by Frost Kay
“Please, Papa,” she sobbed. “Please open your mind.”
“I’m sorry. I can’t risk our people. Even for you, no matter how much I love you. They rely on me.”
Hazel slowly pulled away and shook her head. “So did I.” She sucked in a rough breath, and her chin shook as she looked at each of her brothers. “Will you not say goodbye?” She felt so betrayed, but not enough to not say goodbye. She’d regret it her whole life if she didn’t.
Jo pushed Brent out of the way and sprinted to her, wrapping her in a fierce hug. “I love you.”
“Love you, too,” she wheezed, her ribs aching and her heart hurting more. How could she live without them? “Come with me.”
Jo pulled back and shook his head. “Rose accepted. I can’t leave her and the girls.”
Another thing for her to miss out on. There would be babies.
Brent muscled Jo out of the way and pulled her into a bear hug, kissing her on the head.
“Gonna miss you, Sis.”
“You could come,” she offered a second time.
He chucked her on the chin and leaned in to whisper in her ear. “I’m out for patrol. If you’re going north, I’m sure we’ll see each other again.”
A lie and a speck of hope.
Finally, Jake stepped forward and pulled her into a gentle hug, his hand running down her braid. Her quiet, sweet brother.
“Katie’s pregnant. We decided to name the baby Hazel if it’s a girl.”
It was all too much.
She extricated herself from her brother and studied her family. “This is a mistake.”
Her papa chucked his chin at the dirt bike. “Do you need fuel? Supplies?”
He didn’t acknowledge her words, refusing to listen.
Numbness settled over her. She woodenly moved to her boots and pulled them on one at a time, her heel aching. “I need food, water, fuel, and I want my weapons. All of them.”
“Baz, get what my daughter needs.”
Hazel watched him jog back to the gate. It opened slowly and then swallowed him. He’d been one of her best friends all of her life, and he hadn’t looked at her again after the first time. It had been like she was invisible.
An awkward silence settled between all of them as they waited for Baz to return. Hazel busied herself with organizing her backpack when she was struck with another thought.
“I came upon a group of crazies while I was traveling here,” she muttered while focusing on her task. “They’re extremely dangerous. They traffic young women and pose as traders. Their cult leader goes by the name Chem. Do you know him?” Hazel peered up at her papa.
His lips pinched. “We’ve traded with them for years.”
“You trade with slavers?”
“It’s never been proven they’ve been selling flesh.”
Hazel chuckled. “I can tell you from the load of girls trussed up in the back of his trailer that he most definitely is.”
“Did he harm you?” Jake asked, his expression hard.
“No, but he had plans to, I’m sure.” She closed her bag and stood. The gates groaned, and Baz ran out with his hand full of supplies. “What I’m getting at is there’s a girl named Naomi. She helped me escape. If you meet her, get her out if you can.”
Baz slowed and approached her with his eyes pinned to the ground.
Hurt stabbed Hazel. “You know you can look at me.”
His gaze darted up, and he scanned her face before yanking her into a rough hug. “Mesa misses you so much.”
“She doesn’t have to,” Hazel whispered. “I’m going to be up north about five- or six-days’ ride. It’s safe.”
“We’ll think about it. Love you, girlie.”
A lie with a truth. A bittersweet way to part.
Hazel packed the supplies while Brent fueled the dirt bike. Baz held out her blades, thigh holster, and Glock. She strapped on the holsters and slid her weapons into place, feeling a little less like she was drowning.
She walked up to the motorcycle after her papa started it and slung a leg over the seat. Her family crowded around her, and she was thankful that she’d gone numb. It would have been too hard to leave if she’d been sobbing.
“Don’t trust him, Papa. I think Chem somehow recognized me. He’s planning a war and, if you’re allies with him, then you will be my enemy.” She turned her head and scanned his face one last time. “I don’t want to fight you.”
“Stay safe. Be happy,” he said roughly.
Hazel nudged the kickstand up. “We all could have been if you hadn’t been stuck in your ways.”
“I love you.”
“I love you all, too. But it’s not enough.”
Those were the last words she said to her family before she turned her back on everything she ever knew.
Hazel had planned on returning to the sanctuary to warn the others. She just hadn’t thought it would be alone.
Twenty-Three
Hazel
Hazel didn’t feel anything as she drove away from Harbor. Nor did she feel fear when lobos began to hunt her two days later, or when she killed them. It was so bloody hot that she couldn’t stop sweating.
She didn’t feel anything when she headed straight north instead of following Abuela’s map. Nor when she passed the camouflaged cave Remy had drugged her in. Her body ached so badly from riding, but she pushed on.
Hazel felt absolutely nothing when she spotted the bluff as the sun started to sink in the sky through a gap in the trees. She followed the path and scanned the opened space between the first fence and the tree. Nothing. A dead laugh puffed from between her lips.
