Chapter 32
THIRTY-TWO
EMMA
Water.
Cold.
Darkness.
It swallowed everything, the sound of my gasp, the burn in my lungs, the frantic drum of my heartbeat. My body broke through the surface once, then the current dragged me under again. The shock of the cold stole every thought but one: up.
I kicked hard, arms cutting through the black, lungs screaming for air. Something brushed against my leg, slick, alive, and wrong.
Thanks to the Radicals last year, I’d seen enough snakes for one lifetime, thank you very much. Eels could join that creepy little club of slippery motherflappers.
I never swam so fast in my life.
I thrashed, kicking faster, until my fingertips broke the surface and I sucked in a mouthful of river and night.
By the time I stumbled into the shallows, my limbs were shaking and my throat burned from swallowing half the river. Mud sucked at my boots as I crawled onto the bank, coughing, blinking against the dark.
The forest loomed ahead—black on black—but I ignored it. My eyes scoured the river instead.
No movement. No head breaking the surface. No Caden.
Surely, he swam faster than me.
Then a sudden dread sliced through my chest.
What if he hadn’t made it up? What if the blast had knocked him out before he even hit the water?
I didn’t even hesitate. Eels or not, I spun back toward the current, heart hammering against my ribs hard enough to bruise, plunging headfirst into the freezing dark in search of the man who…wasn’t there.
The current seized me instantly, dragging at my legs with brutal hands.
The cold knifed through every layer of skin, carving straight to bone.
I forced my eyes open underwater until they burned, the world dissolving into shadow and silt.
River grit filled my nose, the taste of oil and rust coating my tongue until it felt like blood.
Then, a flicker.
A blur of motion downstream. A shoulder, a sleeve, a flash of familiar skin.
“Caden!” The scream tore out of me, half-breath, half-prayer, before the river swallowed it whole.
I swam harder, pushed past the burn in my lungs and the fire in my muscles with the kind of frantic strength that only comes from terror.
There was only one reason he wouldn’t be swimming, one possibility that hollowed me out as I forced myself deeper into the water, and the image of Caden—still, unconscious, gone—was the last thing my mind could bear.
I kicked harder, every stroke a silent plea. My eyes burned from the silt and cold, but I refused to blink.
Then my hand caught fabric. His jacket.
I latched on and pulled, my fingers sliding down to the solid weight beneath, but the moment my hand closed around him, a violent jolt went through me.
He wasn’t moving. Not fighting. Not even breathing. A cold, lifeless weight in my arms, his body rolling with the current like he’d already surrendered to it.
And in that instant, it wasn’t the river that froze me, it was the sick, soul-tearing thought I might’ve found him too late.
An overwhelming panic clawed at my throat. No, no, no—
I hooked both arms around him and kicked for the surface, my lungs already screaming. His body dragged against mine, while the river pulled him back every time I gained an inch. My muscles burned, but I refused to let go.
We broke the surface in a violent gasp.
I forced myself to stop fighting the river and turned with it instead, twisting us sideways as the current surged past. I slid behind him, arm locking under his shoulder, hauling his chest against mine, tipping his chin up just enough to keep his mouth clear.
“Stay up,” I gasped, whether to him or myself I didn’t know.
The river hurled us downstream, rocks slamming into my legs as I fought to steer toward calmer water. By the time my boots hit mud, my body was numb with exhaustion. I let the current carry us the last few feet before stumbling into the shallows.
I half-dragged, half-crawled him out of the river, using the slope of the bank and what little strength I had left, collapsing beside him in a heap of water and shaking limbs. My breath came in ragged bursts, uneven in the cold night air.
His face was too pale, lips gone blue, water sliding from his hair in cruel, unhurried streams that traced the lines of a face I couldn’t lose.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
I was shaking when I pressed my ear to his chest, the world narrowing to the silence between heartbeats. I didn’t breathe. I didn’t blink. I only listened, desperate for the sound I never thought I’d be begging for.
I held my breath until I heard it.
A beat.
Faint, but there.
“Come on,” I muttered, already on my knees beside him, my hands fumbling for his jaw. His skin was like ice beneath my palms, slack, unresponsive, wrong in a way that made panic roar up my throat.
“Breathe,” I whispered, though it came out broken, barely a sound at all. “Please, Caden, breathe for me.”
I tilted his head back, my fingers trembling so hard I could barely find the right angle and sealed my mouth over his.
