Page 50 of Fractured Loyalties (Tainted Souls #2)

Inside, the air is thick with adrenaline. Elias leans back, breathing hard, one hand pressed to his shoulder. His knuckles are pale around the pistol still gripped in his other hand. He doesn’t speak. None of us do.

The trees close in, shadows folding around us until the clearing and the wreck are gone.

Kinley takes a hard turn, finding the old logging road that will carry us away from Volker’s reach, at least, for now.

My pulse pounds in time with the ruts in the path, but my focus is on Elias, on the blood darkening the edge of his coat.

He catches me looking, eyes unreadable in the dash light. “It’s not over,” he says. It sounds like a promise. Or a warning.

And I believe him.

Kinley keeps the wheel steady, jaw locked, eyes locked on the tunnel of black ahead. The suspension groans with every rut, and the whole frame shivers as we cut deeper into the woods.

Inside, the SUV feels smaller than it should.

The air is thick with heat from our bodies, the metallic tang of spent rounds, and something sharper—Elias’s blood, drying into his shirt.

His thigh presses against mine with each jolt, not just for balance but because he’s not letting the space between us grow.

“Lose the lights,” he says, voice low but certain.

Kinley kills them, and we’re swallowed by darkness. The only glow comes from the instrument panel, painting everyone in faint green. Lydia shifts, watching out her window, rifle angled toward the shadows between the trees.

I glance back at Jori. He’s pale, shivering, but conscious. His head tips toward me, then past me toward Elias, like he’s weighing questions he’s not ready to ask.

“You’re bleeding again,” I murmur, not to Jori but to Elias.

“I noticed.”

“Let me—”

“Not yet.” His tone is flat, but his hand finds my wrist for the briefest second before letting go.

Somewhere behind us, an engine growls—distant, but too steady to be a stray sound.

“They’re still on us,” Lydia says, eyes fixed on the treeline sliding past her window.

Kinley doesn’t look away from the road. “They won’t be for long.”

Elias shifts beside me, his arm brushing mine. “Keep your line. No sudden swerves. Let them think they’re closing.”

The sound grows for another half-minute, then fades, swallowed by the forest. Kinley guides us over a shallow rise, and when the road straightens again, there’s nothing behind us but black.

Lydia exhales slowly. “They took the wrong fork.”

No one cheers. It doesn’t feel like a win—more like the kind of reprieve that can vanish without warning. The SUV eats up the distance in long, quiet stretches, the hum of the engine the only steady thing in the world right now.

I keep my eyes forward, letting the dark road pull us farther from that facility, from the wrecked vehicle in the clearing, from the sharp scent of adrenaline that still clings to my skin. Jori shifts beside me, finally leaning his head back.

Elias’s thigh presses against mine again, deliberate this time. He doesn’t speak, but the weight of him there says it clearly enough. We’re not done—not with them, not with what’s coming.

But we’ve made it out. For now.

The forest thins until the dirt road meets cracked asphalt, the SUV gliding over it like it’s been waiting for the shift. Kinley’s hands stay tight on the wheel, eyes forward, jaw clenched.

Lydia’s phone buzzes against the console. She checks the screen, then answers without looking at any of us. “Yeah.” A pause, then her voice drops lower. “When?”

The call ends fast. She’s already swiping through something on her screen, the cold glow lighting her face. “Caleb was spotted earlier tonight,” she says finally. “Three blocks from the clinic.”

The name hits like a punch to the ribs. My hands go cold against my thighs.

Elias doesn’t ask for more details. “We’re going to my place,” he says.

Kinley flicks a glance at him in the rearview. “I don’t know the way.”

Lydia’s already pulling up a map. “I’ll navigate. Keep moving.”

The rest of the ride is a tight coil of silence.

The smell of metal and damp fabric filling the air, the undercurrent of Elias’s blood.

His thigh stays pressed to mine, the weight of it deliberate now, like a tether he’s not ready to cut.

Jori sits stiff on my other side, not speaking, but his eyes keep sliding to me and then to Elias, reading currents he can’t hear.

When the SUV comes to a stop, Elias gets out without waiting, unlocks the door, and waves us in.

Inside, everything is the same, the quiet hum of expensive systems keeping the outside world exactly where it belongs—out.

“You’ll stay here for tonight. Tomorrow, we move to my second safer apartment,” Elias says, glancing around, looking like someone who doesn’t trust the air around him. His voice is too calm, the kind that doesn’t leave room for negotiation.

“I’m not staying here,” I tell him.

His eyes flick to mine. “Yes, you are.”

“I’m going back to my apartment, going back to living life the way I used to. You don’t get to—”

“I do,” he says, stepping closer, “when the man who nearly broke you is walking the same streets again. You think you can just walk back into your routine like nothing’s changed?”

“I can take care of myself.”

“That’s not the point.” His tone hardens. “I’m not giving him the chance to get close to you again.”

I feel the heat rise in my chest, sharper than fear. “You mean you’re not giving me the choice.”

We stand there, the space between us shrinking until I can see the fine shadow of stubble along his jaw, the tight set of his mouth. His eyes don’t waver. Neither do mine.

“Do what you want,” I say finally. “But not with me here.”

