ELIANO #2
Every cell in my body feels wound tight like a tiny string when we reach the small harbor. My eyes sweep along the shoreline, and I immediately understand the exact dilemma Salt must have faced if he ended up here.
There really is a road near the harbor that appears to head deeper into the forest, while the city lies to the left of the port, hidden beyond a wall of trees at least two or three miles wide, if not more.
I jump down the gangway onto the dock and notice that all the betas are following me.
"Are you planning to come with me?" I ask suspiciously.
"Of course," Bram says. "I honestly doubt you will convince Salt to come back that easily."
"You do not know that."
"I think you will appreciate having an extra argument," he replies. "We will see how it plays out. If there is no need, we will simply wait."
"Fine," I mutter, casting him a wary look.
"So where to, bloodhound?" Bram adds with a crooked smile. "Sniff, sniff."
"Oh, you are hilarious," I say dryly. "Jealousy, jealousy, you betas are made of it. Alrighty. We are going left, into the forest."
"Are you sure he decided to push through the swamps? It is full of alligators. Only a madman would try that."
"Salt wants to get to the city at any cost. He is probably looking for some kind of transportation. I doubt he chose the gravel road leading deeper into the forest, especially one with very little traffic."
"You think he risked forcing his way through—"
"Yes," I cut in. "I know it."
"Suuure," the beta says mockingly, then adds, "but I am only going as far as the point where it starts getting dangerous. I am not risking myself or my men."
I say nothing. We move on.
It is already getting hot, but it also means the forest is bright.
I look around, listening not only to the sounds of the woods but to myself.
Something is guiding me, pulling me forward like a thin, hard string.
I have no doubt where I should go. Every step feels certain; every step brings me closer to him.
My Salt.
"Wow," Bram says at one point, watching me. "You really do not hesitate at all."
"I have always had good intuition," I mumble vaguely, not about to explain the whole True Mate thing.
We walk about two-thirds of a mile before the terrain starts to worsen. The ground turns wet and spongy. Bram and his men slow down, glancing around warily, as if expecting an alligator to leap out at any moment.
"Much farther? It is not safe here."
"Not far," I reply. "I think maybe six hundred feet."
"Seriously? All right. Let us agree that if we do not find him within six hundred feet, we turn back. Deal?"
"Deal," I say, feeling a knot of nerves tighten in my stomach. Am I really right to be this confident, or is this arrogance that will land me in a terrible situation?
After another two hundred feet, my certainty only grows stronger. At moments, I swear I catch Salt’s sweet, alluring scent, the yuzu fruit tone and fresh kiwi.
"He is close," I blurt out. "Very close. I can already smell him."
Bram merely raises his eyebrows in mild surprise.
"Alphas are fucking animals," one of his men mutters, but I ignore him.
"Yeah, I can even tell which one of you hasn’t changed his boxers for three days straight."
The silence answers me; nobody asks me to point out the stinker.
We lift our feet carefully because the ground here is soaked and unstable.
"He is nearby," I whisper.
I scan the area carefully. Where could he be? If he heard us, he definitely hid. We are now moving through a stretch where we have to step on branches and fallen trunks just to keep our boots out of the water.
"Fuck, much farther?" Bram mutters, wobbling slightly on a wet log.
"It is right here," I say quietly. "Maybe sixty or ninety feet."
I narrow my eyes slightly and reach for Salt… energetically. In my mind, there is only one direction, along the length of a fallen tree trunk. I head that way, stop, and notice a patch of bent grass.
"He jumped here."
I look around, think for a moment, then slowly lift my gaze upward.
Bingo.
There he is.
Curled up on a branch among the leaves, Salt stares down at me with eyes full of anger.
"Will you come down here to us?" I ask softly, my heart speeding up, a strange happiness flowing through me.
Salt… I found him.
We can salvage this whole mess…
"Oh fuck," Bram says, craning his neck. "The fucking bloodhound actually did find him. Holy shit, I cannot believe this."
Then he raises the gun that suddenly appears in his hand and fires.
I do not manage to stop him. I lunge at Bram and knock him into the mud, but the other betas shout,
"It’s just a sedative. Calm down, idiot."
Growling, I turn back toward Salt, who is clutching his arm. Sure enough, a small dart is sticking out of it.
"Why did you do that?" I snap. "That is not what we agreed on. I was supposed to talk to him, not knock him out."
"It’s faster and easier," Bram says, standing and brushing mud off himself. "We need to go back." He shows me his phone. "I just got a text from the ferry captain. He has to leave in an hour to bring Mr. Gomez to the island. We do not have time, definitely not for chatting."
Salt’s eyelids are already closed. Suddenly, he starts slipping from the branch, sliding down and hitting lower branches on the way. I rush under the tree and catch him in my arms at the last second.
The last word I hear from him is,
"Bastard."