His lips were freezing—laced with the cold taste of river water and skin drained of color—but I breathed into him, anyway, forcing air into lungs that refused to move. The St. Lawrence clung to him as death itself tried to claim him.
And some frantic, hysterical part of me thought…
So this is how I feel his lips for the first time.
Not in the heat of everything unsaid. Not in surrender. But here, on my knees in the mud, forcing life into him while the world burned behind us.
One breath.
Two.
I pulled back, gasping, the sound tearing out of me like fabric ripping. His chest stayed still.
No!
I bent again, breathing harder this time, desperate enough to shatter something inside me. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare fucking leave me.”
I crushed my lips to his and forced his mouth open, pushing air into him like it was the only thing keeping the world from collapsing. I poured everything into it, every breath, every heartbeat, every piece of me that still remembered how to hope.
And for one raw, uncontrolled second, my restraint broke; my tongue brushed his, tasting the cold metal tang of the river, the ghost of life I was still fighting to pull back into him.
The contact was electric—violent—a spark ripped through me so hard it felt like my soul flinched. And as if the same shock tore through him too, Caden’s body convulsed. His eyes snapped open, wild and disoriented, right as a wet, choking cough exploded from his chest.
Water spilled from his mouth, cascading over my hands as his body arched, fighting for air, for life, for me.
Relief punched the air from my lungs. I sat back, shaking, drenched, half-laughing, half-sobbing. “Gods, you idiot,” I whispered, brushing the wet hair from his forehead. “You couldn’t make this easy, could you?”
He coughed again, chest heaving, lashes dripping with river water. For a moment, he stared at me—unblinking, disoriented, alive.
Then his fingers twitched, rising to his lips as if he needed proof they still existed.
“You kissed me?” His voice came out rough, like gravel dragged through water.
I raised a brow, trying to hold on to sarcasm because the alternative was falling apart. “I gave you mouth-to-mouth, genius.”
He coughed again—harder this time—then pushed himself upright with a groan, water streaming off him in rivulets. “With tongue?” he rasped, a flicker of that infuriating arrogance ghosting across his face.
I narrowed my eyes into slits. “You were dead, Caden. Forgive me if resuscitation wasn’t on your list of preferred kisses.”
He blinked, his eyes dark and unguarded in the moonlight. “You’re crying.”
I shrugged and swiped at my cheeks with my already-soaked sleeve. “Excuse me for having an emotion about your untimely death.”
Caden didn’t answer. He simply stared—dark, unreadable—something tight and volatile working in his jaw.
My nerves snapped first. “What?” I demanded. “I didn’t exactly do this for fun.”
His countenance hardened, tone quieter but cold enough to bite. “Didn’t say you did.”
“Good,” I muttered, as I rose to my feet, and took in our new surroundings.
The forest around us was too quiet—like the world was waiting, holding its breath. Somewhere in the distance, a motor rumbled—faint but closing in.
I met his gaze, pulse hammering. “We need to move.”
He nodded once before he started to push himself up. His balance wavered, the effort obvious, but of course he’d rather drown again than admit it.
I slipped under his arm, hauling him upright despite the weight. “Easy,” I said through clenched teeth.
“I can stand for myself,” he snarled at me, the stubborn bastard.
“Fine,” I snapped, letting go. “Fall on your ass, see if I care.”
He staggered a step before catching himself, and I didn’t even try to hide the small, satisfied sound that escaped me. But he dragged himself upright faster than I’d expected, shoulders squaring like stubbornness alone might keep his organs where they belonged.
The trees swallowed us fast as we moved, the forest closing in with damp quiet. Branches dripped river water onto our heads as we pushed through undergrowth slick with mud.
Every step squelched. Every breath steamed in the cold. And neither of us spoke.
Caden walked half a step ahead, steady despite the hit he’d taken, his shoulders rigid and jaw set. His soaked clothes clung to him, black against the pale fog curling through the trees. He didn’t even glance back once.
Fine.
If he wanted silence, he could have it.
Though I hated it.
Fighting with Caden wasn’t like fighting with James. Not even close.
When James and I fought, it burned. Shouting until everything between us cracked open, until the worst parts of us spilled out and left nothing unsaid. It was ugly, raw, almost toxic. But clear.
Caden, however, didn’t explode.
No shouting. No slammed doors. Only silence. Controlled, purposeful silence.
Where James’s anger flared bright and loud, Caden’s restraint was dark, quiet, and somehow far more destabilizing.