them puts something on my index finger. It glows red.
All I want is to push them away and return to Asher, but I understand they have a job to do.
When one of them lifts my arm to sling around his shoulder, Asher gives a sharp shake of his head. The world tilts again, but this time, I’m cradled in his arms.
“Just a little further, my little backpack, and don’t mind Grayson. He thinks he’s a hotshot because he flies a helicopter. Just ignore him.” Asher makes a point of bumping Grayson’s shoulder as he walks past.
“Damn it, Ace, possessive much?” Grayson flashes Asher a megawatt smile and gives me a wink.
“Hands off.” That sounds like a warning. “You do your job, and I’ll do mine.”
“I see.” Grayson gives me a long hard look. “Seems like you’re doing a damn good job of it too.”
Asher deposits me on the waiting gurney while Grayson’s team tell me to lay back. One of them straps me in while another wraps a blood pressure cuff around my arm. He glances at a display and his lips twist. Whatever it is, he doesn’t like what he sees.
They ask questions about my injuries and I tell them what I can in between breaths. I mention the man who hit me with the rock, how I was unconscious for some time before waking up to the flames. One of them purses his lips and asks for an oxygen mask. While he puts it over my face, I watch Asher with his friend and can’t help but hope they’re talking about me.
Next I know, I’m being loaded inside the helicopter. Asher and Grayson thump each other on the back. That’s when I realize Asher is going to leave without saying goodbye and for some reason that hurts more than it should.
I try to wipe away a tear, but it’s hard with the way I’m strapped down. It seems I was nothing other than a backpack to him, a burden to be delivered and discarded.
I hate being helpless, and I hate that Prescott is right. It’s not safe out here for a woman. I think that, more than anything else, is what makes the tears fall.
Something rough presses against my cheek.
“Don’t cry, Ev-e-lyn.”
I open my eyes and blink to clear the tears. Asher looks down on me, concern and something else, scrawled on his face.
“You’re going to be okay.” Somehow, with his promise, I believe I just might be.
“Thank you…for…rescuing me.” It’s challenging to speak, but I huff out the words.
He gives a cheeky grin. “Definitely, the best part of my day. Grayson is going to take real good care of you, and I’ll come check in on you later, right now…”
“You have a job to do.” I lift my hand and wrap my fingers around his powerful bicep. “I hope you find the asshole who started it.”
“We will.” Asher’s brows pinch together and he wipes another tear from my cheek.
Those are the last words I hear before he jumps out of the helicopter and moves a safe distance away. The whine of the rotors spin up and the helicopter cants forward as it slowly rises out of the clearing. Asher stands below us and waves as the helicopter spins around and heads down into the valley.
When we bank into a turn, I gasp as the full enormity of the fire becomes apparent.
A living thing, it spills down the hills, pushed by the wind, eagerly consuming the dry brush. It’s headed straight to the valley floor where the twinkling lights of hundreds of homes stave off the darkness.
Hundreds of homes which are now at risk.
8
Evelyn
There’s a soft knock on the door of my hospital room.
“Yes?” My words are soft, cautious, maybe a little hopeful. The doctors and nurses don’t knock.
Nobody in this town knows me, except for one person; a man I can’t stop thinking about.
Thoughts of Asher La Rouge invade my dreams, fill nearly every waking thought, and storm around my body stirring up sensations I have no right to feel.
I don’t know the man, yet I ache desperately for him.
It’s unsettling, because I shouldn’t be aching for anyone. Granted, it’s been well over a year, yet I still feel like I should be mourning Justin’s death.
Ah, but Asher?
He makes me want to stop running and soak in the feelings I thought I’d have again.
That knock is probably Prescott. He has the resources to discover what’s going on, and he wouldn’t think twice about flying across the continent