“Rue,” I cut her off, turning my head to look at her. “You have a concussion. You haven’t eaten, and you’re throwing up. My arm is bleeding again. If we don’t stop and decompress for five fucking minutes, we aren’t going to make it to Arizona. We’re going to make a bigger mistake than this car, and we’re going to get caught. Both of us.”
She stares at me, her green eyes wide and luminous in the shadows. The defiance in her expression slowly crumbles, giving way to the sheer exhaustion she’s been fighting since the crash. She looks so small, swallowed by the passenger seat of a car that isn't hers, trapped in a life she didn’t ask for.
Without thinking, I reach across the center console. My fingers brush against her arm.
She flinches, a tiny, involuntary movement that feels like a knife to my gut.
I pull my hand back immediately, my jaw clenching. “Try to sleep,” I tell her, my voice turning cold again to mask the sting. “I’ll keep watch for now.”
I turn away, staring out the windshield into the black void of the desert, wondering how much longer I can keep this wall up before the proximity of her completely breaks me.
24
RUE
The engine blockticks as it cools, the only sound in the suffocating silence of the desert. The heater is off now, and the chill of the early morning creeps back into the stolen SUV, settling over my skin.
And there’s no way I’m sleeping.
I stare at Noah’s profile in the dim light. He’s looking out the windshield, his jaw clenched so tight I can see a muscle ticking beneath his skin. He looks pale, worn out from the last week of running, and the gunshot wound that is currently seeping fresh blood into the dark fabric of his hoodie.
He won’t look at me.
“Noah,” I murmur, my voice raspy.
He doesn’t turn his head. “You really should be sleeping. There’s nothing to worry about. I’m keeping watch.”
“But… There’s nothing out there to even watch. We’re completely hidden.” I swallow hard, fighting the lingering nausea from my concussion. “I think we should… talk or plan or something.”
His gaze remains fixed on the dark thicket, but his broad shoulders stiffen. “About what? The way I suddenly make youflinch when I reach for you? Am I suddenly just like Matthew, too?” The ice in his voice tears at my heart.
“That’s not what it was,” I argue, my voice gaining a fraction of its strength. I unbuckle my seatbelt, the click loud in the enclosed cabin. “I think my ribs are bruised. My head feels like it's going to split open. I was just thrown around inside a wrecked Pathfinder, and my nerves are shot. When you touched me, I flinched because I’m in pain, Noah. Not because I’m repulsed by you or something.”
He finally turns his head, his pale blue eyes catching whatever faint light filters through the windshield. The icy, detached expression he’s been wearing since he came out of the lake falters, just for a second.
“Your arm is bleeding again,” I say, shifting in the passenger seat and turning my body toward him. “You're pushing yourself too hard with all this.”
“Welcome to survival,” Noah mutters, but his voice lacks its usual venom. He leans his head back against the headrest and closes his eyes. “It’ll be fine.”
Except that the bandage needs to be checked.
“Take the hoodie off.”
His eyes snap open, narrowing at me. “What?”
“Take it off,” I demand, reaching out across the center console. This time, my hand doesn’t tremble, mostly because I don’t want him to die on me or something. I press my palm flat against his chest. “I need to see the bandage. If you bleed out in the front seat of this stolen car, we aren’t going to make it to Arizona.”
For a moment, I think he’s going to push me away and tell me to go to sleep again. He stares down at my hand against his chest, watching the way my pale fingers curl against the dark fabric. Beneath my palm, his heart is hammering—a frantic, heavy rhythm that entirely betrays his calm exterior.
“You don’t need to play nurse, Little Rabbit,” he says, the nickname slipping out low and gravelly.
“I’m not playing anything,” I snort. “Lean forward.”
A heavy, charged silence stretches between us, drowning out the whistling wind outside. Finally, Noah lets out a ragged exhale and leans forward.
Because of the tight space in the front of the SUV, I have to lift myself onto my knees, hovering over the center console to help him. The proximity is immediate and charged. My knees press against his thigh as I reach for the hem of his hoodie, carefully pulling the fabric up over his torso.
It takes the T-shirt with it.
