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“What?” I asked.

Leo grabbed my arms and pulled them over my head, then planted his hands back on my waist. “Grab Adrian’s hands.”

I didn’t have time to let out a scream as Leo launched me upward.

Adrian grabbed me before gravity could pull me back down, quickly setting me upright on the parapet walkway.

“Thank you,” I whispered, but Adrian had already turned away from me, the air around him filled with tension as he aimed his gun at the river below.

Leo and the rest of his soldiers scaled the wall just as easily as Adrian had, leaving the charred bodies of creatures below.

The fighting continued in the distance, smoke rising from different spots throughout the city, and I wondered again if I should stay.

Leo stepped next to me and watched the smoke rise with me, lowering his voice so only I could hear. “You’ll never make it across the base on your own. You’re injured.” He lifted his hand, running it lightly down my cheek.

I stopped breathing.

It ached where his cool skin touched mine, a bruise already forming from the impact of being thrown into the ground from the grenade’s explosion.

Leo removed his hand, shaking his head. “If we had time, we would help you . . . But we have to keep moving.”

“Why? Where are you guys going?”

“Up the mountain.”

That was hardly an answer.

If they were special ops, they may have been debriefed on something I wasn’t aware of. And he was right, I would never make it anywhere far on my own. Not in my condition and not without backup.

I had no choice but to go with them.

Leo extended his hand to me, knowing I had made up my mind. “Let’s go.”

We’d been running for over a half hour.

In normal circumstances, this would be easy. I ran this mountainside every day.

But these were not normal circumstances.

My mouth was dry, my head throbbed miserably, and my ears were still messed up from the grenade blast. I hadn’t heard the water’s roar until Gray Waterfall was directly in front of me.

I was exhausted, concussed, and Niall was dead.

He had sacrificed himself so I would survive.

I tried not to think of Hunter somewhere out there with a claw buried in his chest, too.

“We’re almost there,” Leo said, staying by my side while the rest of his group ran farther up ahead.

I felt wetness above my lips and swiped the back of my hand across my face, pulling it back to see dark liquid smeared across my skin.

Blood.

My nose must be bleeding.

Noticing the blood, Leo slung his gun across his back and scooped me up all in one casual motion.

I was once again in this stranger’s arms, but I was too tired to protest.