17. Zyran #2
I try to reach for her anyway, my hands lifting, trembling, and fingers stretching toward hers even though I know I’m not going to make it.
Behind her, my father’s footsteps echo once more. “Don’t see you,” he says too calmly. “Weak, all you are is weak.”
My eyes narrow and I try to stand. My muscles scream in protest, strength draining faster with every heartbeat that slips uselessly through my fingers. And then my arm drops halfway, fingers curling into nothing as my vision blurs, Esperr’s figure smearing into streaks of color and movement.
She’s still reaching for me, her fingers stretching out, trembling, hovering just inches from my shoulder, as if she can just touch me, she can somehow anchor me here, keeping me from slipping under.
Her mouth is moving, my name on her lips, but I can’t hear her over the roar of blood in my ears and the sickening, wet rasp of my own breathing.
NO.
I refuse to die—not when we’ve barely gotten to each other.
I won’t.
I try to push myself up, try to force my body to obey, but my arms buckle beneath me. The world tilts violently; the concrete rushes closer as my vision fractures at the edges. Every breath burns, sharp and useless, my hands slick with blood that just won’t stop spilling between my fingers.
“Stop,” I choke, though it comes out as little more than a strangled rasp. “Don’t?—”
But she doesn’t listen.
Esperr takes the last step toward me, closing the distance that I can’t, and her hand finally brushes my arm. The contact is real—warm in a grounding way that makes something desperate claw up my throat.
For a split second, relief floods me. I can feel her warmth spreading through me. She made it; she’s close enough now that I can see the panic in her eyes, and the way her brows pinch together.
But then behind her, something creaks, the sound almost so small that I might just think it’s something else.
My gaze jerks past her just in time to see him lift the gun again, the barrel steady—only it’s not aimed at me.
“No!” I try to shout, but it comes out broken, barely more than air forced through blood. My hand shoots out, fingers grasping uselessly at the space between us. “Run!”
She frowns at the sound of my voice, confusion flickering across her face as if she doesn’t understand why I’m telling her to leave when I’m the one bleeding out on the floor.
The gunshot cracks through the warehouse–
Her body jerks.
For a second, I don’t understand what I’m seeing, my brain refusing to process it, refusing to accept the sudden bloom of red spreading across her white shirt or the way her eyes widen in shock rather than pain.
Then her knees give out and she collapses forward, the impact knocking the breath from her lungs as she falls next to me.
Esperr’s fingers twitch weakly where they clutch at my shirt, her eyes unforced now, searching my face like she’s trying to memorize it.
“Caring makes you weak!”
I shake my head violently, breath hitching, as my vision blurs so badly, I can barely see her anymore. With everything that I have, I pull myself forward, crawling until my hand reaches her. “Stay with me,” I rasp. “You’re fine… you’re fine… just—Esperr, stay with me.”
But her grip loosens, becoming still against my hand.
Something inside my chest shatters.
I scream her name, the sound tearing me apart?—
A sharp knock cuts through, and my eyes snap open.
For a second, I'm not sure where I am—my chest heaves, and my breath comes in short, uneven bursts.
The phantom burn on the side of my neck is so real that I can almost feel the blood slipping between my fingers.
My hands instinctively fly up, pressing hard against the skin there, but it is dry, with no warmth or wetness.
It’s just skin and the faint tremor that I can’t stop.
Knock. Knock. Knock.
I flinch so hard my shoulder slams into the door; my vision blurs for a moment until I blink, feeling the interior of my truck.
Looking over, I find Rhys, who stands just outside the driver’s side window, his knuckles hovering midair like he’s deciding whether to knock again or leave.
My pulse is still racing when I reach over and turn the key into the ignition, just enough that I can roll the window down.
Rhys leans over slightly, brows drawn together as his eyes flick over my face, and then down to where my fingers are still pressed against my neck.
“Nightmare?”
I swallow hard, forcing my hand to drop from my neck even though every instinct in me wants to keep it there, to make sure the skin is still intact and that there isn’t a bullet hole still bleeding there.
“I–uh, something like that,” I mutter, dragging a slow breath into my lungs and letting it out carefully. Though I know he can still hear the hitch in my breath.
The echo of her name still burns in my throat.
But thankfully out of all my brothers, Rhys won’t push; he never does when it comes to this stuff. He just shifts his weight slightly, resting his forearms against the top of the door as he glances out over the garage that Cyran and I share.
“You’ve been sitting out here a while,” he says. The way he says it makes it sound like he’s talking about the weather rather than the fact that I can’t seem to get any sleep unless I’m in my truck.
I glance at the clock on my dash and curse under my breath when I see how much time has passed—long enough that it’s been sixteen hours.
I slept for sixteen hours.
“I… I didn’t realize I fell asleep,” I mumble, still not believing it myself.
Rhys hums softly, not quite believing me, but he lets it slide. I hate that it takes me as long as it does, his gaze sharpens just a fraction, but it's there like he’s calculating something.
“There’s something; figured you’d want to hear it in person.”
My shoulders tense automatically, the remnants of the dream still clinging to me, the image of her collapsing forward, blood soaking into my hands. It refuses to leave no matter how many times I remind myself it wasn’t real.
“Mhm.”
Rhys nods once. “Your name got flagged in a search last night. Not deep enough to set off alarms, but enough that I caught it before it got any further.”
My grip tightens on the wheel. “What kind of search?” I ask.
He tilts his head, studying me for a moment before he answers.
“Still digging. It could be random, someone checking old records. Or…” he pauses just long enough for the implication to settle.
This isn’t random or anything else. It’s new, and I could bet my left nut that it has something to do with Esperr.
I exhale slowly, jaw tightening as the last of the nightmare’s fog burns away, replaced by the burning question of who she is.
“Let me know what you find,” I finally say, voice stray now even if my chest stills feels like it hasn’t fully unclenched.
Rhys gives me a curt nod and straightens before stepping back from my truck. I expect him to walk away, but he lingers for a moment, his gaze flickering over my face again like he’s debating on saying something else.
In the end, he just knocks twice against the hood of my truck, a familiar gesture before turning and heading back inside the house.
I sit there, hands gripping the wheel, with the echo of the dream replaying behind my eyes. To her reaching for me, her body jerking back when the gun went off.
My jaw tightens until it aches, and pressure builds in my skull.
Who the fuck is Esperr?