Page 38 of Bird on a Blade (Hunter’s Heart #1)

CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN

EDIE

I burst into the woods, arms pumping, hair streaming behind me. No coat. No phone. No car keys.

It needs to look believable.

The snow falls in thick white clumps, sticking to my hair and sweater and leaving little prickling dots of cold. At least in the woods proper, it hasn’t piled up too much yet, although the ground is slick and I stumble more than once, catching myself on the nearby trees.

Sawyer’s behind me. Half-following me, half-corralling me back toward the church so I don’t get lost in the dark, snowy woods. When the cops show up here in a few days’ time, there need to be two sets of footprints:

One from the predator, and one from the prey.

Branches snap off to my left, and when I glance over, I see Sawyer slipping through the trees, his hair falling into his eyes. He nods, points forward, and I keep moving. My breath comes out in white puffs; the cold burns in my lungs.

This one last thing, and then I’ll be free.

I surge forward and come across the creek that leads to Sawyer’s church, the water slushy from the cold. I follow it, listening to his footsteps thudding behind me. There’s something exciting about this, about being chased by the man who just murdered my ex-husband while he made me come.

Because that’s who I am, this woman running through the swirling, silvery snow. The sort of woman who gets excited by those things.

It’s freeing. As freeing as running through the woods.

The trees shiver around me, reaching out with their long grasping branches to pluck at my hair and my sweater. The more evidence I can leave behind, the better.

And Sawyer, of course, is always there. Stalking me. Seeing me home.

My foot lands on a slick patch of ice, a place where the creek splashed water and froze, and my legs fly up in front of me. I shriek in panic. There’s a split second when I’m flying, but I never land. Two wiry arms catch me. Pull me up.

Sawyer yanks me up against him, his breath hot against my neck.

“Careful,” he purrs.

I wriggle my ass against him. He’s already starting to get hard again.

“Put your mask on,” I tell him.

He arches an eyebrow, eyes going bright with lust. “Is that what you want, baby?”

I nod, breathless from the cold and from the chase. He grins, steps back, and pulls his mask out from his back pocket and slides it on over his head. Seeing it, his second face, sends a jolt of lust through me.

Not that we have time for that.

“Run,” he growls. “It’s cold out here. You’ll catch your death.”

I grin. Then I turn and run, flush with a second wind. This time, Sawyer runs, too, jogging so he’s just behind me, a constant threat.

“Turn!” he shouts, and I do, veering off to my left .

Two seconds later, I erupt into the clearing.

I stumble to a stop, gasping at the sight. The clouds have cleared, and the moon’s out, heavy and full and high in the sky. The snow fell more thickly here and piled up in drifts against his church and the graveyard. Even though it’s the witching hour, the middle of the night, everything glows.

Sawyer grabs me by the waist and yanks me up against him. “Got you,” he snarls into my ear, and I moan a little, dropping back into his embrace. I’m freezing, my bare hands numb and raw, and I slide them up under his arms, trying to seek warmth.

“You’re shivering like a little rabbit,” he murmurs, then pulls me around to face him.

We both know I’m shivering from the cold and not fear, but I won’t hide who I am anymore. I won’t hide how much his darkness turns me on.

“A killer’s after me,” I whimper, making my eyes big and scared.

Sawyer pulls out his Bowie knife. He cleaned it of Scott’s blood, and the blade is like liquid silver in the moonlight. He presses the flat side against my cheek, and I gasp at the ice of the metal.

“The killer’s caught you,” he says.

Then he pushes up his mask and kisses me, his mouth hot and bruising. Just as I’m melting into his warmth, he sinks his teeth into my bottom lip, hard enough to draw blood. I moan at the sting of the bite, the taste of my blood. Moan as he licks it away.

“I’m going to fuck you so good,” he murmurs into my ear. “As soon as it’s safe.”

As soon as we’re away from this place, he means. All afternoon, we’ve been getting ready: clearing the church of any evidence that I willingly stayed there, planting strands of hair and drops of blood for investigators to find. We packed his truck with a few crucial supplies, mostly food and money. Then he drove the truck to a landing spot downriver. Our escape car .

But first, we have a scene to stage.

I step away from him, gazing up at him in the moonlight. He still has his mask pushed up on his forehead, and his face is carved of light and shadows and speckled with blood. He’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen.

“Are you ready for me to cut you?” he says softly.

I nod. Blood’s dripping down my chin from his bite, but that, I know, won’t be enough. And that bite wasn’t for the scene anyway. It was him claiming me. Me letting myself be claimed.

Sawyer pushes his mask back down, a single movement that makes my pussy pulse. That isn’t necessary, strictly speaking.

I just like it. And Sawyer knows how to please me.

Then I steady myself and hold up my arms, just like we talked about. Sawyer steps forward and flashes the knife out, slashing it over the front of my forearms three quick times, shredding my sweater and slicing my skin just like we discussed. The pain is blinding, as blinding as the snow in the moonlight, and I shriek and stumble backward, clutching at the cuts. Blood splatters out and forms a delicate lacy pattern in the snow.

