He grabbed the pack from my shoulder and dropped it to the ground. “Let’s take a break.” He looked up at the bright blue sky. “We still have plenty of daylight left to spend up here, so there’s no reason to push so hard.”
“Fine.” I huffed as I lowered myself to the ground. Clayton took a seat beside me and angled so that he faced the trailhead while I faced the trail itself. He draped my sore leg across his lap and made small circular frictions around the side of the knee joint, starting from the front of the patella and working around.
My head dropped back. “That feels unbelievably good.”
I felt his laughter beneath my leg. “I like making you feel good.”
I smiled, eyes closing. “So I’ve noticed.”
His massage took an upward turn, his hands journeying until his fingertips almost brushed the juncture of my thighs.
My cheeks burned while I tried to act indifferent to his touch. I mean, accidents do happen. I relaxed under his gentle pressure while he worked out the worst of the pain. Then it happened again. His thumb stroked along the thick denim seam running between my legs.
I lifted my head slowly, squeezing my legs together as I sat more upright. Clayton centered his attention where I’d trapped his large hand.
“Tell me to stop,” he whispered.
I forced myself to relax as the now-familiar flush of desire rose in me. “What if I don’t want you to?” His concern made me question his control, but I wasn’t afraid. I was captivated, drawn into the depth of his gaze.
Then a rain of pinecones pelted his back and my arms. I brushed away the dirt and thorny barbs.
“Look what I’ve found!” Figment scrabbled across the worn path, tossing and head butting the dried-out husks of pinecones, mostly picked apart by real squirrels seeking the seed inside the prickly shell.
“That’s great.” Disappointment at being interrupted settled around me. I tried not to focus on the dull ache between my legs. We were being watched, so I tried to convince myself that rolling my hips into his hand was a bad idea.
A final glance at Figment’s inquisitive assessment of what parts went where gave me the strength I needed to pull away. “Just wonderful.”
Clayton stood and tugged me to my feet, helping me into my backpack.
He glanced up, his face impassive as Figment scampered up to his shoulder. “You can go ahead. We’ll let you enjoy your solitude.” Clayton continued to rub her ears. “Just don’t go too far.”
“Yeah, okay.” I resumed my hike, leaving as the pair whispered to one another, shutting me out of their conversation. Shoulders back, I pressed on alone. If they didn’t want to play with me, then I didn’t want to play with them. Maturity, thy name is Madelyn.
Pushing up the trail harder than I should have, I almost missed the turn guiding me up the final incline to where the landscape dropped away before me. Trees and rocks jutted up off to my left and right, but ahead lay nothing. My legs ached from the effort of climbing to Emasen’s cliff edge, but the view made the burn worthwhile.
Exhausted, I shrugged out of my backpack, letting it slide down my arms to land with a soft thud on the compacted earth. Sweat stung my eyes. Perspiration beaded on my skin, struggling to squeeze through the coating of waterproof sunscreen Emma had made me apply before allowing me to leave the house.
I walked to the edge of the precipice and stood with the toes of my sneakers hanging over the sheer rock face of the cliff. My shoulders tensed, air whooshed into my lungs as I rolled to the balls of my feet, preparing for the impossibility of flight.
“Step back from the ledge,” Clayton’s soft voice coaxed from behind me.
“Clayton,” I groaned. “I wasn’t really going to jump.” I pointed towards my back. “No wings, remember?” As if either of us could forget.
I twisted abruptly, discounting the lingering tenderness in my knee, and lost my footing. Arms flailing, I tried to regain my balance and failed, toppling backwards from the ledge.
“Clayton!” I shouted his name as my body whistled through the air, plummeting towards the earth. Frantic heartbeats thundered in my ears, drowning out the sound of my screams.
As I fell, my earliest memories flickered through my mind. I pushed aside the barrage of images and settled on my favorite. That of a black-skinned boy with glittering onyx eyes. And wings. Tiny, ruby-red wings that had fluttered with his excitement and made my child’s heart long for the half of my heritage I lacked.
“Madelyn!” Clayton bellowed, leaping from the edge and following me into the sky.
