I had to hold on to something. Anything.
To my left, I spotted something solid, maybe a stump. I crawled toward it, dragging myself like the hand of a clock, my injured leg acting as the center pin I had to pivot around.
It was the base of an old tree, long fallen, the bark worn smooth. My left arm hooked around it and didn’t let go. There was just enough space to rest my head. The moss met my cheek, and my breaths came slower.
I didn’t know who I was praying to. But in my head, I swore that if I made it through, this would be a story I’d tell myfuture students. People thought Physical Education was all push-ups and whistles, but half the syllabus was psychology. And right now? I was the living case study.
Was I proving anything? Or just stalling death?
I drifted. Then came back. And drifted again.
By the time I registered the sky again, it was sunset. If something hadn’t eaten me yet, maybe it had just taken a leg and called it a day.
The thought came too late, but it surfaced anyway.
I should’ve stayed on the trail.
4
DOM
The Lazy Moose looked exactly like the kind of place where a man could find peace. Wide, open fields. Sturdy ranch house. Blue sky stretching so far you half expected to hear a soundtrack swell behind you.
And also—horses.
I stood beside Noah, watching them from what I considered a safe, reasonable distance. “So, just to be clear…they can smell fear, right?”
Noah snorted. “They’re not sharks, Dom.”
“Disagree. They’ve got those big, intelligent eyes and that judging energy.” I gestured at one who was definitely staring at me too long. “See that one? She knows I don’t belong here.”
“That’s Caramel,” Noah said dryly. “She’s a sweetheart.”
