Page 151 of Stardusted

I didn’t get it out before everything went black.

Chapter 35

CAN YOU CALL IT AN ALIEN ABDUCTION IF I’M ON BOARD?

Somebodywas pounding a snare drum. Loud, hammering thuds in rapid succession. I groaned, then grimaced at the grit coating my tongue. My aching head felt like it had been stuffed with cotton. My mouth, too.

Then memory slammed back: the midterm, the Enil,Sky.

I gasped and bolted upright.

Only to be yanked back by a strap across my chest. Exhaling shakily, I reached for it as my vision cleared. Seatbelt. One of these days, I’d unbuckle before trying?—

Wait. What wasthat?

I held up my arm. A thick, purplish-blue band of metal wrapped the wrist below my marked palm, gleaming dully in the dim light. It looked like it had fused right there, molded close but loose enough to slide up and down a few inches. No clasp, no buckle. Just smooth, seamless,otherworldlymetal.

I curled my fingers around the edge and tugged. It didn’t budge.

“What the hell?” I whispered.

“Easy,” said a rough but familiar voice.

Slowly, I looked up…and locked eyes with Sky.

My heart gave a hard thump against my ribs.

I was in the passenger seat of his SUV. That drumming was rain beating on the windshield. Night had fallen, and taillights blurred past in streaks of red, flying along a highway I didn’t recognize.

Which meant we’d been driving for a while.

He was dead.

I nearly died.

“Sky?” I rasped. “What is this thing? Where are we? How…?”

He tore his eyes from the road long enough to glance my way again. “The cuff is an inhibitor. A signal blocker. And we’re safe for now. Are you okay? You fainted.”

Fainted. Or knocked myself out on the snack machine. One or the other. Either way, my head hurt like a bitch. I touched it gingerly. No blood, but even the barest pressure hurt.

Was Iokay, though?

Yeah…

Well, no. I didn’t know. Something was building in my chest, growing too fast. Squeezing like an iron vise.

He’d died. The Enil had come for me. They wereafterme.

Panic. That was what this was. It was a volcano of…offeeling?—

“No,” I wheezed, scrabbling for the seatbelt. Nope, I wassonot okay.

I was going to be sick. Right here. I needed air. There wasn’t enough air.

“Shit—hang on.” Sky let go of the wheel and reached for me, but I cringed away.

I didn’t want him to touch me. I might shatter if he did. I was too brittle, too wound up, too stretched out and thin.