I had only a fraction of a second to wonder if he would make it before his strong arms plucked me from my downward spiral.
His enormous scarlet wings opened wide, stretching out so far in either direction I couldn’t see the blackened tips and tiny, hook-like hands that topped them.
Clayton’s blunt chin dug into the top of my head. The muscular arms holding me close tightened until my breath wheezed from my lungs.
“Were you trying to get yourself killed?” he snapped. “What if I hadn’t been there? What if you’d been alone?” His skin trembled beneath my fingers.
“It was an accident.” I struggled in his hold, trying to free my arms from where he pinned them to my sides. “If you hadn’t startled me, I wouldn’t have fallen in the first place.”
“You can’t be so careless.” He held me dangling in the air before him, shaking me senseless, before tucking me back against his chest. His voice cracked. “What would I have done without you?” His thumb worked across a bony protrusion behind my shoulder blade, marking my absence of wings.
“It’s okay, really.” I rested my cheek against his chest since my hands weren’t free. “A fall from that height would have hurt.” I carefully avoided making a comment on my personal experiences. “But I would have healed eventually.”
“I don’t want to hear this.” His head tossed from side to side. “I don’t want to know how you know that.”
If I’d thought he couldn’t hold me tighter, I’d been wrong. I would wear bruises for a while, but for now, I allowed him to have what he needed, letting him squeeze until joints popped and pain blossomed. It was such a small hurt when compared to the anguish carried in his voice.
Using my chin to part the fabric of his shirt, I rested my face flush against his skin. His body shuddered beneath my cheek. His desperate groan filled my ear with his heated breath as he glided the last few feet and touched down.
Still gripping my upper arms, Clayton lowered me to the ground, sliding me down his body so slowly time felt suspended. With earth beneath my feet, I leaned into him, trying to calm his ragged nerves. Something hard pressed against my stomach, making me shift to get comfortable and him growl low in his throat. Oh. Oh.
“Madelyn…” His voice grew husky.
I pulled back, meeting his gaze. “You really are worked up over this.” I twisted in a circle before him. “I’m fine. See?”
“Madelyn…”
“Don’t beat yourself up over it.” I touched his arm, the muscle beneath my hand pulled taut as a bowstring.
“Run,” he grated out over his lips.
I spun around, searching for another demon or a wild animal, unable to imagine anything Clayton couldn’t protect me against. We were alone in the ravine. No one or thing had followed us here. “Why? What’s wrong?”
Our eyes locked. I gasped and backed away slowly. Clayton’s pupils flashed silver, huge, luminous, and spellbinding. His wings twitched with his effort to still them, but vibrant reds saturated his skin as his arousal heightened and called forth my body’s own response.
“Go.” He clutched his head, breaths ragged. “Run!”
I turned, but from the corner of my eye I saw him fall to the ground. Instead of leaving, I took a half step forward.
“Get away from me!” He slashed the air inches from my face with razor-tipped claws. “I can’t control myself. It’s too much. Your scent…” His wings stretched and the
n cloaked his body as he hid himself from me. “Find Figment, she knows the way.”
This time he didn’t have to ask twice. I spun on my heel and ran. Rocks turned my ankles and bramble tugged on my pants legs as I covered the familiar ground. I don’t know how he expected me to find Figment. I hadn’t seen her since she’d ditched me for Clayton earlier, and there was no time to look for her now. I had to run.
To my right a narrow trail hugged the mountainside, leading up and away from the basin and the tormented demon rocking on his heels beneath the shelter of his wings. I took a step towards the upward path.
“Not that way. He’ll see you.”
I jerked my head around in time to see Figment glide from her tree-side hideout onto my shoulder, which quivered with the need to shake her loose. Her small chest heaved from exertion. She must have raced us to reach the bottom. “Up is the only way out. The ravine is a dead end on both sides.”
“There’s a crevice at the base of the mountain. Follow it through to the other side. He can’t reach you from the air if you stay inside the mountain.”
Using her tiny paw, she pushed my cheek to the left and I saw it. The locals called it a fat-man squeeze, but I hadn’t realized it ran the length of the mountain. A fissure in the rock face made an uncovered chute where an aerial scout could see me, but the depth of the trail carved into the rock would guard from an overhead attack.
