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They’re aiming their guns right at us, all headed by that creepy scarecrow, Ephraim Jacobin.
No one says anything.
Eerie silence stretches on.
“Don’t even think about it,” Lucas warns in a feral growl, his body hard and battle-ready against mine. “This is official police business. We’ve got your boy dead to rights on attempted murder, Ephraim. Drop your guns.”
There’s a breathless moment where multiple sets of fingers hover over triggers.
Eyes narrow, sighting down the lengths of barrels, ready to end us both in a thunder of death we won’t even hear. Bullets travel faster than sound.
I’m almost too tired, too sick, too sad to be afraid.
I’ve almost died so many times tonight that if they’re going to shoot me, whatever.
We tried.
Still, that silence is far more unnerving than any threats.
Until a new sound splits the night, this wailing like a hundred angry ghosts.
Sirens.
Loud. Shrill. Fast approaching.
Enough of them to know there’s some major cavalry riding up on the hillfolk.
There’s a frozen moment as every head in the room snaps up.
Right before the Jacobins abruptly vanish.
I wouldn’t believe it if I wasn’t seeing it with my own eyes.
One minute they’re standing there, menacing as ever.
The next, they just melt away into the shadows like grizzled ninjas.
No.
More like cockroaches, scurrying off at the first hint of light.
Lucas slumps against me, then catches my chin in his fingers, tipping my face up to his so gently.
His lips brush mine.
I moan, whimpering the hot relief that rushes through me, the last of my energy collapsing, leaving me limper than a worn dishrag.
“Hey. Hey,” he whispers with a weary smile and a new shine in his warm, spring-green eyes. “You okay, Miss Lilah?”
“Best I’ve ever been. Who knew I just needed a fight and a bunch of guns in my face?” I joke, then jerk my arms, rattling the chains. “Now, if you could get me down from here...”
For about five seconds, I almost murdered Lucas Graves myself.
If only because that sarcastic, sweet, overprotective, dumbass man thought it was funny to make jokes about how kinky this could be before he unhitched me from the meat hook and put me down on my own two feet—only to catch me as my legs collapsed under me.
Whatever strength my survival instinct gave me disappeared.
And now, as I sit on a padded examining table at Redhaven’s tiny medical center, I realize I’ve likely still got some kind of sedative swirling in my veins.
I’m so ready to pass out.
It’s been the longest night of my life and now it’s just a blur.
Telling Lucas what happened, hearing his side, then repeating it all for Captain Faircross while he jotted down notes and asked questions that helped us piece everything together.
The nurses fussed over us the whole time and gave Lucas a well-deserved reaming when apparently he’d already taken a head wound from Culver Jacobin while he was out looking for me tonight.
Shit.
See, I should’ve choked him harder.
Kegels.
Next time, I’ll snap his flipping neck.
At least it’s finally quiet, though.
Neither of us can go home yet when we’re waiting for the toxicology report to find out if I was injected with anything worth worrying about. As soon as they have an ambulance ready, they say they’re dragging Lucas off to Raleigh for immediate head X-rays at a larger hospital just to make sure he doesn’t have a skull fracture.
I know he doesn’t.
He’s more hardheaded than a cantaloupe.
Of course, if he hadn’t been as stubborn as a bull to come after me, I wouldn’t be alive right now.
I keep thinking that over as we sit in the exam room, waiting for the nurse to give us the all clear.
I’m definitely going to the hospital with him.
I haven’t been able to let go of him except when the nurses forced us apart for exams, and right now we lean against each other, our hands twined and resting where our thighs press together, his thumb stroking over the lower edge of the bandages on my wrist.
We’re both a total mess.
Filthy, torn-up, bandaged, bruised, and we badly need showers.
Yet somehow, I’ve never been more content in my life.
“Missed you, jerk,” I whisper. I’ve got to be honest. I’ve got to tell him how I feel, put the thorns away when I know I almost lost my chance to talk to him forever. “These days haven’t been right without you. I don’t know how everything went so wrong—”
He touches his fingers to my lips. “They went off the rails because we’re both big headed and stubborn as hell, darlin’. Convinced our way’s the only way. We blow into everything temper first. You know what that means?” He chuckles. “We’re too much alike, Lilah, and I like it that way. Means nothing will ever get boring.”
I smile until I break.
“Honestly... after tonight, after the last few weeks, I could use a little boring.” I tilt my head to his shoulder, looking up at him. “But I don’t think I could ever get bored with you.”
