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I hadn’t made a sound; I was certain of that But he wasn’t shooting in the dark; after he’d toweled his hair dry with his T-shirt, Lewis lifted his head and focused his stare right on the scrubby trees that screened me from immediate view
Busted
I cleareda few scrapes in the process Apart from another distant mutter of thunder, the lead-colored day was very quiet Water lapped the shore Lewis shook out his T-shirt and pulled it on, then a thermal top, then added one of those well-used flannel shirts on top, which he buttoned ale "Lewis, did we ever-you know?
He concentrated on his shirt buttons, even though it wasn’t like they took a lot of effort I could see he was thinking about lying to ave up and said, "Once"
"Wow" I tried to sood" He kept his eyes fixed somewhere else, not on me, but I still felt a flash of heat and nerves "Look, I’m not in love with you," he said "Maybe I used to be, but I’m not anymore So you don’t have to worry about any coaze finally brushed over er, I felt another wave of corresponding heat
"I just want you to understand where I stand," he said "You don’t love ht," I said My lips felt nuht now, but you do" That wareance "You’ll remember"
"What if I don’t want to?"
He let out a breath, and it plu, perilous second, it seeive it up before he could make the leap He looked away "Hurry up We have to be on the trail in the next hour" And with that he sat down on the shore, put on thick socks, laced up his hiking boots, and sauntered off
I guess his ribs had healed He wasn’t favoring theh there had been a spectacular multicolored bruise on his left side
On the one hand, it was good that my sole human ally and-to be fair-protector was back in top for had been convenient for us to use as a shield between us Now gone
I watched, but he didn’t glance back The water was still steaain, and stripped even though the bone-chilling wind ood ater felt I guess I’d known intellectually, but the second I waded in and felt it i me, I could barely breathe for the pleasure of it I sank down to my neck, then held my breath and slipped under the surface I stayed under for at least thirty seconds, then broke through to take in a gulp of air The bottom of the pond was slih I had no specific recollection, I was pretty sure I’d had better baths It just didn’t feel that way at the moment This was the first real ical I couldn’t really relax, though I kept watching the tree line, waiting for the bad guys to ju, with a sharp san to chill I waded out, hastily dried off, dressed, and ran back to the cave My teeth were chattering by the ti his pack to toss me a chemical heat pack
"Open it, rub the pack, and put it in your shirt," he said "It’ll help keep your core tee open and shook out what looked like a really big sachet, rubbed it between my palms, and was instantly rewarded with a burst of steady heat I dropped it down ave Lewis a treernails were a little blue I scraloves, and hefted my own backpack It clunked with plastic water bottles
"Enjoy your bath?" Lewis asked His tone was about as neutral as you could get, so I couldn’t read anything into it I just nodded "Good Let’s move out"
"What about Kevin and Cherise? Do you think they’re still?"
"David’s scouting," he said "He’ll warn us if they come anywhere close"
He took off I had no choice but to follow
I’ll skip over the day froed brush, cli, panting, and generally having the sort of outdoor experiencething, and while the outdoors looked pretty, as far as I was concerned it’d look even prettier seen fro car
When my road-show Daniel Boone finally called a perun to drift silently out of the clouds just an hour after we’d started the trek, light and whispery and dry, brushing against rateful for it, but that was before it started to stick to the cold ground A few randoed blizzard within the next couple of hours, and what started out a nuisance beca step Lewis heldreal in the world seemed to be the pressure of his hold on , and I supposed I ought to feel grateful that it wasn’t sleeting Sleet would have been a step down, circles-of-hell-wise
No cave this time, but Lewis put up the tent and we crawled inside, into our sleeping bags, too tired to do more than murmur a couple of words before sleep sucked us down I wanted to ask Lehere ere going, but I didn’t have the energy I no longer cared all that ht I ached all over, and I was still aching when, with the suddenness of a light switched off, I fell asleep
It didn’t even occur to me to wonder where David was, or why he hadn’t joined us The ways of the Djinn, I’d already guessed, were not necessarily easy to figure out, even if you were dating one
I woke up alone All alone The tent was silent, not even a breeze rattling the fabric, and it was deeply dark And very, very cold The cheone to sleep as an inert, stiff, dead thing next to , and my hands had taken on a waxy chill I burrowed deeper in the sleeping bag, conserving warn that Leas up and around and doing so the weather balrave out there
"Lewis?" I whispered it, because somehow it seemed like the ti where I was, but that didn’t see was neatly rolled up and attached to his pack, which was leaning where his body had been when I’d fallen asleep I crept out, wrapped loves on my hands and a knit cap over ht
Only it wasn’t night It was full daylight, and the reason it had been so dark in the tent was that the tent was covered at least four inches deep with snow It looked like an igloo My first step sank al, terrible for hiking