Even if a pack of lobos had been chasing her, she doubted she would have experienced even a small speck of fear.
Her hand curled tighter around the gas and twisted the throttle, flying across the space. The wind whipped her scarf from her face as she switched from third gear to fourth and then fifth. The engine roared, and the ground blurred beneath Hazel. For the first time in days, a speck of feeling crept in.
Euphoria.
Her fingers cranked on the throttle, taking the motorcycle to its max. Avians launched into the air at her approach. The first fence rushed to meet her, but she didn’t want to slow down.
You don’t want to die.
Hazel eased off the gas and pressed on both the hand and foot brakes. Her stomach lurched as the bike fishtailed behind her and, once again, the numbness settled over her when she got control and stopped the bike by almost lying it on its side. She lifted her arm to cover her nose and mouth as the cloud of dust rolled by and she abandoned the bike.
She stood tall as projectiles from the sky landed on the earth less than twenty feet ahead of her. Hazel dropped her arm and tore her goggles from her face, then nodded at Jameson who gawked at her.
“What in the blazes are you doing here?” He barked out a laugh. “Good god, woman. How fast were you going?”
Hazel glanced over her shoulder and shrugged dispassionately before facing him once more. “Does it matter?”
Jameson’s smile fell when he got a good look at her face. He took ground-eating steps, his brown hawk-like wings stretching out behind him. He halted before her and touched each side of her face, then forced her to meet his whiskey eyes. Hazel soberly met his probing gaze. She had nothing to hide. What he saw in her eyes caused his features to pinch.
“I need Matt.” The words popped from her cracked lips. As soon as they broke free, a desperate need to see the last tie to her home seized her. “I need to see him now.”
Jameson nodded. “I can take you now, but we have to fly.”
“I don’t care.”
He swooped closer and swept her into his arms; bow, quiver, bags and all. He crouched and then launched into the air. Completely detached, Hazel observed as the ground fell away and they soared over the first two fences in no time. They flew over part of the town and then lowered until Jameson landed in an alley.
She pushed from his arms and ti
redly staggered to the left. “It’s this way, right?”
“Yep. Second door down.”
Hazel’s steps quickened as she approached Matt’s home, arrows rattling in her quiver noisily. Hazel wiped at her forehead, her hands clammy. She’d said some horrible things to him. Would he forgive her or kick her out onto the street like she deserved?
She paused at Matt’s door and lifted her fist to knock. Movement caught her eye, and she turned to the right, the perfect angle to see through the crack in the curtains. Emotion slammed into her and she reeled, her left hand grabbing the doorjamb for support.
Matt’s arms were wrapped around Remy, his hands tangled in her black-and-red hair as he kissed her with passion Hazel had never experienced. A strangled sound gurgled in the back of her throat; her eyes locked on the embracing couple. She’d never loved Matt that way, but it still broke something inside her to see him with someone else. They’d had plans to spend their life together, not that she expected him to keep his promise now that things were different. Heat filled her eyes. He’d moved on.
Now, she was truly alone.
Hazel lurched away from the door, tears coming to her eyes for the first time since she’d been exiled by her family. She stumbled down the alley, her bow slipping down one arm and quiver down the other. Jameson lifted his head, and his eyes widened.
“Hazel, sweetheart,” he crooned and held out his arms, sympathy in his expression. “Come here. Let’s get you home.”
She stared at him blankly, salty tears rolling down her cheeks. “I don’t have a home anymore.” Her eyes filled again, and he wavered. “I don’t even have a family.”
Jameson stepped closer, and her attention dropped to his outstretched arms. What did he want? Hazel woodenly handed him her bow and quiver, then shrugged off her backpack and handed him that, too.
“I’m going for a walk,” she whispered, her voice rough.
“Okay, sweetheart. I’ll go with you.”
“S’okay.” Hazel gave him a watery smile. The breakdown coming would be ugly. “No one needs to see this.”
She turned her back on him and stumbled down the lane, feeling like she was going to shatter into a thousand little pieces. Hazel careened toward the farm, buildings and people a blur until she reached the outbuildings. Her tears flowed harder, and her pace slowed, her fingers drifting along the wavy metal. How had she survived everything?
You had hope.
Hazel hiccupped. She’d always planned on going home. Her shoulders shook as she reached the rows of lush plants waving in the evening breeze, the shadow of the bluff turning the plants a deep shade of green.
Her feet moved quicker until she was running along the plants, the cut on her foot throbbing. She swiped at her face and sank to her knees near the first fence, the wet soil chilling her legs. A soul-rending cry exploded from her lungs, and Hazel wrapped her arms around herself and rocked, sobs shaking her whole body.
