“If you could be eating anything on our tree date, what would it be?” I ask.
He chuckles. “Tree date?”
“That’s what we’re doing, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” he agrees. “I’d be eating pizza.”
“Do you still have it with just cheese?”
He laughs and I feel the rumble through my back. It feels good. “Is there any other way to have it?”
“Um, yes. With toppings, like pepperoni and mushrooms and onion…”
“Fuck no. That shit ruins it. I don’t know who came up with the idea to put all that crap on it, but it should be the way it’s intended. Cheese only.”
“How boring.” I scrunch up my nose.
He snorts. “What about you, little one?” he murmurs into my ear. “What would you eat?”
“You can’t guess?”
His fingers find my belly and slip beneath my tee to stroke over my skin. “If nothing has changed then it would be your nanna’s apple pie.”
My heart aches at the memory of my beautiful nanna. God, I miss her. I miss her so much. Is this my punishment for what happened to her? My heart aches at the thought.
“Stop it,” Noah says softly. “Don’t let that get into your mind. What happened to your nanna was not your fault, Lara.”
“It was and we both know it. I mouthed off and was overconfident. I got myself into trouble and she paid the price.”
“You can’t do that forever, blaming yourself. She wouldn’t want that. You have to let go, Lara. You have to.”
“I’m trying,” I whisper. “I really am.”
“Keep talking. Focusing on that is only going to hurt. Keep talking with me, give me this night with you.”
“Okay, Noah,” I whisper.
His fingers trail lower, sliding over my hip bones, making it all feel better. The way he always does.
“So we have food for our tree date covered. What else do we need?” I say, voice wavering.
“That a stupid question?” he asks in a husky voice.
“Noah.” I laugh softly. “We’re in a tree. I don’t know how you think that could work.”
“I could make it work.”
I gasp as his fingers slide beneath my panties to find my aching sex.
“This is wrong,” I whimper. “We’re probably going to die tomorrow.”
“All the more reason for me to touch you once more,” he whispers against my ear.
His finger glides down over my clit and he carefully slips one inside. I moan and arch back against him. It feels good. So good.
“You’re wet,” he murmurs. “Fuck.”
“Noah,” I half warn, half plead.
“Hush, let me do this.”
He moves his hands in that skilled way he has, working my body until I’m on the edge, fingers latched onto his arms, nails gliding along his skin. In and out his fingers pump until I can’t take it a second longer. I explode with a cry, my entire body trembling with a much-needed release. Making a pleased, throaty sound, he slides his hand from my panties.
“That was worth every second,” he murmurs against my ear.
“What about you?” I whisper into the darkness.
“It isn’t about me.”
This man. Could he get any better? Why did I deny him for so long?
“Get some rest, Lara.”
“I don’t want to fall,” I admit, even though my eyes are heavy with exhaustion.
“I’ll never let you fall, don’t you know that by now?”
Yes.
This man.
* * *
The sound wakes us.
I don’t know it at the time, through the fear and terror, but that sound is going to haunt me for the rest of my life.
It starts off in the distance, just a low hum that wakes us from our sleep. It takes a moment to wake up and when we do, I realize the sound is getting closer. The sound of a car, maybe a bike. I’m not sure when it’s this far away but it’s coming closer by the second. My heart jerks to life and I know there will never be another day in my life that I’ll wake with this much fear.
There isn’t a single word in the world to explain it. It starts at the top of my head and consumes my body right down to my toes. My chest is so tight I can’t breathe, my stomach twisting violently and my head spinning. I thought I was strong enough, but hearing that sound coming closer has me questioning everything.
“Noah,” I plead.
What I’m pleading for, I don’t know.
“Lara,” he says, his voice tight and so full of fear it makes my skin prickle.
“He’s coming.”
He takes a shaky breath. “He’s coming.”
The sound nears and I realize it’s not a car, but definitely a motorbike. Maybe an off-road one. It’s traveling slowly, which means he knows where we are. How does he know where we are? We’re above the cameras.
