Page 67 of Sweetheart: Part One

Something real.

Alive.

And I felt it through the bond in one soaring instant of peace. Before he grabbed our connection and sealed it shut, blocking us out just like he always had.

NINETEEN

VEX

My heart thundered in my chest, bare soles pounding against cool grass.

It was just me, in the dead of night, fleeing through a maze from a psychopath I’d just stolen from.

A psychopath that the universe had decided was my fated mate.

I crashed into the wall of a hedge, launching all of my momentum into the first turn.

Ebony’s aura shivered in the air: a threat. But if I could reach the next corner, he wouldn’t know which way I’d gone.

Another cross road, and fifty per cent became twenty-five.

Then twelve.

I’d done it. I slowed at last, a wild grin on my face as I turned, half expecting to see him on my heels. Instead, the maze was quiet, his aura thinning in the air around me.

It was dark, and around me rose the scent of flowers and grass beneath a blanket of night, no sound but my footsteps and the rustle of my own arm catching the scattering of a million tiny leaves that made up the maze walls.

He didn’t know where I was.

I hadn’t thought too hard about what he’d do if he caught me—I really, really hadn’t.

I’d stolen from his room and left it in shambles. But I was desperate and running out of time.

I had one night left, and he was my only hope.

It had been the most precious item I’d taken—my omega instincts told me that.

And Ebony Starless might truly kill me for it.

EBONY

The blood pounding in my ears was deafening. It elevated every time I heard the soft padding of footsteps.

Everything else melted away.

Who I was, what I’d become. There was no fame. No chains holding me down, suffocating me.

I was on the hunt. She was my prey, and I wouldn’t lose. I hit an intersection and stopped. I listened to the low rustle of wind through the trees.

Footsteps.

I chose my turn, launching into a sprint.

I’d win. She didn’t have an aura like mine. I liked fair games, but she’d set the goalposts—she knew what I was, and hadn’t ruled it out.

Did she truly think she could win?

I hunted for a few silent minutes, fixated on nothing but sight, sound, and smell, prowling past each corner with a vicious need to see her around it.

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