Total pages in book: 194
Estimated words: 187754 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 939(@200wpm)___ 751(@250wpm)___ 626(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 187754 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 939(@200wpm)___ 751(@250wpm)___ 626(@300wpm)
So when I feel my heart calling out for them, I finally let myself push away from the wall until I’m visible. “I’m here!”
“Goldilocks!” The stricken look on Khalil’s face morphs into crippling relief when he sees me alive and in one piece. Fortunately, he doesn’t stay incapacitated for long. “Hold on, baby. We’re going to pull you up.” When I nod, he quickly disappears back over the upper ledge. A couple of minutes later, a thick red rope is slung over the side. The long length pools onto the ground by my feet, and I grab it.
“Tie that around your waist,” Khalil instructs. “And make the knot as tight as you can. I’m going to pull you up.”
“Okay.”
Once I have what I hope is a decent knot tied around my waist, I hold onto the slack, and Khalil begins to pull me up. Thorin grabs me the moment I clear the lip of the upper ledge, and he pulls me over until I collapse on top of him while breathing hard.
This feels familiar.
When I look around, I see dead bodies everywhere, but my gaze doesn’t linger on them. I search for Seth and find him standing back with his hands in his pockets like some passing bystander.
“Seth…” I climb to my feet with Khalil’s help and go to Seth. He doesn’t back away from me, but I can tell he wants to. “What happened? Are you hurt?”
“My leg is fine,” he answers evenly. “The bullet grazed me.”
I nod with a hard exhale. “Good. That’s good.”
I can feel Thorin and Khalil watching our exchange closely, and I’m again left wondering what Seth told them. Had he believed my lies when I said I didn’t love him, or am I living in a fool’s paradise thinking he might have seen through them?
“Is something up with you two?” Khalil inquires when the awkward silence stretches on.
I can’t bring myself to answer while Seth just stares at me blankly with blood on his shirt like he hadn’t just killed for me.
“Seth?” I decide to ask him instead. I need to know that he knows it was all real for me too.
Instead, he turns away, giving his back to me. “We should go,” he suggests while starting the hike back up the slope. “We need to get the supplies to clear these bodies out.”
I stand there feeling like my heart is splintering in two while Thorin and Khalil give us both weird looks.
So Seth hadn’t told them, and yet, he obviously believes all those things I said in the dell. The only question is…why hadn’t he ratted me out?
“Come on,” Thorin softly orders while taking my elbow.
I force myself to put one foot in front of the other as I make my way back up the slope. Khalil lingers behind, making sure the mercenaries are all really dead. He’s over by one of the larger slanted rocks, checking Sanders when I hear it.
The horrifying familiar crack like thunder and the sound of heavy rain pouring down…
Except the sky is clear and there is no rain.
The snow beneath our feet begins to crack and slide, slowly heading for the ledge where it spills over the side. I imagine the image from below where Finnegan lies dead is that of a waterfall except with snow.
The ground starts trembling, and it feels like a stampede heading straight for us.
Seth, who had stopped to pick a flower turns to face us with a confused frown. “What is that?” he calls out from fifty feet ahead.
The blood drains from my face as I gape at the horrifying image behind him. Mist crests the hill that leads home, and then a wall of white so thick and high it blocks out the sun follows as it heads straight for us.
The answer to Seth’s question spills from my lips in a horrified shudder. “Avalanche.”
Fuck, it’s cold.
I stopped feeling my fingers and toes hours ago, but if I complain again, I have a feeling I’ll perish from strangulation instead of exposure.
The storms have finally stopped, but the sun still hasn’t appeared as snow slowly falls, making visibility poor. Today, the wilds are cloaked in fog and mist that blanket the forest floor and wrap around my ankles.
“So I’m guessing you’ve realized life is too short to spend it guarding a soulless witch, and you’re planning to quit once we make it out of here, huh?”
I peek over at Tyler, who is currently trying to use the hands on his grandfather’s watch to determine our direction. Caught off guard, his head snaps toward me, and his brown eyes widen when he finds me watching him. Amusement breaks through his surprise, and then he snorts.
“Or I realized the soulless witch needs me more than I thought, and I’m asking for a raise once we make it out of here.”