Page 24 of The Lovely and the Lost

I remembered falling—and waking up in the ravine below.

Beside me, Saskia yipped sharply—just once, not an indication of anything other than her annoyance at my distraction.

Find. Play.That was what we were here to do. That was the mission.

“Yeah,” a low voice said behind me. “What she said.”

I turned to face Gabriel, ready and willing to make him back off if I had to. But for the first time since I’d met him, there wasn’t a hint of challenge in his expression. I’d known his eyes were dark brown, but standing this close, I could see a lighter ring around the pupil.

“You okay?” he asked.

I wiped my sweating palms roughly over the fabric of my pants. “I’m fine.”

* * *

As the morning wore on, the sky darkened overhead like a canvas painted in shades of black and blue and gray. Gabriel and I made our way from the cliffs inward toward the vertical incline of solid stone, stretching up in the direction of the mountain’s peak.

The terrain under our feet got more uneven, but I didn’t slow my pace, and Saskia didn’t slow hers. I could hear the crunch of Gabriel’s boot against gravel behind me, but I focused my senses outward and threw everything I had into forward momentum.

The rain was coming. It was only a matter of time.

Saskia looped back to check on me. She didn’t need me to tell her to keep going. AndIdidn’t need to stop for so much as a drink.

Chrrrrrk.Without warning, a rock shifted beneath my feet. I pitched forward. Fingers caught my arm and hauled me up.Breath on my neck. No space. No room.I heard noise but barely recognized that it was Gabriel talking. His grip on my arm wasn’t tight, but it didn’t matter.

My body wasmine.

Instinct washed away everything else. I saw red. Ifeltmy fingernails digging into the flesh of Gabriel’s forearm, hard enough to draw blood. On some level, I was prepared for him to fight back. I was ready for it, but instead, he let go of me.

It was three seconds—six heartbeats—before I processed that there was no retaliation forthcoming. It was another two seconds—three heartbeats—before I pried my fingers loose from Gabriel’s arm. My ears still roaring with white noise, I managed to focus on the outline of Saskia’s form beside me.

One second. My breathing slowed, and the sounds of the real world came slowly back.One heartbeat.

Gabriel’s gaze traveled down at the marks I’d left on his arm. I tried to find the words to ask him not to tell Cady. I was better than this. I had more control.

He found his voice before I found mine. To my surprise, he aimed his commentary to Saskia. “My apologies,” he told her as my canine partner stared him down. “It is understood that if I touch your human again, you will have no choice but to eat my face.”

Saskia seemed to find that acceptable.

“We good here?” Gabriel asked, finally glancing back at me.

My voice caught in my throat, but I pushed the words out. “We’re good.” I felt like I should say something else, butI’m sorrywouldn’t come. Instead, I knelt to Saskia’s level. “Find Bella.”

Saskia took off again. Gabriel and I set off in the same direction.

“I’m game to ignore the drop of rain I just felt if you are,” he informed me a few minutes later.

I upped my pace. “I’m game.”

The rain picked up. A clap of thunder sounded overhead, and I felt it, all the way to my bones.

“I don’t like the look of those clouds,” Gabriel told me. “I’m not saying we have to head back to base camp. I’m just saying that most people with smaller self-destructive streaks than mine would probably agree that we should.”

I stopped listening to Gabriel and started listening for Saskia. Horizontal lightning cut across the darkened sky. I brought my index fingers to my mouth and let out a sharp whistle. I trained my gaze in the direction Saskia had gone, waiting.

Nothing.

“Saskia should have checked back by now,” I said.