Page 1 of Oathbreaker

One

Briar

“Colt!”

I can’t possibly be seeing what I’m seeing.

Colt died five years ago.

He died.

Hell, I’m standing right next to his headstone, his name engraved in the marble.

And yet…he’s walking out of the shadows. No?—

He’s limping out of the shadows, slowly making his way toward me.

It’s that slow, pained gait that finally snaps me out of my shock, has me believing the improbability of what I’m seeing. If this was a fantasy—and I’ve had plenty of them about Colt—he would be striding over the rolling hills, shirt unbuttoned, coat open and flowing, a la Mr. Darcy, searching for me, worried for me…

And declaring, “You must know…surely you must know it was all for you.”

But he’s not.

He’s maneuvered his way out from the shadows and into the moonlight, and while he’s moving steadily, it’s not the poignant ending of a romantic film.

Because he’s moving painfully.

So damned painfully.

“Colt,” I say again, staring in his direction, and I know he hears me this time because his gaze locks on to mine, mouth hitching up at one corner, giving me The Smile.

The one that had me falling in love with him the first time Dash brought him home from college break.

To give him a place to crash for a few weeks while school was out of session.

Because Colt’s family…

Well, suffice to say, for as much as my parents are involved in their own lives and not super interested in what my brother and I are doing with ours (and they’ve been that way from the moment we hit our teenaged years), Colt’s parents make ours look like Mom and Dad of the Year.

My heart warms at the memory because, God, Colt was such a fish out of water those first few days. Then he settled in, and I got to see his wicked sense of humor, that smile.

Add in a handsome package, a body a teenaged girl dreams of, and a sweet, protective streak a mile wide…

There was never anything for me to do except fall.

And I did it hard.

We close the distance between us, and I get my first good look at him.

“Oh, my God!” I gasp.

He looks terrible, and I don’t mean that in the whole he-didn’t-sleep-well-last-night sort of way. I mean that he looks terrible—he’s skinnier than I’ve ever seen him, having lost well over thirty pounds, and he’s covered in cuts and bruises. They line his arms, cut upon cut, some stitched up, some worse than that, I presume, since there are bandages covering them.

And the bruises.

God, the bruises.

They’re a rainbow of yellows and blues, of greens and purples and almost blacks.