Chapter 4 Valentina
VALENTINA
I can’t breathe. Every gasp tears through my chest like I’ve swallowed barbed wire, each inhale cutting deeper, but I force my body to keep moving.
It’s like running through molasses—the more I fight, the heavier I get, every stride dragged behind me as though the forest itself wants me to fail.
My legs feel like they belong to someone else, slow and clumsy, and every useless second I’m stuck with that goddamn image burned into my head.
That look.
The moss-green-haired psycho—what was his name again?
Zack? Chris? Zay? Oh, right. Isaiah. That look he gave me right before the lights went out is seared into my brain.
What even was that? Pride? Triumph? Or worse—that smug, infuriating satisfaction of knowing he had me, me, flat on my back and helpless for the first damn time in my life.
It wasn’t just a look; it was a claim. Like his eyes were saying, you’re exactly where I want you.
No. Absolutely not.
I refuse to be that girl. Even if—ugh—I hate myself for even thinking this—even if he’s exactly the kind of tattooed, sharp-edged trouble I’d usually imagine myself climbing like a tree. Focus, Val. He drugged you. He kidnapped you. That should be an instant, full-body ick.
And it is. Totally. I’ve decided.
I am not going to think about those midnight eyes, that ruthless side smirk that looks carved to ruin girls like me, or the way my traitorous body had the audacity to react when I saw him up close.
Absolutely not. My pussy can shut up until I can get my hands on Earl, a massive, pretty rainbow vibrator with six settings and two different types of suction that I know green hair boy can’t match.
I press my hand into the peeled, dry bark of a tree, its roughness biting into my palm as if to keep me upright. My whole body sags against it, trembling with the weight of exhaustion. The world tilts and sways around me, the edges of the trees melting into smears of gray and brown.
God, it’s in my veins. Thick and heavy, slowing me down, pulling at me with invisible hands. The same damn drag I’ve been fighting ever since that night.
I suck in a breath that tastes like rot and cold metal and squeeze my eyes shut.
Three months. Three long, sleepless, paranoid months of training myself to outlast this feeling.
To burn the poison out of my blood with running, with pain, with anything that would force my body to adapt.
I thought I had built immunity, brick by stubborn brick.
But that big silent motherfucker and whatever cocktail he and Isaiah used to knock me out—is stronger than the shit I’ve been fighting off. It clings, wrapping around my limbs, turning my muscles to water, my heartbeat to sludge.
I force myself to open my eyes. The tree in front of me is splitting into two, then three. I blink until the world sharpens again, until my legs are shaking but holding.
Shit, this would be so much easier if it was summer, instead of the nasty, sticky, icy air pressing into my skin, making the world feel sticky and cold, like the forest itself is trying to slow me down.
Branches claw at my arms and snag in my hair as I tear through them, lungs burning, heart slamming so hard I taste copper.
I stay plastered against the tree, forcing myself to listen past the roar of blood in my ears.
The forest hums with sound when you pay attention—the whisper of brittle leaves scraping against each other, the skeletal creak of branches above, the occasional plop of water falling from one limb to the next until it hits the ground like a slow clock.
I feel like the goddamn bride in Kill Bill, whispering to myself to wiggle your big toe, except there’s no grace or calm here.
I’m on the edge of screaming as every nerve in my body feels like it’s burning from the inside out.
My legs don’t want to move, but I shove myself off the tree anyway, teeth gritting, vision tunneling.
All I need is a road. A stretch of asphalt. A single pair of headlights, and I’ll hitchhike barefoot if I have to—straight to Cast’s house.
Not that I’d tell him what happened.
We have… a complicated thing, me and Cast. After I tried to kill his girl Willow—yeah, long story, revenge, a dash of almost kidnapping, a secret child, all that fun family drama—you’d think he’d want me dead on sight.
But somehow, somewhere between all the hatred and grief, we carved out this weird connection.
Not love. Not even forgiveness. Just… a bond. Like two feral, estranged siblings who would gladly kill each other if pushed—but who won’t stand by and let anyone else take the shot.
I push off the tree, when—crack. My head whips up, heart slamming against my ribs so hard I swear I feel it in my teeth.
