CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
JAMES
I was shaped by what survived, not by what was lost.
Denver is no different from every other big city now. One gang calls the shots, and everyone else is just trying to stay alive.
I don’t want to be here. Especially not in Tyler Reed’s city.
We’ve been in the fire station for two weeks now, rationing the food Michael found the first time he and Sarah went out scavenging. Long enough for my shoulder to mostly heal. Michael patched it up, holding my arm steady so I could still use my hand.
The pain? Whatever. It’s familiar. An old enemy. I’ve dealt with worse. The only thing I care about is Sarah. She fainted after watching Alicia, an Outsider, kill some guy from Frank’s gang. His gang, like the others, follows Tyler’s rules.
I should have been there. I should have been the one carrying her.
We lost everything when the lake house went down in that storm. Everything. Months of scavenging, gone. All we had left was one backpack, the only thing I managed to grab from our room.
Food’s not the only thing we need. We need it all: tents, sleeping bags, an ax, clothes. And most importantly? Guns.
Michael got lucky. Found a shotgun in one of the lockers at the fire station, plus three boxes of ammo. It was a damn miracle, like striking gold in a wasteland. Now I’m carrying his old handgun, knowing full well six bullets might be the only thing standing between me and disaster.
Meanwhile, Sarah still has the handgun Ryan gave her. She hasn’t used it since that run-in with Axel’s gang in the parking lot, when she fired a warning shot so I’d know she was in trouble.
Yeah, we’re armed. But so is everyone else.
Ever since we lost the lake house, nowhere’s safe for Sarah.
Not in the city. Not in the woods. Not anywhere.
Not with me by her side. If someone recognizes me, they’ll go after her just to get to me.
We shouldn’t even be out on the street together, but there’s no way in hell I’m letting her leave the fire station with Michael again without me.
“You know those graffiti birds we keep seeing on the walls? That’s Tyler’s mark.” Michael’s voice pulls me out of my thoughts. He’s a few steps ahead on the sidewalk, eyes scanning the empty street. “I saw it on a few walls in the fire station too.”
I glance up from under my baseball cap, spotting the white graffiti bird symbol on the brick wall we’re passing.
“It’s not just walls, Michael. He’s tagging everything—doors, signs, cars, even windows,” Sarah says, walking beside me. She fidgets with the straps of her half-empty backpack.
“Well, he runs this place,” Michael adds.
Sarah snorts. “A city without chocolate. What’s even the point?”
I bite my tongue to keep from laughing. Only Sarah would be thinking about chocolate in the middle of all this.
“We’ve checked ten stores and found nothing. I’m serious, boys. If we don’t find chocolate soon, we’re gonna have a real problem.”
I take her hand and squeeze it. She looks up at me.
“We’ll find some before we leave.”
“You promise?”
“Yeah, little danger, I promise.” I reach up and pull the hood of my sweatshirt over her head. I gave it to her before we left the fire station. “Just keep the hood up, okay? Gotta hide your face.”
“No one here knows who you are, James. You don’t have to worry about anyone seeing me with you.”
“We don’t know that. They might not know my name, but they could still recognize my face.”
“Your beautiful face?” She nudges me with a smile. “I’d love to see someone try to mess with that. I know how to throw punches now.”
I chuckle, but the smile fades in an instant.
A single gunshot shatters the quiet, echoing from a nearby street. Then a second shot. Followed by a third.
“Run!” I shout to Michael, tightening my grip on Sarah’s hand.
We bolt around the corner just as the roar of speeding cars hits my ears, and my baseball cap flies off.
“They’re coming this way,” Michael says, sucking in air through clenched teeth.
Sarah’s breathing turns shallow and rapid, her shorter strides barely keeping up with my pace. I slow down just enough for her to catch up.
We turn into the next block, and that’s when I notice something’s off.
I scan both sides of the street. Everything looks different than it did this morning. Every entrance, every store, every building is barricaded.
Every. Single. One.
That’s not good. I’ve seen this before.
“Why’s every building barricaded?” Sarah asks between breaths, stopping next to me in front of a two-story building.
“So no one’s got anywhere to hide,” I reply, scanning the street again.
“Jesus!” Michael shouts, raising his shotgun just as another gunshot rings out.
Sarah tenses.
“Where are we going? The fire station?” she asks.
“We don’t have time. We need to get off the street and hide. They’re not gonna check the buildings. They want whoever’s still out here.”
I wipe at the sweat running down my forehead, trying to think fast. I turn to the door in front of us. Two thick wooden planks are nailed across it from the inside. No padlocks. No chains. This can’t be one of the Reed brothers’ setups—someone locked themselves in.
“James, look!” Sarah points to a small window near the top of the side wall. “I can fit through and unlock the door from the inside.”
I shake my head. “You can’t go alone.”
“I can do it, James.”
“I know you can, but we don’t know if there’s anyone in there.”
“I’ll be quick.”
“No, I can’t risk it. Not with you.”
I spin, scanning the other side of the street, desperate for another place to hide. We need cover, now. We’re too far from the fire station, and those cars are getting closer.
I turn to Michael, about to say we should check the next street, but I don’t even get the words out before my heart slams into my throat.
Sarah’s already halfway up a dumpster, hauling herself toward the tiny window, one neither Michael nor I can squeeze through.
“Sarah!” I lunge forward, grabbing for her boot, but she’s gone before my fingers even graze the sole. “Fuck!”
I grind my teeth and kick the door. It doesn’t budge. The damn thing is solid, and all I’ve done is piss myself off more.
Michael squints up at the window his sister just climbed through, lips pressed into a line.
I run a hand through my hair, cursing under my breath. “Shit, Michael, I swear I’m gonna kill your sister.”
