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It was like riding through a cloud, which would have been difficult enough in a truck with two headlights and four strong wheels balancing on the unsteady ground. But Eli wasn’t in his truck. And he sure as hell wasn’t practicing what he preached about not being reckless. Because the woman and the horse he loved were out there, and he was furious and terrified and determined to bring them home safely, no matter the cost to his own safety.
Such a hypocrite, a voice murmured in his head. But he couldn’t make out the voice.
“Tess?” he said aloud to himself. “Beth?” Or was it his own voice realizing what he should have known from the start…that there is no such thing as safe when it comes to the people you love.
The grass quickly grew thick beneath his tires, and if he could see past the fog in front of his visor and now starless sky, he’d probably notice white knuckles gripping the handlebars of his brother’s bike.
In the waning reach of his headlight, he swore he spotted a blurred figure ahead, one that looked like a woman on a horse. At least that was what Eli hoped he saw. But the vision was there and gone as the world around him plunged back into the foggy darkness.
The lights of the other bike bobbed ahead of him, but other than that, he could see nothing. Finally, he reached under his chin and yanked the helmet off, tossing it somewhere in the grass below.
It was still difficult to see but now only because it was dark and not because he was squinting through foggy glass.
He heard a male voice yell something indecipherable, and then he detected the unmistakable sound of a woman’s scream.
“Beth!” he called out, but the thick air seemed to swallow his voice. He twisted the throttle as far as it would go, then without a second of warning, the front wheel of the bike hit a divot in the grass, and Eli instinctively pulled on the brake—hard—which he realized too late was not the right move. The back wheel flew up behind him, and he was weightless.
Until he wasn’t.
His back smacked the damp earth a millisecond before his head. Every ounce of air escaped his lungs in a searing, painful rush.
Eli gasped. Or at least he tried to, but taking in even a mouthful of air felt like trying to swallow a knife. He thought it might kill him, yet he knew if he didn’t breathe, that would kill him. So he forced one sip of air and then another, all the while realizing that the longer he lay there, the more danger Beth was in.
Finally, he no longer felt like he was suffocating, until he tried to sit up. A growl tore from Eli’s throat, one that was coupled with the sharp, searing stab of pain in the right side of his chest and back.
Had he fallen on something? Was he bleeding?
Eli’s pained breaths came in short pants, and his vision was clouding again, which was weird because the fog wasn’t as bad down on the ground. But he felt oddly cold. And Beth and Midnight were still out there. And once again, he’d failed at protecting what was most important to him.
“Eli!” The woman’s voice sounded like she was shouting from underwater, but he swore it was Beth’s.
“Beth?” He tried to call out, but each utterance…each breath only made whatever was poking through his back and chest poke harder. He knew what it was now, but the knowing wasn’t going to make it any easier to breathe.
“Oh my god, Eli!” She dropped to her knees next to him. A second later, a bright light shone in his eyes. “Your lips are blue.” Her voice trembled as she spoke.
“I…messed up…again.” He sucked in shallow breaths between the words.
Beth lowered the small flashlight but left it on. He could see her now. She was okay. But Midnight? The men in the barn?
She shook her head, and he could see her cheeks were streaked with tears.
“This is my fault.” She hiccupped. “I should have told you I was coming, but I was so mad at you for not letting me help and for thinking I could possibly leave you and Midnight to do this alone. And now…”
A horse whinnied in the distance, and Eli saw flashes of red and blue in his peripheral vision.
“Midnight’s okay?” He groaned, coughed, then gritted his teeth against the ensuing pain.
She nodded. “The police are here, and there should be an ambulance on the way.” She swiped a fist under each of her eyes as she sniffled. “They got the bad guys,” she added, and it looked like she was trying to smile.
“How did you know?” he asked weakly.
She let out a tearful laugh. “Who else would Midnight let in her stall without making a sound? So I army-crawled under the door and waited with her until it was time to run.”
Despite every part of him screaming not to, Eli pushed himself onto his left elbow. His whole right side protested against the movement, which he made painfully clear with a hoarse but definitive “Fuck!”
“What are you doing?” she cried.
He tried to reach for her with his right arm, but he couldn’t lift it, not unless he had any plans to pass out soon after. Actually, he was pretty sure he was going to pass out even if he kept still.
