Page 158 of Swept for Forever
“I was,” he rasped, still fighting for breath. “Until I saw this gymnastical octopus otter.”
A broken laugh tore out of me, half-cry, half-cough. “That’s not a real thing.”
“It is now,” he groaned, leaning his forehead against mine.
I brushed his dripping hair back. Our kiss tasted of blood and river water, but we didn’t stop, not until our lips started trembling too hard to keep going.
He huffed. “God, what I would give for a dry pair of underwear.”
I couldn’t argue with that.
He pulled me up. “Come on. We’ve got to get out of these wet clothes.”
We stripped to our underwear and wrung out the rest. The sun was still going strong, but this wasn’t some California beach. We were shivering.
Dom spotted a flat rock not far from the bank and tugged me toward it.
“Lie here,” he said, motioning to the sun-warmed slab. He stayed upright, his arms around me, scanning the woods like he expected trouble to crawl out of it.
“You’re freezing too,” I said. “You need warmth.”
“I’m fine, Otter. Just let the sun do its thing. We don’t know how long we’ll be stuck out here.”
Then came footsteps, fast and heavy. Coming through the forest.
Had the river swept us to safety or straight into something worse?
Dom sprang up, pulled me behind the rock, and yanked our clothes from the grass. He shielded me tightly.
“Get ready to run,” he warned.
Please, God, not back in the water.
“Dom! Autumn!”
My breath caught. “Is that…?”
Dom lifted his head just enough to see over the slab.
I braced, expecting Stiff-Neck and Pickle to charge out of the trees.
“It’s Boone,” he said, his voice cracking with relief. He straightened, and so did I.
Old Hound Boone barreled through the trees like a man half his age, his men flanking him.
“Over here!” Dom waved.
“How did they—?” I asked.
“I shared my location with him,” Dom said. “It must’ve cut out way before I made it to the lodge, but hey, they didn’t have to work too hard to figure it out.”
He helped me up, still keeping me behind him and shielding me from view.
“Guys! You all right?” Boone called out, peeling off his jacket and tossing it to Dom with a nod that it was for me.
Dom draped it over my shoulders.
Buffaloberry’s own Deputy Granger arrived a beat later and handed his to Dom.