A tortured cry rose behind me, reverberating through the rocky basin. This could not be happening. Not again. But here I was, legs burning as I ran for the shelter of the crevice and slipped inside. Jagged rocks scraped my hips and hands as I felt my way through the opening and entered the chute. Graffiti covered the walls where the local teens had claimed the space as their own.
Bracing along the smoother rocks, I used them to keep my balance as I hustled through a larger space, just wide enough for two people to fit side by side. I heard the crunch of cardboard flatten beneath my heel and looked down. A box stuck to my shoe and when I finally managed to scuff it off, I was rewarded by the Trojan logo smiling up at me.
“Eww.” I wiped my hands on my jeans. “Just eww.” Damn teenagers and their lack of hygiene.
A shadow fell across me, darkening the broader alley. I knew, but couldn’t stop myself from looking up. Clayton was suspended in the air above me. His eyes were wide and unseeing. His chest heaved as his fingers flexed open and closed at his sides, waiting for a chance to put them to use.
I glanced at Figment still clinging to my shoulder. Her beady eyes stared up at him, disbelieving, which did nothing for my confidence.
“What do we do now? He’s going to wait us out or catch us on the other side.”
“Keep going.” She ran a paw over my hair. “I’ll distract him and you run for the Jeep.”
“No, Fig—” I tried to catch her, but she was gone, scampering over the rocky outcroppings until she cleared the gap. She soared into the air, landing on Clayton’s face and sinking claws into either cheek while using her body as a blindfold.
“Run. I can’t hold him for long.”
“I can’t just leave you.”
“Please, for both our sakes, you must keep yourself safe.”
“Fine, but if he hurts one hair on your head, then when this is over, his ass is grass.”
Scrambling over the uneven rocks, I made my escape. A sliver of daylight grew until I burst through it, out the other side, and into the campground. The Jeep sat alone in the empty lot, salvation within easy reach. Gravel crunched beneath my feet, bogging me down when I needed speed.
I skidded around the driver’s side, yanking the door open and hauling myself inside before tugging the door shut with a solid whack. Keys glinted in the ignition.
In an instant I realized he’d known this would happen. Why else would he have left the keys? And Figment. He’d even brought along a chaperone. As the flood of clues I should have noticed compounded, I felt doubly the fool. I’d known he struggled against his desire for me, and still I had made him bring me here to this isolated spot where I’d further baited him with kisses.
With a harsh twist of my wrist, the engine turned over and cranked. Spinning wheels and spraying gravel, I sped towards the trail leading to the highway. My foot couldn’t press the pedal down hard enough. The engine thrummed, vibrating through a rough patch until the road turned smooth.
I drove, hard and fast, watching the road while casting glances in the rearview mirror. With the top gone, he could reach in and pluck me from my seat. Not a happy thought.
The hairs on my neck prickled as if dozens of tiny spiders paraded across my nape. I looked up to see Clayton gliding overhead, thrusting his wings to pull ahead of the speeding Jeep. I stomped the gas pedal to the floorboard. He sailed past me, gaining a few car lengths before he stopped and hovered in the center of my lane with outstretched arms.
I slammed on the brakes, knowing it was too late to stop. Tires spinning, the Jeep swung sideways as the grill smashed into Clayton’s hips with a shattering crunch.
His body flew backwards, tumbling over asphalt until he rolled to a stop on his back with one wing twisted beneath him and the other twitching and broken beside him.
“Clayton!” I leapt over the half door. My feet smacked the pavement as I ran to him. Dropping to the ground, I lightly touched his shoulder. He winced and half-opened hazy blue-gray eyes.
“You idiot. I could have killed you!”
His chest rattled on his next indrawn breath. “I would have hurt you.”
“You wouldn’t have hurt me.” I didn’t know where the certainty came from, but I didn’t question it. I stroked my fingers across his ruined cheek. “Clayton—”
“Shh.” He pressed a kiss into my palm. “It’s my fault.” His eyes drifted closed. “Always you, Maddie. Always.” Then he went still.
