Page 4

Wouldn’t be long now. Any minute, and the darkness would engulf me.
“Rebel!”
It was a muffled shout. One I would have put down to a hallucination if it hadn’t been accompanied by an arm spearing through the water toward me. Curiosity sent the darkness receding just enough that I could watch the arm blindly groping for me, but a good few feet off target.
I had the strange desire to laugh. Funny, bodyless arm.
Floppy, weird-looking thing.
The water rippled around me wildly, and hands grabbed at my arms.
For a millisecond, I thought it was one of the guys.
But her hands were too small. The face that loomed over me wasn’t Fang’s permanently grumpy scowl or Kian’s playful grin or Vaughn’s too-sexy smirk.
Sasha’s panicked face swam in front of my eyes.
I’d only met the woman once, when I’d gone next door to borrow an egg for a cake I’d been baking. But I would have kissed her if I’d been able to move.
With her hands around my arms, she got her feet beneath her and pushed hard on the bottom of the pool.
The two of us, along with the chair, shot up above the surface.
“Rebel!” Sasha spluttered. “Are you okay?”
My body took over, trying to suck in air while painfully vomiting water at the same time.
All too soon we sank beneath the surface again. This time we only fell halfway before she pushed off the bottom and sweet, blessed air kissed my face.
“Shit, this was not my best idea. I can’t swim very well.” She gasped, face barely above the water with the effort of keeping me above it.
I couldn’t help her. No matter how hard I tried to get my arms and legs free, I was completely at her mercy. I sucked in another breath but then the weight of me and the chair dragged her down again.
She pushed off the bottom once more, but she was getting tired.
I was going to drown us both.
The second my mouth was out of the water, I pushed away the desire to take huge, gulping breaths and forced out choked words instead. “Let me go.”
“No!”
“Let me go or we both drown.”
There was fear and confusion in her eyes. Then suddenly, determination. Instead of letting me go, she opened her mouth and screamed.
We both sank beneath the water again.
Her next push off the bottom wasn’t strong enough to get us all the way up.
Every sliver of hope inside me died.
Inch by inch, second by second, the darkness came for me again.
All I could do was pray Sasha was strong enough to get herself out. She was too young and innocent to be caught up with my crap.
I wouldn’t even get to tell Fang I loved him. He’d poured his heart out, and I’d been too chicken to say it back. Even though I felt it. Fuck, I felt it so hard.
Vaughn’s face swam in front of mine.