I turn and head for the bedroom that’s supposed to be mine. I suddenly don’t want to be anywhere close to this life anymore; it feels like my personal life is slipping away. My bag is still where I left it. I zip it shut, sling it over my shoulder, and walk back into the living room.

Jori is leaning on the table, Kinley standing close to him, watching but not speaking. Lydia looks up from her phone but doesn’t move.

Elias’s gaze follows me to the door. “Lydia,” he says, “stay with her.”

I don’t answer. The night air outside bites against my face as I call for a cab, my fingers steady even though my pulse isn’t. When the headlights sweep the curb, I climb in without looking back.

The cab smells like cheap cologne and coffee grounds.

The driver doesn’t speak, just taps on his GPS and hums something low under his breath.

I lean my head against the window, the glass cold and slick with fog.

Outside, the city moves like it never stopped—drunk kids laughing too loud on sidewalks, traffic lights bleeding red into the wet asphalt, the constant, restless pulse of people who don’t know anything’s changed.

My apartment looks the same from the outside. Quiet, plain, tucked behind a row of forgettable brick units. Safe, in that way things can be when no one notices them.

I swipe the key and step inside.

The air smells like nothing. No Elias. No blood. No disinfectant or leather or gunmetal weight pressing against my spine. Just the faint scent of the candle I forgot to blow out the last time I left. It’s long since burned to the wick.

I set my bag down and just stand there. The floor’s cool under my shoes. My plants are still alive—barely. The framed photo on the counter still turned face-down. I don’t fix it.

The quiet should feel like relief.

Instead, it feels like stepping into a house that was never really mine.

I strip off my clothes and leave them in a trail to the bathroom. The shower is hot, too hot. I scrub until the skin along my ribs stings, until the knot in my stomach doesn’t feel like it might strangle me in my sleep.

When I climb into bed, the sheets feel too soft. The silence presses in. I close my eyes.

I don’t sleep.

By morning, my eyes burn from the inside. I don’t remember falling asleep, but I must have for a little while. There’s light in the room—gray, filtered through blinds, uncommitted. The kind of morning light that doesn’t ask for anything. It just arrives.

I pull on clothes. Jeans, hoodie, sneakers. Simple. Functional. Nothing that clings or suggests anything about the skin underneath. I braid my hair back tight. No lipstick. No earrings. Just the plain silver ring I always twist when I’m trying not to fall apart.

The street smells like rain. I don’t remember if it rained.

At the clinic, Celeste is already at the front desk. She looks up when I walk in and—just like always—her expression doesn’t change much. But the way her hand pauses slightly over her tablet is enough.

“I didn’t expect you today,” she says.

I shrug, keeping my voice neutral. “It felt like a waste to stay home.”

Celeste nods, but her eyes scan me like she’s checking vitals. She doesn’t press. Doesn’t ask about Elias. Just gestures toward the coffee machine. “Alec’s in surgery. He’ll want to check in later.”

I nod and move past her, grateful for the reprieve.

Everything in the clinic gleams like it’s been freshly cleaned. Like they’re expecting company.

Even the air smells different.

It takes me a moment to realize what it is.

They’ve installed a new security system—new locks, discreet cameras, reinforced glass at the reception desk. Alec’s way of saying: We know and we understand. Without forcing me to explain anything elaborately.

I find comfort in that. Not in the security itself, but in the quiet acknowledgment.

I spend the morning organizing intake forms, sorting files, rescheduling appointments. The rhythms come back fast—muscle memory. Names, dates, insurance codes. I lose myself in it, and for a while, it almost feels like before.

Until I catch my reflection in the clinic's front glass—face pale, eyes hollowed out from a sleepless night, hair too tight. I don’t look like someone who’s healed.

I look like someone trying very, very hard not to unravel.

At lunch, I step out back. Just for a breath.

The clinic’s side courtyard is quiet—just gravel, the rusted remains of a bench, and a square of sunlight that feels too sharp against my skin. I don’t sit. I just lean against the brick wall and tilt my head up, eyes closed, letting the sun warm my face.

And then I feel it.

That subtle prickle at the base of my skull. A feeling too specific to be just an imagination.

Someone is watching me.

I don’t whip around. I’ve learned not to move fast when it feels like this. Instead, I slowly open my eyes and glance to the edge of the alley where it opens into the street.

Nothing.

No shadows. No figures.

But the feeling doesn’t leave.

There’s a car across the street—dark, idling. No one in the driver’s seat, not visibly. Just music thumping low behind the tinted glass.

I tell myself it’s nothing.

But I also know Lydia’s subtle when she wants to be. Watching from across rooftops, trailing from half a block behind, never getting too close unless someone tells her to.

And Elias—he wouldn’t have told her to stop.

Still.

Still, there’s something else.

At night, when I get home, there’s a folded piece of paper tucked under my apartment door.

No envelope.

No handwriting.

Just a printed sentence, clean and centered on the page.

You really thought it was over?

My stomach goes cold.

No signature.

Just a faint, greasy fingerprint smudged into the corner. The ink slightly warped from the pressure of whoever folded it.

I lock every bolt on the door. Close the blinds. Turn off every light.

But the dark feels no safer than the street outside.

I sit in the silence and twist the ring on my finger until the skin beneath it burns.