I shook his arm, but he didn’t move again or speak. I shoved from the ground and ran to the Jeep, searching under the seats and in the console, finally finding what I sought in the glove box. A cherry red cell phone, an exact replica of the one Figment had produced that morning in my bedroom.
My knee-jerk response was to call Emma, but I didn’t trust her not to make things worse. I swallowed, tasting my pride slide down my throat like sandpaper, and punched in Dana’s number instead.
“Hello?”
“You’re home.”
“Of course I am, silly. Parker is home from school because of swelling in his leg. I think the cast is too tight.” Water ran in the background. “Did you need something?”
I stared at the hulking mass of demon sprawled in a crumpled heap across the road. “You have to help me.” I tamped down my fear and tried to steady my voice. “Clayton took me on a hike.” Her silence told me she hadn’t known. “Something happened and I…I ran over him.”
“You what?” I heard something break, like maybe she’d been doing dishes when I called and now had one less to dry. “You mean with a car?”
“It was his Jeep.” Hysteria was creeping up on me. “Look, he’s passed out and I need help to move him. Please help me.”
“Calm down,” she snapped. “Where are you?”
Peering through the windshield, I noted a metal sign a few yards ahead. “We’re at mile marker twenty-nine, just before you reach Emasen.”
“Don’t try to move him. I’ll get help and meet you there.” The line died.
I tossed the phone in the passenger seat and walked back to Clayton, dropping to the pavement. He lay so still. I took his hand in mine and held tight, brushing a curl from across his forehead.
“Stupid, stubborn, male. You didn’t have to do this. I would have survived anything you could have done to me.” I stroked his bruised cheek with the backs of my fingers and smoothed over his busted lips with my thumb. “You have to be okay. I can’t lose you too.”
Regrets weighted my conscious. Even when I heard the distant hum of engines, I couldn’t lift my head. I slumped there, holding his hand, forcing his
fingers to mesh with mine, and felt my heart fragment. Brakes caught and tires squealed over blacktop. Two sets of doors opened, one shut. And I still couldn’t look up.
I almost believed if I took my eyes from Clayton that he would leave me, and I couldn’t go through that again. I’d just begun to live, to think beyond today and look forward to waking in the morning. I couldn’t lose him. I wasn’t strong enough.
“Clayton.” Dana’s high-pitched cries succeeded in snapping my head up. “What has she done to you?” She shoved me aside, breaking my connection with his hand so she could kneel where I had knelt, checking his pulse before turning on me. “How could you do this to him?”
“It was an accident. I didn’t mean for him to get hurt.”
She looked over my shoulder. “Why were you driving his Jeep? Why was he chasing you?” Her eyes narrowed. “He tried to claim you, didn’t he?”
“No. Maybe? I—I don’t know what happened. We were hiking. I fell, and when he caught me, he went crazy and told me to run so I did.”
Dana’s shoulders hunched over Clayton. “You could have killed him. Maybe Jacob wasn’t in the wrong. Maybe it’s been you the whole time.”
One of the males she’d brought for backup, Mason I think his name was, spoke up. “You don’t mean that. Madelyn wouldn’t hurt a fly and you know it. This is all a misunderstanding. Clayton will set the record straight when he wakes up.”
“If he wakes up,” she sniffed, dabbing her fingertips under her eyes.
Mason waved to another, taller male to step forward. Together, they lifted Clayton and carried him to the rear of Dana’s truck. She lowered the tailgate, and blankets spilled out from where she’d lined the bed of the truck in preparation for his transport. The Evans Inn logo flashed in black relief on the topmost comforter, leaving me no doubt of his destination.
Making my way back to the Jeep, I crawled inside and shifted into gear, then followed the speeding trucks back to the inn.
Chapter Twelve
I drummed my fingers in slow succession across the steering wheel. There wasn’t a single vacant parking space left at Evans Inn. Dana must have reached out and touched every branch of the colony’s phone tree to have the lot filled so quickly. The overflow of vehicles hugged either side of the road, forcing the oncoming traffic to straddle the dotted line in turns to fit through the narrow gap.
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