Page 31

We were nearly to the edge of the fire’s light, nearly out of arm’s reach of anyone, when Fox jerked back, and I went with him since he kept his grip on me. Arthur had shoulder-checked him roughly, but he didn’t say a word. He stared hard into Fox’s eyes, lips thinned into a fierce line like he was thinking about fighting him there and then.

The silence was plenty clear. His loaded stare was a warning. If Fox ignored it? I wasn’t sure I wanted to know what would happen. I didn’t want to think things could get worse than getting tossed into the creek and left for dead.

Fox stared back, fighting silently with his brother for another second, then walked on. I eagerly kept up as heavy glares bored into my back. Like Lot’s foolish wife, I glanced back if only to count my enemies and commit their faces to memory in case I saw them in a police lineup of suspects.

One caught my eye. One with a head of reddish-brown and freckles across his nose. The man who had hidden himself from me before slunk out of the shadows, meeting my gaze for the briefest moment.

I could have sworn—

It couldn’t be—

Fox jerked my arm, plunging me into the cold dark of the forest past the firelight’s perimeter.

As soon as we made it a couple hundred feet away, I whirled on Fox. Drawing in a sharp breath, I readied to hurl my questions at him.

He put his hand up to stop me before I could get in a single word. “Don’t.” It was cold and final. Then, weaker, “Just don’t...”

The burning questions stalled on the tip of my tongue, the air begging to burst out of my throat, but if Fox wasn’t ready... “Fine.”

Turning away from him, planting my feet in the snow, I decided I would take the time walking back to gather my thoughts and formulate the most dire and important questions to get to the heart of the issue. If I was smart about it, I might even be able to figure out what Everly had to do with all of this. She was clearly connected, and I had every reason to go straight to the police to point a finger at Arthur Winter.

I didn’t know what was going on yet, but if I figured it out, there was a chance to find her. That chance burned in my veins, thawing the ice and keeping me going even though I should have given up when my ankle gave out and the sun went down, taking all its heat with it. Now my ankle clicked every other step, and the laces strained to keep the swelling contained, cold air buffering it.

I’d taken little more than three steps when Fox lunged, grabbing me by the sleeve again.

I hissed through clenched teeth, “What now?”

I had only a glimpse of his shadowed side-profile. His eyes narrowed as he leaned in, looking deep into the dark woods behind us.

I didn’t smell anything. No sign of an animal. No hint of his brutal cousins coming after us.

Then a crashing sound caught up to my ears, and seconds later, Ben popped out of the brush with his phone flashlight blinding us and rifle swinging at his side.

My shoulders sagged with relief as I blurted, “Where were you!”

“Right behind you the whole time, of course,” he grunted, then marched right past us like he couldn’t be bothered to ask what happened.

I wasn’t sure what that meant. I wasn’t sure what he’d seen. I didn’t know if his frigid mood had something to do with what he witnessed.

To be honest, his mood was starting to piss me off. If anyone should be pissed off, it should be me and Fox. The guy just got beat up and tied to a tree, and I was forced to kiss him in front of a bunch of freaks to get him untied.

Ben was acting like I kicked him, striding three paces ahead and never looking back to make sure I kept up.

If he was still brooding because I told him to go back while I went ahead to save Fox, he had no right. I risked myself, no one else.

I crossed my arms over my chest, gritting my teeth hard enough to make my jaw ache. No one was saying anything, and I still didn’t know what was going on. At the peak of my frustration, fed up with everyone and everything, the time it took to get back to the cabin was wasted on my barely restrained wrath. Instead of honing down my racing thoughts to the most poignant questions to ask Fox, I was biting back a scream of guttural rage every other breath.

When we reached the gravel drive outside the cabin, Fox’s car was still there, door open, battery dead. Ben kept power walking like he intended to walk all the way back to campus, but at the last second, he spun around to break first.

“This is all your fault,” he exclaimed, pointing a menacing finger at Fox of all people.

I balked, blinking rapidly. Had he waited three more seconds, I would have been the one in a yelling tirade, but Ben caught me off guard when his anger exploded at Fox. Not me.

“Excuse me?” Fox scoffed.

Ben came stomping back, hands balling into fists after he threw his rifle to the ground. Not exactly proper gun safety... He shoved a finger hard into Fox’s chest, nostrils flaring. “This is your fault. Whatever is going on with your stupid family, you know what it is, and you’re not doing a damn thing about it. In fact, you seem content to keep dragging Rae into it and getting her hurt.”

“Is that so?” The taunting note wasn’t helping Fox make his case, and I wanted to intervene, but Ben beat me to it. He grabbed Fox by the collar, two fists tangled in the front of his shirt, and tried to throw Fox to the ground.