Page 43 of Sweet Torment

My thighs burn. My lungs feel like they’re on fire. I’ve been running for hours. Four? Five? Time means almost nothing to me now. It’s a cycle. Run until I can’t breathe, hide until I hear their voices, then run again.

The only way to get a break is to go up.

Bark scrapes against my legs as I climb higher. I just need to breathe and think. And I need my body to stop betraying me for five fucking minutes. Twenty feet up, I wedge myself between two thick branches and try to remember how to be human instead of… this.

“Come out, come out, pet!” Carter’s voice carries through the trees, sing-song and mocking. “We can smell that sweet hole calling to us!”

They have all the advantages. They aren’t fighting against their own bodies. I can’t outrun them forever. It’s not a question of if they catch me, but when. And what they’ll do to me.

Everything escalated so quickly. No time to adjust.

“The longer you run, the harder we’ll fuck you when we catch you,” Nathaniel calls out, closer than before. “Might as well give in now while we’re still feeling nice.”

“I bet she’s touching herself up in one of these trees,” Maverick laughs. “Fingering herself, wishing she had a cock instead.”

They’re maybe fifty yards away. Too close. But my legs are shaking so badly I don’t trust them to hold me if I climb down. I pull out my water bottle and force myself to drink. The protein bar tastes like asshole. My body is burning up from the inside out, clenching around nothing, nipples so hard they hurt.

Something warm starts to build under my skin. An aching pull.

Weller.

No. Can’t be. He’s not here. None of them are. It’s a heat-induced hallucination. A ghost of the bond screaming for something that isn’t here. My mind is manufacturing comfort that only makes the reality of this worse. Thinking of Weller’s safe arms around me only highlights the hell I’m living.

My mind is starting to crack.

A breeze shifts and for a second, I swear I can smell Owen. Black currant and spice. It’s so real I look around, expecting to see him. But there’s nothing. Just trees and more trees. The scent is gone as quickly as it came. Then another trickles in on the wind, fig leaf and burnt amber. Tristan. My heart aches with longing.

“I can smell her arousal from here,” Carter says, and he’s definitely closer. “She’s practically begging for it.”

The bond pulses again, stronger this time. Like Weller is—no. Stop it. Get a fucking grip.

And just as that thought fades, I scent honey and cedar in the air. Freddie. I let it wrap around me like the hug I need right now.

“Found something!” Nathaniel shouts. “Fresh tracks!”

Their voices start moving away.

Shit. I need to use the opportunity to build the distance between us.

I half-climb, half-fall out of the tree, my legs barely holding me when I hit the ground. Everything hurts. My inner thighs are so wet it’s embarrassing. My tank top is torn, pants ripped at the knees, everything clinging to my sweat-soaked skin. All of the mud is gone, my skin too slick for it to stick. I run in the other direction, trying to throw them off. But I’m moving like I’m drunk, stumbling over roots, the heat coming in waves so intense I have to stop and press my thighs together.

The forest floor is a blur of greens and browns. My feet catch on another root and I go down hard, the air knocked out of me. Lying there, gasping, a wave of pure despair washes over me. I’m not going to make it. They’re going to find me, and I’m too weak to fight them off.

Please, I think, the word a silent scream to the sky. Please, please, please.

I crawl to my knees and then stand. Legs wobbly. I begin moving, no clue which direction I’m even going.

“There you are.”

I spin around. Carter steps out from behind a tree, blocking my path. He’s bigger than I remember from dinner. His scent, leather and sugar, makes my body flood with want.

“Fuck off,” I snarl, backing up.

“Such a dirty mouth,” he says, advancing slowly. “I can’t wait to put it to better use.”

I pull my knife, my hand shaking. “Stay back, asshole.”

He laughs. “You’re seriously going to fight me? When you can barely stand?”