Page 20

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Diem

S omething fell from the sky before I could react to Tallus’s warning. It smacked me in the shoulder and threw me off my feet. I tumbled into Tallus as a crunch of metal filled the air. We landed in a messy pile of limbs in the gravel—my chin ricocheting off the ground. My teeth clacked, and I ate dirt, but it was the pain radiating through my back and neck that undid me. Spindly fingers pinned me down, and for a minute, I didn’t think I could move and feared trying.

It took a long time for the world to right itself and for my brain to register what had happened. Not spindly fingers. Branches poked and scratched my face when I turned my head. I couldn’t see beyond them. Once again, Tallus was trapped beneath me, only this time, I struggled to shift away so he could get free.

“Diem… Diem, are you okay.” He slapped my arms, squirming and wiggling. “Diem, answer me. Oh my god, don’t be dead. Diem!”

“Stop fucking moving.” It hurt. Everything hurt, and I couldn’t get my bearings.

Tallus stilled, and I took a second to gather my strength.

My cheek ground against the gravel parking lot as I worked to get my arms beneath me, fighting the blinding pain dimming my vision. Spitting dirt, I pushed the ground away, doing what I could to lift myself off my much scrawnier boyfriend. Hot fire shot across my shoulder and up my neck. I almost collapsed but persisted in moving enough of my weight so he could get free.

Tallus wiggled from beneath me and did all he could to drag me from beneath the spindly arms pinning me down. Then he encouraged me up.

My body screamed in protest, and I growled, somehow making it to my knees. Tallus offered a steadying hand, which I used to regain my feet. The world spun, and my stomach churned, but I breathed through it.

“Jesus fuck. Oh my god. Diem… Diem, you’re bleeding. Your face.”

“I’m fine,” I rasped, finding Tallus’s hand and offering a squeeze to reassure him I was okay, even though I was pretty sure I wasn’t. I knew pain. I was familiar with pain. I’d spent a lifetime tempering one kind or another. It was bad, but I’d survived worse.

Slowly, I turned to the Jeep to see what had happened. An enormous branch, at least ten or twelve feet long and as thick around as my thigh, had landed exactly where we’d stood a moment ago. Several smaller branches extended from the main body, clumps of rotting leaves still attached in places.

The hood strut had broken, and the hood itself sported a nasty crumple in the metal where the tree branch had landed. That was going to cost a pretty fucking penny to fix. A pretty fucking penny I didn’t have.

My attention moved to the broken end of the branch, and I frowned. Not fully broken. It had been partially cut. Not enough for it to have fallen on its own, but enough so… That was when I saw the brown rope camouflaged by the mess of bark and rotting foliage.

Someone did this on purpose. Rigged a trap. Waited until we were beneath the branch before tugging it down. It was the only thing that made sense.

I glanced up but growled and slapped a hand to my shoulder as pain ripped through me anew. Biting back curses, I awkwardly angled my body to see where the branch had fallen from. High above, the spiky ends of wood from a recent break protruded from the trunk. Rather, a partial break. A cleanly sawed section shone white and crisp in the struggling sunlight, confirming my suspicion.

Tallus’s shock must have calmed because he drew the same conclusion and said what I had yet to voice—with far more dramatics. “Oh snap! Someone tried to drop a tree on us. Diem, this is one fucked up version of The Wizard of Oz . We need to get the fuck out of here before whoever did this sends in the flying monkeys. Or a dog.” He spun, scanning the trailhead and forest. “I’m going to be disemboweled by a dog before this day is through. I know it. That’s how I’m going to die.”

I agreed—about leaving, not the disemboweling and predictions of death—but the Jeep was temporarily out of order, and I didn’t think I had the strength to fix the problem since it required moving the massive branch, hooking up the battery, and tying the hood down since I doubted it would close on its own any longer. Considering the dilemma, I swiftly disregarded it as a possibility. The Jeep would have to be a later problem.

“Call a cab.”

I hobbled to the vehicle and leaned heavily against the side, scanning the area for the asshole who’d done this, figuring they were probably long gone. I wrenched the door open, gathered my phone and keys, and checked for anything else I might need. From the trunk, I maneuvered a duffle of supplies to the ground, grinding my teeth with the effort it took not to scream.

“Ten minutes,” Tallus announced when he got off the phone. “D, let me look at you.”

“I’m fine.”

But I wasn’t fine, and when I moved to close the trunk door, a knife of pain stabbed my shoulder again, and I almost blacked out. Tallus caught my arm before my knees buckled and pinned me with a hard look.

“Take it slow. I think we should go to the hospital.”

“I don’t need a fucking hospital. I need a cigarette, about four shots of whiskey, and an ice pack.”