Page 115 of Knot So Lucky

"Anyone following?"

"Negative." Different voice, somewhere to my right. "We're clear. They haven't caught on that he's missing yet."

The words penetrate through the fog with alarming clarity.

My family doesn't know I'm gone.

Cale and Roran don't know I'm gone.

No one's coming for me because no one realizes I need rescuing.

The thought should terrify me. Should trigger adrenaline and survival instincts that override this debilitating weakness.

Instead, it just makes me tired.

So impossibly tired.

If I fall asleep, they might be tracked. Or get confronted when the Lane family security protocols kick in—automated systems that monitor my location and vital signs, that alert my parents when something's wrong.

But those systems rely on the medical monitoring equipment I'm no longer connected to.

I could be off-grid.

Completely, devastatingly off-grid.

The realization should spur me to action. Should make me fight harder, think clearer, and find a way out of this situation before it escalates beyond recovery.

But my eyes are so heavy.

Just one minute. If I close my eyes for just one minute, maybe I'll be able to think more clearly when I wake up.

One minute of rest, then I'll formulate an escape plan.

One minute...

The car is moving in one moment—I can feel the vibrations, hear the engine noise, sense the velocity through my body even though I can't see properly.

Then suddenly everything is chaos.

Too many loud noises happening simultaneously. Metal shrieking. Glass shattering. The horrible crunch of impact that I feel through my bones even though I can't process what's causing it.

The car jerks violently, throwing me against something hard. Pain blooms across my shoulder but feels distant, like it's happening to someone else.

Then everything goes still.

Eerily, impossibly still, like the world just stopped mid-motion.

Voices erupt—panicked, angry, overlapping in ways that make comprehension impossible.

"—the fuck?—"

"—ambushed—"

"—get him out now?—"

Hands grab at me, pulling me roughly from wherever I'm sitting. My body moves like a ragdoll, muscles not responding to the commands my brain is trying to send.

I'm drifting.