Page 25 of Branded Souls (Ember Hollow Romance #3)

Fox

W e spun for what felt like forever before coming to a stop.

A complete stop.

I blinked, stunned we didn’t hit anything.

I looked over at Skye, my arm still locked across her chest. She was breathing hard, mouth slightly open.

“Are you okay?” I asked, my voice rough with shock.

She didn’t answer. Didn’t even look at me. Just stared straight ahead, eyes wide and unfocused, like she couldn’t quite register what had happened.

I turned, glancing around the car. Nothing looked broken or bent out of shape. No airbags. No blood.

Still, I checked myself. Arms, legs, chest. Nothing screamed pain, but adrenaline had a way of dulling everything. I couldn’t trust it yet.

I leaned over the center console, getting close to Skye. Gently, I touched my fingers to her cheek and turned her face toward mine .

“Skye, I need you to talk to me,” I said, my breaths almost as heavy as hers.

At the sound of my voice, her gaze found mine. Those beautiful, hazel-green eyes latched onto me. The panic was evident in her expression.

My thumb brushed across her cheekbone. “Are you injured? Does anything hurt?”

Her gasping didn’t slow, stare not moving from mine.

“No,” she eventually breathed. “I’m not hurt.”

Relief crashed over me. I sagged forward, my forehead touching hers. Her scent wrapped around me, bright bergamot and something darker—ink, maybe—and I let myself savor it for a moment.

We were okay. She wasn’t hurt.

What the hell had just happened?

Too soon, I pulled back from her. “Stay right here,” I instructed.

I didn’t wait for her to respond before I unclipped my seat belt and swung the driver’s side door open. Rain poured, instantly soaking my hair and my clothes, but I could see through it better now that we were stationary.

We had spun off the shoulder and into a small, grassy area. Headlights zoomed past on the highway. Nobody had stopped. Whoever had run us off this road was gone.

I clenched my teeth. Quickly, I walked around the SUV. There seemed to be minimal damage, if any.

When I climbed back into the vehicle, it was running fine.

I checked back in with Skye. “You still good?”

She was staring at the windshield again. Both hands were on her chest, pressing over her heart. She was still too pale .

“Skye?” I reached for her, brushing her hair back from her face.

“I’m fine,” she said, her voice strained.

Physically, she should be fine. I didn’t see any bumps to the head, though it hadn’t been that violent of an incident. We’d spun around once, maybe twice, gauging the distance we were from the road. We came to a stop fairly quickly. I didn’t even have any aching where my seat belt was.

Another crack of lightning flashed, and Skye jumped.

I instinctively put a hand on her shoulder. “You’re okay,” I reassured her.

She was shaking.

“We need to get out of this storm,” I muttered.

It was getting dark now, and I wasn’t about to get back on this road—a road someone had ran us off—in the dark and in the rain.

Skye had been through enough today.

“What happened?” Skye stammered.

I fished my phone out of my pocket. I debated calling the cops, but I wasn’t going to make Skye sit here and wait for them to make a report. I wasn’t interested enough in an insurance claim to make her suffer any longer.

“Your guess is as good as mine.” I did a quick search on my phone for the nearest place to stay.

Luckily, there was an exit less than a mile ahead that had a decent hotel on it.

“Did someone do that on purpose?” Skye asked.

I put down my phone and shifted back into drive. Cautiously, I inched back onto the highway. It wasn’t too busy, probably because of the storm .

“I don’t know,” I said tensely. “Could be.”

Skye let out something close to a whimper.

My heart clenched. “It’ll be okay, Skye. I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

I wasn’t sure what someone would accomplish by running us off the road and leaving us there. But I sure as hell would do my best to figure it out.

Minutes later, we pulled into the parking lot of the hotel.

“What are you doing?” Skye stared at the quaint, but neatly kept building.

I pulled into a space closest to the door. “It’s going to storm the rest of the night.” I had checked the weather while I was looking for a place to stay. “It didn’t look like it was going to let up anytime soon on the radar. We can stay here tonight and go home in the morning.”

Skye’s hand was still on her chest. She shook her head. “I didn’t bring anything with me to stay overnight.”

“It’s fine. I keep a go-bag in my trunk. I have extra basic necessities. You can borrow some of my clothes to sleep in.”

She stared at me like she wanted to argue but didn’t have the energy. She looked exhausted, like she was hanging on by a thread.

“Come on,” I said softly. “Let’s get you inside.”

She followed me in without a word, and stood silent as I checked us in.

Of course, they only had one king available, but I would be fine sleeping on the sofa or the chair—whatever.

With my backpack slung over my shoulder, I led the way to our room. Skye trailed behind me as if she were in a trance. Her arms were gripped tight around her, and she was still trembling .

As soon as I unlocked the room, Skye rushed inside, elbowing past me, saying, “I need to use the restroom.”

She slammed the bathroom door before I had time to register it. I stood there, listening for sounds of distress, but heard none.

I did another assessment of myself, gently touching where the seat belt had been secured around me. Nothing was sore.

We had spun off the highway, but we hadn’t had an abrupt stop or a crash. We had slowed down on our own once we hit the grass and stopped. I reminded myself that she physically shouldn’t be injured, but that didn’t mean she wasn’t scared, maybe even terrified.

I walked deeper into the room, frowning when I realized how small it actually was.

It seemed fairly clean, but there was no sofa or chair—just the king bed and barely enough room to walk around it.

Between the desk shoved up against the side wall and the dresser with the TV on top of it, there was minimal floor space.

I probably could have searched for a better hotel, but I’d wanted to get Skye someplace safe.

I listened again for any signs of distress in the bathroom, but it was completely silent. I threw my bag on the bed and grabbed my phone, sending text messages to my brothers about what had happened.

There was much to do at this point to figure out who the hell had run us off the road. I hadn’t seen anything through that rain, and no one else had stopped.

I texted back and forth with August for a while, waiting for Skye to come out of the bathroom, but she never did. As the minutes ticked by, anxiety built in my chest.

It was too quiet. There wasn’t a hint of running water or footsteps in there .

The pit that had been in my stomach since we ran off that road got heavier as I approached the bathroom. I knocked softly.

“Skye,” I said, loud enough that she should be able to hear me through the door. “Are you okay?”

No response.

I knocked harder. “Skye, I need to know that you’re okay in there, and then I’ll leave you alone.”

I waited. Seconds turned into a minute, and then I slammed my fist on the door so hard it vibrated in the frame.

“Skye, I need to know that you’re okay. Answer me.”

When she didn’t, the panic set in. I tried the knob, but it was locked.

I cursed and spun around, scanning the room for anything that might help me get through.

My eyes landed on my backpack—my go-bag.

Rushing over, I yanked it open and pulled out the small toolkit I always kept inside. It was a set of interchangeable screwdrivers meant for electronics and small repairs—but it would do.

I grabbed the tool I needed and dropped to my knees in front of the bathroom door. My hands worked fast, tearing apart the handle without a care for what I might break.

It probably only took seconds, but it felt like forever before the knob finally came free and I could shove inside.

My heart lurched the moment I saw her.

The bathroom was fairly small, with nothing but white tile everywhere. She was curled up in a ball next to the sink. Her forehead was pressed against the wall as she gripped her knees to her chest.

She was shaking, her breaths heavy and labored.

I dropped the screwdriver. It clattered to the floor as I ran to her.