“He knows where we are,” I say frantically.
“Fuck,” Noah curses.
“How does he know where we are?” I yell.
“I don’t know, but we have to move. We’re high, he won’t get a clear shot of us. We have to move, Lara.”
He stands, pulling out a spear and a rock from a branch he leaned them against. He tucks the spear into his jeans and clutches the rock in his hand. I do the same, standing on trembling legs. I don’t think I can move, let alone climb across trees.
“Move,” he barks.
The bike comes closer and my vision blurs as the terror clutches my body. We’re going to die. Goddammit. I don’t want to die.
“If you see him, don’t be afraid to hit him,” Noah yells, grabbing a branch and taking himself higher. “Let’s get higher.”
The bike is right beneath us now, the low rumble like torture to my ears. Tears run down my cheeks as I move higher. Then it stops. It just stops. That scares me even more.
Through the silence, a voice rings out. “You think I can’t see you.” A male. Familiar. I’ve heard that voice before. “I can see you. Are you ready to play?”
“Noah,” I sob.
“Keep moving, Lara.”
“I wonder what I should do to you today,” the voice calls. “I don’t want the game over too suddenly, and you’re making it far too easy for me, climbing those trees. How far do you think you’re going to get?”
“Don’t answer him,” Noah growls. “Move.”
“You can only climb so far before you have to come down. Or I can shoot you up there, but that won’t be any fun.”
I hiccup.
“Scared, are you, Lara? I knew you would be. You’re going to be the one I leave alive longer. It’ll be fun to watch you beg for your life. I could have picked your friend Rachel for this, but she has sass that girl.”
I freeze. Rachel. How does he know about Rachel?
“Did she tell you about our date?”
I shake my head, trying to remember.
“She was so gullible, really. I charmed her socks off and got even more information about you, and the silly girl thought it was because I was into her. Can you imagine?”
I jerk. This man was the one Rachel went on a date with? Oh God. She went on a date with the guy trying to kill us. He got that close? He got that close. I gag. Reality hitting me like a sledgehammer.
“Focus, Lara,” Noah calls. “Don’t listen.”
Tears cause my throat to tighten. My fingers tremble as we climb higher.
“And you, Noah. Thinking you can outsmart me. You can’t outsmart me. I’ve thought of every scenario, including the one you’re in right now. Which one of you will I hurt today? Eeny, meeny, miny, moe…”
“Noah,” I cry.
“Move,” he barks. “Now, Lara.”
With shaking fingers, I keep moving, climbing higher. The voice below goes silent and trepidation clutches my chest, because that’s never a good thing. He’s quiet for a reason. That reason is made known in a matter of seconds when an arrow comes shooting through the tr
ees and right past my leg.
“Noah,” I scream.
“Move, Lara. Move!”
“I can see you, foolish idiots,” he yells from below. “You think I can’t, but I can. Stop moving, you’re making it too easy.”
Stop moving. He’s right. Each movement we make has the trees rattling.
“Don’t stop moving,” Noah says, as if reading my mind.
“If we move, he can see us,” I whisper.
“He can see us anyway. Moving gives us a chance.”
Laughter from below.
Another arrow comes barreling through the trees, getting lodged in a branch above Noah’s head. Bile burns my throat. Noah reaches up and jerks it out, shoving it in his pants. We climb, moving from branch to branch, but those arrows keep coming. Flying through as if there is nothing in their path.
“He’s a skilled archer,” Noah growls. “He could hit us and kill us, but he’s not. He’s playing, he’s tormenting.”
“How can he see us?”
“Just move, Lara.”
Another arrow comes up through the small clearing, so close that I’m forced to leap backward. Doing this has me losing my balance. With a terrified scream, I fall. It seems like I’m moving in slow motion, arms flying, legs flailing. I hit a tree branch so hard, I can hear the loud crunch as it snaps beneath me. My screaming becomes agonizing cries as branch by branch, I fall closer to the ground.