I clutch my arm to my chest, breathing hard through the harsh, burning pain, and look up at him through my snow-wet hair. He flicks the knife out, splattering more blood.

“Almost there, my perfect prey,” he says, tucking a loose lock of hair behind my ear. “I know it hurts. I know you’re cold.”

I nod, curling my fingers around the wounds. There’s no threat of me bleeding out—Sawyer knows where to cut. But they still hurt like hell. And I am frozen solid.

“I’ll make sure you don’t get lost.” He tilts his head across the clearing. “Now run. Make it look good.” Behind his mask, his eyes catch the moon and gleam. His voice drops into a rough, dangerous growl. “Bleed for me.”

And despite the cold, the pain, my aching muscles—my panties are soaked.

I stumble backward, kicking up glittering flakes of fallen snow as I cut across the clearing, leaving footsteps and trails of blood in my wake. The snow hasn’t quite stopped completely; the last few flakes that drift through the air look like stars.

With the cuts on my arm and the heavier layer of snow on the ground, I can’t run nearly as fast. Worse, the damp is seeping into my shoes, making my feet burn with cold. It’s a relief when I make it to the tree line, where most of the snow is caught up in the tree’s branches, forming a cathedral of white overhead.

I shamble along, running and stumbling, and Sawyer follows. My limping footsteps will help sell the story, which is what I tell myself as I push forward. My entire body shivers; my lip throbs where Sawyer bit me, a reminder of his kiss. And the cuts on my arm burn nearly as bad as my feet. The blood seeping through my fingers is hot and sticky, and it pours down my arm to splatter across the forest floor. A trail of deception.

Every now and then, I hear a crack in the woods, and I glance over my shoulder to see Sawyer lurking behind me in his mask, his bloody knife at his side. He urges me on, knowing what’s waiting for me at the end of this chase.

The end of one life. The start of another.

It’s not long before the woods clear out and the river appears up ahead, a black expanse against the brilliant white of the snow. I make it to the rickety old pier and stop, leaning against the railing. The wind here is as sharp as Sawyer’s blade.

“Keep going, perfect prey.” He stops just behind me, his hand on my hip. “Only a little further now.”

I look over at him. At some point, he took off his mask, and Sawyer, my Sawyer, gazes down at me. He presses his forehead to mine, eyes closed. I expect him to kiss me, but he doesn’t. He just breathes me in.

“What are you doing?” I ask.

“Remembering the way you look right now.” He straightens up and steps back. The wind whipping off the river pushes his hair away from his forehead to show his heavy, furrowed brow. “How you looked when you gave up everything for me.”

I smile through my shivers and my pain. “It was always you, Sawyer. Even when I couldn’t see it.”

Something flashes across his face. Happiness, I think.

Then he leans in and kisses my forehead. Presses his mouth to my ear. “Go. It’s time to drown.”

I laugh at that—would Sawyer Caldwell ever kill by drowning? But I turn from him, and I run the length of the pier in one burst of strength, shaking my arm so the blood splatters across the wood. At the end, waiting for me, is a small, cozy boat. He’s fixed it up with a thick flannel blanket, a silver Thermos I don’t remember ever seeing. A First Aid kit.

I stop and look out at the shimmering mountains. The snow like falling stars. The endless, velvet cold.

And then I jump, somehow landing on both feet in the boat, somehow not tilting the whole thing over. I grab the blanket and slump down on the little seat, wrapping it tight around my shoulders. A few seconds later, Sawyer follows, moving slowly and carefully. He hands me the Thermos.

“Hot cocoa,” he says. “With marshmallows.”

I laugh, delighted. “You’re kidding me.”

“Absolutely not.” He smiles up at me, his expression almost shy. “I knew you’d be cold. I just hope you like it.”

He watches me as I take my first sip. I do like it. It’s dark and hot and sweet. Just like him.

As Sawyer rows us away from the pier, I sip at the hot cocoa, shivering wildly beneath the blanket. The wind is brutal on the water, but Sawyer moves quickly until we catch the current that will take us half a mile downstream, where his truck is waiting. Where our future is waiting.

“Let me see your arm.” The boat pushes along on its own, and he kneels in front of me, carefully guiding my injured hand out from under the blanket. My entire body vibrates from the cold, but his hands are as warm as fire. He pushes the sleeve up, tugging gently against the cuts. Even in the dark, they look angry and cruel. I know they’ll scar, but I don’t mind. They mark me as his.

We don’t speak as Sawyer dresses my wounds, cleaning the blood away with witch hazel and then wrapping them in bandages from the First Aid kit. When he finishes, he kisses my blood-streaked palm, then rises up enough to kiss my blood-streaked mouth.

“Is this really what you want?” he whispers.

I cup his face, trembling in the cold. It feels like the end of the world, all this darkness, all this cold, all this blood.

But all I can feel is hope.

“Yes,” I whisper back.

And just like that, Edie Hensner is dead, killed at the hands of Sawyer Caldwell.

But I’m not dead, and I wrap myself in his arms instead.