A deer explodes out of the underbrush ahead of me, a pale streak in the moonlight, muscles quivering as it bolts into the dark. Hooves drum against the tangle of roots and wet leaves, a chaotic, frantic rhythm until it vanishes.
For one fragile second, my lungs loosen. Just a deer.
I wrench myself off the tree and stumble forward. Every step is agony, like dragging two bodies tied to my ankles. My muscles burn, my breath is thin and raw, but I force my legs to obey, to keep moving, because standing still out here feels like begging to die.
“I thought an assassin would get farther than this,” a voice rolls out from the darkness—low, velvet-deep, and rough around the edges. It drags against my skin resonant and heavy, a sound that sinks straight into my bones and rattles something I don’t want to name.
“I thought when a girl says no, most self-respecting guys would take the hint,” I groan, the words dragging out of me on a shaky breath.
My eyes dart around the darkness, desperate for an exit.
The woods close in on me—black trunks like prison bars, their skeletal branches etched in silver against the faint spill of moonlight.
“You think you’re here because you’re pretty,” he says, and the humor in his voice is sharp enough to cut.
His voice slips through the trees like smoke, wrapping around me until I can feel it sliding beneath my skin.
Heat floods through me in a way that has nothing to do with attraction and everything to do with the kind of fear that tastes like adrenaline.
Against every scrap of training, against every screaming instinct that tells me not to, I take a slow step back.
I groan and force myself to turn, scanning the dark shapes of the trees. I still cannot see him. I can only feel him. His gaze crawls over me like the weight of a storm about to break, and his voice surrounds me so completely it feels like the woods themselves are breathing him in.
“Aww, you think I’m pretty?” I ask, pitching my voice high in a fake sweetness, letting it curl into something sharp at the edges. My eyes flick up to the branches above me, watching how still they are, how the wind has gone quiet as if holding its breath.
“You know you’re pretty,” he says, and his voice slides over me like the edge of a blade.
I crouch low, my fingertips skimming over the cold, damp earth, dragging through dead leaves and brittle twigs until I find the jagged edge of a rock. My hand closes around it, the grit biting into my palm as I straighten.
“And I know there was a much better way to get me to you than kidnapping,” I say, keeping my tone light even as I feel the weight of him getting closer.
“Like what, Killer?” he replies, drawing the word out as if savoring the taste of it. “You think I am stupid enough to bring you into my bed too? I know exactly how dangerous you are.”
I can hear the grin in his voice, and it is infuriating. Then I catch it, a faint ripple of movement in the corner of my vision. Not on the ground, but above me. He is there, a dark silhouette balanced on a thick branch, still as a predator waiting to strike.
“Obviously you do not know me well enough,” I say through my teeth as I whip the rock forward with every ounce of strength I have.
The shadow explodes into motion, jumping off the branch with fluid ease, landing in front of me with a soundless grace that makes the hair rise on my arms. The leaves crunch softly beneath his boots as he straightens to his full height, and suddenly he is there, so close that I can feel the heat of his body cutting through the cold October air, his presence pressing in on me from every direction.
“Nice shot, Killer,” he mocks, his voice low enough to curl around my throat, and my eyes flutter down despite myself when the faint, clean bite of mint reaches me on his breath.
I force my gaze upward, but the night is greedy, hoarding every detail of his face.
All I can make out are sharp edges, the faint glint where moonlight brushes over skin, the dark mess of his hair, and the weight of a gaze that feels like it can see every thought I am trying to hide.
It is enough to tell me that he is beautiful in the most dangerous way, the kind of beautiful that has nothing to do with safety and everything to do with ruin.
His shoulders are broad, blocking out the line of trees behind him. Tattoos snake down his forearms in inked shadows I can barely see, but my imagination fills in the rest. Even standing still, he radiates motion, coiled and ready, like he could close the space between us without a sound.
The air between us feels too thin. I can smell the heat of him under the clean, sharp scent of mint—warm skin, leather, something metallic. My pulse jumps so fast I can feel it in my teeth, but I refuse to back away again.
“I just wanted you to show yourself,” I say with a shrug, forcing my voice to sound casual. “And now that I’ve seen the hype, I’m sorry to inform you, but no.”
His lips curve in the dark. “You’re too good for me, killer?”
“I’m too good for most people.”
“Oh, I get it. You only fuck the ones you can kill.”