To him.
Noah bellows my name, and my hands frantically try to grab onto anything they can. I manage to get hold of a branch on the bottom of the tree, leaving me hanging in the clearing, hands slipping as the weight of my body takes over. It’s too thick and I can’t get a good enough hold on it. Pain radiates through my body in so many places, I can’t pinpoint a single one.
“Well, well, now we’re playing for real.”
The voice sends shivers running through my body as I look down to see a man wearing a black mask with only two eyeholes showing, pointing an bow and arrow up at me. His voice seems familiar, but I don’t have time to think about where I’ve heard it. I can’t see anything else about him, but I don’t need to. I need to get the hell out of here, now.
Terror has taken me once more, and I’m frantically trying to hang on to the tree. I need to get back up. My legs flail desperately as I try to pull myself back up onto the branch.
He laughs.
“It’s not going to happen, Lara. I’m sorry.”
The spring of his wire as he shoots the other arrow is all I can hear in the few seconds it takes to reach me. The tiny device rips through my calf, as easy as a knife through butter. My scream echoes through the forest as I lose my grip and crash to the ground. I don’t feel the impact. The only thing I can feel is the agony in my leg, the red-hot, scorching pain that is threatening to take me into darkness.
Through blurred vision, through my screams and hysterical crying, I see him lean over me, that black mask right in my face. Who is he? Goddammit, who is he? “I’m going to give you a head start,” he says, evil eyes flashing with joy beneath the mask. “You have two minutes to run, Lara.”
What?
I stare at him, pain threatening to cause a blackout.
“Run,” he barks.
Run.
Run.
I force my body up, screaming in pain as I start to hobble away down the narrow path. This isn’t fast enough. I’ll die at this pace. I grit my teeth, suck in my tears, ignore the roaring pain in my calf, and do just what he asked: I run. In the distance I can hear Noah’s desperate bellows, but I don’t stop. I can’t stop. The sound of the bike starting up behind me has me realizing that there is no way I’ll outrun this man.
Sick. He’s sick.
I run harder, trying to edge off the path, but it’s impossible without a giant machete to cut the underbrush. Dammit. I run until I can’t breathe, until my whole body is screaming in pain, until my mind threatens once more to shut down. The bike is closer. I can’t outrun him. I stop, doubling over with a cry. The arrow protruding from my calf makes my stomach turn.
Weapons.
I straighten and frantically reach into my jeans to pull out the spear that Noah gave me. It’s about a foot long with a sharp point on the end. I clutch it in my hands and stand behind a tree, panting as I wait. The bike comes to a stop; leaves crunch as he moves closer to me. “I know where you are, Lara. You’re making this way too easy for me. At least show a little fight.”
I swallow the vomit rising in my throat.
He gets close enough that I can hear his breathing. I hold my breath and wait as he moves around behind the tree. I clutch the spear. I only get one shot at this. One shot.
“Boo.”
He appears so quickly it takes me off guard. I react without thought, driving the spear into his hand that’s moving toward me. It slides through his palm easily, far too easily. All the blood drains from my face as I watch red trickle out of the wound. He smiles, and then laughs. Like the pain excites him.
“Is that the best you’ve got?”
I raise my knee without thought and hit him in the balls. My dad taught me that when I was a little girl, and it’s never come in handy until this very moment. He doubles over with a laugh and I take the chance to turn and run. I reach his bike and stop, heart pounding. I have no more weapons. I lost the rock somewhere on my fall. I glance down at the arrow in my leg.
I don’t think. I just reach down, take the head sticking out of my calf, and pull it all the way through. I’m already in so much pain, I don’t even have it in me to scream. His voice echoes out from behind me and I do the only thing I can. I stab the arrow into his tires over and over, as hard and as fast as I can. Warm blood runs down my leg, but I don’t stop. Then with the last bit of strength left in my body, I kick the bike over. I can hear him running toward me. I have seconds, if I’m lucky.