Michael snorts. “Get in line.”
Another gunshot cracks through the streets. The cars are close now. But I don’t care. I’m too busy counting the seconds she’s been gone.
My eyes stay locked on the building. My hand’s still on the fucking door between me and Sarah, my fingers dragging over the rough wood.
She’s stubborn to the bone. And twice as reckless.
I hear something heavy dragging across the floor inside. A second later, the door swings open, and there’s Sarah, standing there like she owns the place. One hand on the knob, the other twirling a braid around her finger, a triumphant grin on her lips.
“Hi, boys.”
I step inside quickly, giving her a once-over, checking for so much as a scratch.
Michael comes in behind me and shoves the barricade back in place—a desk she must’ve dragged over to let us in. Then he turns to her, rests a hand on her shoulder, and gives her the same worried once-over.
“You okay?” he asks.
Sarah nods. “Yeah, I’m fine.”
We both know it’s a fucking miracle she didn’t get hurt jumping out that window. Not ’cause she’s fragile or anything, but this is just how her little accidents always happen.
I take a quick look around. The place is dead quiet. Dust covers racks of clothes and shelves still stocked with items and faded price tags. It’s a huge department store. This place is a jackpot. Whatever we need, it’s probably in here.
I glance back at Sarah. She’s still by the door, ears glued to the boards, listening for the cars outside. Then her eyes find mine. I crook a finger, motioning her over.
She hesitates, then walks over slowly. She knows she’s in trouble. She knows I’m pissed.
“You wanna have this conversation now, or should we wait?”
Sarah flashes me that bold-as-hell smile. “We can do it now. Pretty sure I already won.”
Oh, she’s got a whole victory speech lined up.
I tighten my jaw. “You almost scared me to death.”
Sarah just nods, still grinning, very fucking proud of herself. “Makes you feel alive, doesn’t it?”
I don’t smile. Not even a little. I stay stone-faced. This isn’t funny. She thinks she’s being cute, but I’m too pissed for that. She doesn’t understand this place.
“Why do you always have to risk your life like that?”
Every time she pulls a stunt like this, I swear she takes a year off my life.
“Why do you always act like I’m the one in danger?” she fires back. “You were the one stuck outside, not me.”
“Exactly my point. I’ve told you, don’t ever risk your life for mine.”
She crosses her arms, chin tilting up. “I’ll risk it as many times as I want for you.”
“Not when you’re mine, you won’t,” I growl.
“Don’t worry. Next time, I’ll just hand you over to the Reed brothers myself.”
I fight back my own laugh. Trouble looks good on her. Too good.
My gaze drops, tracing the curve of her body, from the soft swell of her breasts to the dip of her waist. I bite my bottom lip.
She does things to me, awakening a craving so deep it’s almost impossible to ignore.
Just the thought of running my hands over her body, pulling her in, kissing her senseless… Fuck, my pulse kicks up a notch.
Focus, James. You can’t get distracted right now.
Yeah, right. Like I can focus on anything else when she’s standing this close.
I grab her hips and pull her against me, locking her in place with my arms. She licks her lips at the closeness.
My heart’s still hammering from the thought of losing her. I can’t keep letting her scare the shit out of me like this.
“Never do that again,” I whisper in her ear. “You’re a part of me. And I’m a part of you. You go, I go. Got it?”
“Got it.”
“I mean it.”
“I know.”
I pull her closer and kiss her hard, deep, as if I need to remind her exactly who she belongs to.
When I finally pull back, I rest my forehead against hers, breathing in the floral scent of her skin, so unmistakably her.
“Now go. Go explore. I know you’re dying to,” I say, slapping her ass as I let her go.
She laughs, tossing a wink over her shoulder as she walks away. “I know there’s chocolate in this place. I feel it in my soul.”
I blow out a slow breath to calm my nerves. Michael steps up beside me, already chuckling at whatever my face must look like.
“You know, sometimes Sarah does my job for me. Watching her get under your skin? Gotta admit, it’s pretty entertaining.”
I shake my head, still watching her as she pulls a jacket from the rack.
“Man, your sister’s got a real thing for danger.”
Michael laughs, clapping a hand on my shoulder. “Sometimes, you forget that she and I were raised by the same man. She’s a hunter too.”
I stay by the door, watching as Sarah disappears deeper into the store, Michael trailing behind her. Outside, the cars are just a faint hum now, and the gunfire has been quiet for the last ten minutes.
I’m not worried. Once we’re inside, we’re safe. Gangs don’t waste time searching every building. That’s not how they work. They barricade places to trap people outside. That’s the whole point.
“Big brother, look!”
Sarah’s voice echoes from somewhere deeper in the store. She and Michael are standing in a broken elevator, its doors permanently wedged open. I lean against a shelf, watching them.
“They’re called elevators,” she says, like she’s uncovering some ancient mystery. “I don’t remember seeing them in the movies we watched at the lake house, but Dad told me all about them. When the power was still working, they could take you all the way up to the roof.”
Michael’s eyes widen. “Wait, for as many floors as we want? No ladder?”
Sarah nods. “Yep.”
Michael shakes his head, letting out a low whistle. “Man, life was too easy back then.”
He’d probably been in an elevator before, just too young to remember when they stopped working. It’s weird, thinking about all the stuff they missed. Things that used to be normal but are basically gone now.
My eyes shift to the side, catching on some yellow fabric tugging at an old promise I never forgot. I crouch down and grab two packs, a smile twitching at my lips.
“Hey, Sarah,” I call over my shoulder. “I found the yellow tents.”
I don’t even make it to my feet before something stops me cold.
There’s a gun.
And it’s aimed right at my face.