Total pages in book: 117
Estimated words: 112398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 112398 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 562(@200wpm)___ 450(@250wpm)___ 375(@300wpm)
Brianna glanced back once, her sweet face full of grief and belief, before she hurried across the street and down the sidewalk.
Once they’d disappeared, my mother stood, in disquiet, shifting from foot to foot. “How long will you be away?”
“I don’t know. Until it’s safe.”
“Please be that, Aria—safe. We need you here. In our lives. We all love and miss you so much.”
“I know,” I promised, “and I’m so thankful.”
She pulled me into the tightest hug as she whispered in my ear, “My beautiful, brave, awe-inspiring girl. Take care. I will be thinking about you every second.”
We stayed that way for the longest time; then she was swiping at her tears as she forced herself to step away. She turned on her heel and took the same path my siblings had taken as she headed to my grandmother’s house.
Though my mother . . . she never looked back.
I had a feeling it was too painful for her.
I stood there until she disappeared around the corner; then I turned, still hugging the blanket around me as I started for where Pax waited in the distance.
I was halfway across the field when I felt it—a shift in the atmosphere. The way ice crystals seemed to form in the gloomy air.
With it, evil crackled across the open space.
The hairs on the nape of my neck lifted in awareness.
I whirled toward the direction that I’d sensed it. A hundred feet away, a man had cut through the field, riding toward me on a bicycle.
It wouldn’t have been all that strange a sight except for the expression on his face.
Pure, unmitigated hate.
That, and the piece of metal that glinted from his hand beneath the bright rays of winter sunlight, protruding from the handlebars like a sadistic appendage.
A knife.
Fear streaked through my being.
Then I turned, and I ran.
Chapter Three
Aria
Terror battered my senses, and my heart thundered so hard in my chest that it was the only thing I could hear. The pound, pound, pounding that drummed through my senses on a wail.
A shout of instinct to protect myself.
Tossing the blanket from my shoulders, I took off in a sprint across the crispy, dead grass.
I knew the moment Pax realized what was happening. There was no missing the fierce pulse of protection that blistered through the air, cutting through the cold in a slice of lightning.
A bolt that struck in the middle of me.
My feet clapped on the hard ground and air ripped from my lungs as I raced toward the car.
I could feel the man gaining on me, erasing the distance in a flash. The tires of the bike crunched over the dead field as he pedaled, the harsh rasps of his breath growing closer with each second.
He was suddenly right there, riding his bike around me and cutting off my path.
Surprise tore out of me on a yelp, and I stumbled to the side. The only thing I could do was shift course, pivoting ninety degrees and driving myself away from the direction I’d been going in.
I got the sense the man was herding me.
Forcing me to run toward an acre of woods that rose up about fifty yards in front of us. He came up to my side, and he swiped an arm out, stabbing the knife toward me.
“Bitch. Whore. Did you think he would let you live?”
I ducked, and the blade whooshed by my face, missing me by half an inch.
Behind us, an engine revved and tires squealed, and I could hear the scraping of metal as the car jumped the curb.
Oh God. Pax was coming.
The car roared as he blazed across the field, coming directly for us.
The man was undeterred, his mind so gone to the evils that possessed him that he had no clue what was coming. “Little slut. You have no place. No power.”
Pax was right there, swerving back and forth from behind. His power surged, though it was trapped, held back as he waited for the right moment to strike.
I could almost hear him shouting in my head, Get clear. It will be my pleasure to do the rest.
The man slashed the knife toward me again, but his bike wobbled with the angle. He missed me by a foot, and he cursed as he struggled to regain his balance.
It gave me the chance to sidestep, and I shifted course, making another sharp turn.
One the monster was unprepared for. One that Pax used as the perfect opportunity.
He gunned it, the engine screaming as he flew across the dead grass of the winter field. He clipped the rear tire of the bicycle before he slammed on the brakes.
The man was thrown from his bike, and he arced through the air.
Suspended.
Flying over the top of the car.
Airborne for the longest time.
Finally, he smashed to the ground, as if gravity had suddenly sucked him down. He tumbled at least three times before he came to a stop face down.