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She wouldn’t be there.
And then ahead, around the side of the shops and beside the brickwork, I saw her figure curled on the tarmac, solitary and vulnerable.
“VEX!”The shout came from me without thought, as if sending sound ahead of me would stop this hallucination from slipping away.
She looked up, eyes wide.
It was her.
Twenty feet.
It wouldn’t be real.
It was a nightmare. It was why I hadn’t been able to sleep. Because I knew this is what I’d be met with if I did.
Her expression crumpled as she saw me, and she tried to get to her feet. She was weak, stumbling the moment she straightened, crashing back to her knees.
Fifteen feet.
I could carry her home.
She didn’t have to be strong right now.
Ihad strength for her.
Ten feet—and this was the point where the dream would end in a nightmare.
This was the moment I would wake—reaching for a blank ceiling with nothing but the fading scent of raspberry treacle, and the image of haunted, golden eyes.
Five feet.
Please, not this time.
Please…
Then I collided with her, my jeans ripping on tarmac, my hand around the back of her head to catch her as I failed to stop my momentum, sending us both into the ground.
My own breath caught, each one thicker and thicker as hot tears broke free.
She was real.
She was in my arms, and she was real. Her scent of raspberry treacle was real, filling my lungs.
Her fists were at the back of my shirt, low heaving sobs coming from her chest as she clutched me to her tiny frame.
“I’ve got you,” I told her.
I could do nothing but hold her close, unburned adrenaline shaking me to the bones. “I’ve g-got you, Vex.” My voice was a thick stammer as I made a promise I’d hit the grave before breaking. “I’m n-never letting you go.”
Never again.
I’d die fighting for pack lead if Love even hinted we might leave her behind.
Finally, she released me just enough that she could draw back. Her pale face was streaked with tears, makeup free, nose a warm pink.
But her eyes…
All of those pictures and videos paled beside the real thing.