That’s enough.
I unscrew the gas tank and watch as the liquid starts pouring out. I don’t wait around; I turn and run down the path as quickly as I can. I don’t know how much longer I can stay conscious. The pain is too much. It’s getting too intense. Laughter fills the quiet space. “Well done, Lara, you’re wilder than I thought. You’ve cut my game short for a few hours. You’ll pay for that.”
I drop to my knees and crawl into the thick forest off the path, dragging my body through, gasping in pain as I try to get deeper, deep enough that his bike can’t find me. Trees block my way, branches tear into my skin, and finally I fall against a log, face pressing against the cold bark. I hear the distant rumble of his bike before finally blacking out.
TWELVE
“Wake up, fuck, Lara. Wake up.”
Noah?
I can’t move.
“Lara, come on. Open your eyes for me.”
I’m trying. I can’t.
“Lara?”
Noah.
“Come on, baby, please.”
I can hear you. I’m trying.
My body is stiff; I can’t move it let alone open my eyes. Noah’s voice is fading in and out, and I so desperately want to call out to him, to reach for him, but nothing wants to work. Panic sets in. Am I dead? Is that why I can’t move? Worse, am I injured to the point of no return? Is this me dying slowly?
I begin to pant.
“Lara? Hey. Open your eyes. You’re okay.”
I am?
“Come on, focus.”
Focus.
I steady out my breathing and focus. I decide to work on my fingers. A simple task, right? I breathe in and out, then curl my fingers. Noah says something frantically, but I’m too focused on the movement slowly coming back to me. I can feel my fingers! A few more pained breaths and my eyelids flutter open. I see nothing for a few seconds, but eventually Noah’s face comes into view.
He looks scared.
“Shit, thank God. You’re okay.”
I wouldn’t go that far.
There is a pain in my leg that’s making itself known with every seco
nd that my body spends coming back to reality. I groan and try to reach for it, but it seems my body isn’t ready for that kind of exertion just yet. Instead I shift, trying to raise it so I can see it. So I can determine what’s causing all the pain.
“Take it easy, you’ve been hurt. Just breathe and let yourself come around.”
I focus on Noah. He’s got blood on his head. It’s dried, but it looks like it dribbled halfway down his face before it got to that point. The sun is beaming through the trees and settling on my thighs, warming me. We’re on the path. Did I pass out here?
“What happened?” I croak, my throat dry and scratchy. “You’re hurt.”
“I just scratched my head getting out of the trees,” he murmurs.
“What else?” I ask, rubbing my face.
“You don’t remember?”
I close my eyes and focus, trying to get my mind to come back to the here and now. As I do, I remember what happened.
“He … oh God.”
I push up on my elbows quickly, too quickly. My head spins and I go crashing back down. Noah catches me before I hit the ground. “Whoa. You need to take it easy.”
“He was using Rachel to get to us,” I cry. “Oh God, how could we be so blind? He was so close.”
“I’m sure that wasn’t the only thing he was doing, Lara. He probably had many other ways to get into our lives. Now stop squirming.”
“My leg,” I say through gritted teeth. “How bad?”
“It was a clean wound—you pulled the arrow right through. It’s deep, obviously, but through muscle only. I cleaned it up and bandaged it.”
“With what?” I ask, my stomach turning violently.
He points and my eyes move down to his shirt, which has been half ripped off. He’s wearing the equivalent of a woman’s midriff tank. I can’t help it, I burst out laughing. It’s hysterical, possibly a little crazy, but seeing him sitting there with half a shirt on … my traumatized mind finds that hilarious.
“That’s funny?” he asks, puzzled.
“No,” I say, laughter dying down. “I just … I’m sorry. I think I’m losing my mind.”
He shakes his head and carefully helps me up, pulling me into sitting position. “How’s the pain?”
“It’s awful,” I admit, trying to ignore the intense throbbing in my calf.