Chapter 34 #2
My mouth drops open and I glance at him, wondering, not for the first time, how our brains seem to work on the same plane. “Yes.”
He nods. “Are we both going, or just one of us?”
That one doesn’t take much thought. “Both. If anything happens, you grab Sammy and run for the truck while I give Duane and his friends something to think about.”
I feel Cam look at me, but don’t meet his eyes.
“You realize they probably have guns.”
“I do.”
“And you don’t,” he continues.
Now I do look at him. “That doesn’t matter. If they appear, you get Sammy to safety and let me worry about their guns.”
He holds my eye for a moment like he’s going to argue but then nods abruptly. “As long as you realize that if you get yourself killed, Sammy’s going to murder you.”
“Of course I realize that. But I’ll deal with that later. Let’s go.”
We take off at the same time, sprinting from the dirt of the forest onto the concrete of the driveway, both of us making for the girl next to the garage.
She watches us for half a beat, her mouth open and her eyes staring, then comes to life and sprints toward us.
The girl is faster than I expect and within seconds she reaches us, her breath coming fast and her curls somehow even more out of control now.
She skids right into Cameron and throws herself at him, jumping into his arms like they’ve practiced this a million times, and when he crushes her against his chest, his face buried in her curls and her arms around his neck, a knife stabs right through my heart.
Cameron. Of course, she jumped for him and not me, and on the surface, it makes sense. He’s been her best friend since she was seven and she knows him nearly as well as she knows herself. He’s never left her side, never been gone for years at a time.
The logic is there.
That doesn’t speak to my heart, though, and that particular organ is suddenly turning green with an envy I’ve never experienced before.
Seconds later, though, she struggles out of Cam’s arms and turns to me, her mouth stretched in a grin. She takes my hand and squeezes once. “You came,” she breathes. “I knew you would.”
My heart goes from sickly green to three sizes too big in the space of half a second, and I have to keep myself from laughing with joy.
And of course, the men who are chasing her choose that moment to appear from behind the house. I see them before they see us and turn, shoving both Cam and Sammy toward the truck.
“Go,” I hiss. “I’ll distract them.”
But instead of running the way they’re supposed to, Cam and Sammy both freeze, their eyes darting from the men to me and back. When Cam’s eyes widen, I know what just happened, and I grab them both and take them to the ground before the shots ring out.
“Go,” I mutter. “Let me handle them.”
“Handle them?” Sammy hisses. “What the fuck does that mean?”
“Means he’s trying to sacrifice himself,” Cam says. “While we escape.”
When Sammy’s eyes swing from him to me, narrowed and angry, I know I’m in trouble.
So I’m surprised at what she says.
“No,” she says simply. “I won’t let you.”
The shouting is getting closer now, though, and we don’t have time for this argument. I shove at her and Cam, desperate for them to move. “You don’t have a choice. Get going!”
But she wraps her fingers in the front of my shirt, tightens, them, and jerks. “If you don’t think I have a choice, you haven’t been paying attention. I just found you again, and I’m not letting you go. You stay, I stay, and that goes for Cameron, too. Now are we leaving or what?”
The statement takes the breath out of my lungs with its stark delivery, and the meaning behind it robs my blood of all warmth.
Then everything comes back super-heated and intense.
Because the girl I have no real claim on just claimed me. And a lifetime of not being enough, of never measuring up, disappears on the wind.
Along with the idea of staying behind to distract Duane and his men.
Because if Sammy wants me to go with her, that’s exactly what I’m going to do. I don’t even care where we’re going or what we’re going to do when we get there.
All that matters is that she asked me.
“Right,” I breathe.
I take Sammy’s hand, then Cams, and rise to my feet, already sprinting for the truck ahead of us.
If the men behind us have guns and are willing to take the shots, we might not make it, but I’m going to do everything I can to get us there before that happens.
I’m not going to let either of these two go, and I’m sure as hell not staying behind while they run on their own.
I shove both of them in front of me to shield them as much as I can, and put my hand on the small of Sammy’s back to keep her moving as fast as Cameron and I.
And while we run, I huff out instructions to Cam.
“The minute we’re in the truck, call the council and get them to meet us on the road back to town. I have a bad feeling Duane is going to be on our tail, and I don’t have my guns in the truck.”
Which means we’re going to need backup before they catch us.
God, I hope someone on the council still believes in me enough to send help.