Page 144 of Resurgent

A hand closes around my arm.

I barely have time to gasp before I’m yanked backward, spun around as the rain begins to pour in earnest. I stumble, but his hands drop to my waist, steadying me before I hit the ground.

Sheets of rain fall between us, plastering his dirty blonde hair to his forehead, and dripping from the sharp line of his jaw.

I try to step away, but his hold on me tightens just enough to keep me from pulling away.

“What the fuck is wrong with you?” he demands, breath rough from the chase. “Are you trying to get yourself killed?”

Water runs down my face, but I don’t wipe it away. I just glare up at him through the rain, chest heaving.

“You told me to leave,” I shoot back, my voice shaking more than I want it to.

Lightning flashes somewhere beyond the tree line, illuminating the fury carved into his steely expression.

“That’s not what I meant, and you know it.”

I try to wrench my arm free, but his hold only shifts—firmer now, anchoring me in place.

“Let go,” I snap.

“No. You don't run from this. You don't run from me. We talk. You fucking yell at me for being an asshole if you have to, but you. do. not. run.”

Rain pounds against the ground around us, drowning the clearing while thunder cracks closer this time.

For a moment neither of us moves, neither of us ready to concede as our emotional standoff rages.

I'm about to try for another escape when he pulls me into his rain and sweat soaked chest, infuriatingly melting away my anger as his heart races against my ear.

“You don’t get to run,” he whispers, his voice lower now but no less intense. “Not when there are monsters hunting in these woods that we can't trace.”

“Maybe I don’t care,” I confess, but he ignores my outburst as he wipes my cheek.

“You don’t get to run from me.”

The words hang between us, swallowed by the rain.

And for the first time since he grabbed me, the heat in his eyes isn’t anger.

“Hunt—”

“Yes, Seiri?”

His gravelly, seductive tone obliterates every one of my defenses as he leans down, his lips skimming down the side of my neck. The heat of his breath followed by the cool night's air, leaves my skin pebbled in goosebumps he doesn’t seem to notice.

“You can’t do that out here,” I half-heartedly argue. “Anyone could see us.”

He chuckles against my skin, but he doesn’t stop. Kisses slowly trail down my collar bone, igniting my skin before he even reaches the swell of my breasts.

“You know as well as I do that we’re the only ones out here,” he murmurs, his warm breath sending shivers down my spine. “And even if we weren’t, you love the risk of being caught.”

“I do not.”

“Seiri, you’re a terrible liar.”

Before I can protest, his lips are locking with mine, and I’m being lifted into the air as he stalks toward the trees behind the Riding Tack House.

Slowly, he lowers me back to my feet just before my back is pressed against the trunk of the tree.