They’d exiled me.
Something was cracked inside her chest that felt soul deep. There’d be no fixing this. It hurt too much. They could have been a family again, but they turned her away. Her family had abandoned her.
This is my fault.
Why couldn’t she have put her head down and followed the rules? Cold and hot flashed through her body as sobs wracked her frame. She had been so hellbent on proving she had her mother’s grit that she sacrificed what was most important by making one stupid decision to leave the walls of Harbor.
Huge arms slid around her waist, and Hazel didn’t flinch as she recognized the short, pointed black nails that led to masculine hands and arms covered in onyx scales.
“Hazel?” Noah asked. “What’s wrong?”
Everything.
She ignored him and kept crying. Noah knelt behind her and hugged her closer, his wings curling around them and creating a cocoon. Hazel should have put distance between them, but she couldn’t find the strength to move. He rocked them gently and hummed in her ear while she cried tears for Aaron’s attack, for being kidnapped, for hurting Doc, for hurting Matt, for being scared and alone, for Marco’s harassment and abuse, for everything.
“You’re scaring me, Hazel. I can’t smell blood, but I need to make sure you’re okay.”
He loosened his hold and she clutched at his arms. “Don’t leave me,” she whispered, hanging her head in shame at the pathetic words. She was begging a Tainted for comfort. There was something wrong with her.
“Never,” he whispered fiercely.
Hazel twisted around to face him, but she couldn’t meet his eyes. Instead, she threw her arms around his neck and buried her face against his shoulder, her hot, damp face sticking to his brown shirt. Noah’s arms wrapped around her back and squeezed, holding her close—like he was keeping her from completely shattering.
“What happened?” he murmured softly.
“They wouldn’t let me come home,” she keened into his shirt. Should she have fought harder? It was all a blur. “They exiled me.”
“I’m so sorry.”
Hazel shook her head and pulled back to look at Noah’s face. Eyes so dark they were black gazed back at her filled with sorrow. Her bottom lip trembled, and she found herself absently tracing one of the glossy scales that ran along his right cheekbone. She blinked in surprise at her hand, wondering when it had moved.
“They didn’t want to touch me,” she half-laughed, half-cried, leaning her temple against his cheek. “I’m not even sick, and they exiled me. I’m homeless.”
Noah ran a hand down her spine. “You have a home here.”
Her other hand wrapped tighter around his neck and tangled in his inky hair, the strands softer than her own. His unique scent of pine and spice curled around her. It was comforting, warm, and intoxicating. Her eyes closed as the last of her tears slipped down her cheeks, and she leaned heavily against Noah, too tired to be embarrassed.
“Thank you,” she mumbled, her sensitive lips rubbing against his t-shirt.
Noah shifted and pulled back. She tipped her head back and scanned his face, noting the anger and sadness in his eyes. He cupped her right cheek and brushed away the salty remains of her tears.
“I know it doesn’t feel like it, but things will get better. You have a home. Here. With my family and I.”
Her lips parted and she gazed into his alien face that wasn’t as ugly as it used to be. “Why?”
“Because we’re not monsters, and you’re part of our family now.”
Family.
Warmth filled her belly and, without permission, her gaze dropped to his plush lips, three shades darker than his burnished caramel skin. She was tired of fighting, running, of feeling so isolated. A deep longing to feel a connection with another person crashed over her. It would be so easy to just lean closer and…
She moved without thinking, and Noah froze when she closed the distance between them and brushed her lips softly against his. Sparks ran across her skin at the sensation. Hazel sighed. For this one moment, he made all the bad go away.
She pulled back and gazed into eyes that turned into molten midnight, a touch of wariness creasing the skin between his eyebrows, but he didn’t pull away. Maybe he wanted an escape, too.
Heart pounding in her throat, Hazel let her fingers explore his scales again, her mouth forming an ‘O’ at the texture. It was like running her fingertips along tumbled river stones. They were completely smooth, yet held heat. A tear escaped her right eye, and a strangled sound echoed in his throat. He was supposed to be her enemy and yet he was showing her more affection and mercy than her own flesh and blood had.
Her fingers danced over the rasp of his stubble, and a shiver worked through her. A strange urge to run her hands all over his body seized her, and butterflies took flight in her belly. She wanted to wrap herself around him and soak in his heat, to feel as if she wasn’t alone in the world anymore.
“Hazel,” Noah murmured, capturing her wrist.
She blinked at the contrast of
his caramel and onyx skin and her paler golden skin stained with old henna, dirt, and bruises. It was striking.
Hazel slid further into his lap like she belonged there. Like it was her right.
“Hey,” he crooned, squeezing her chilled fingers. “This isn’t you. You’re going through a lot, and this isn’t what you want.”
She leaned closer, sliding her other hand down his chest. He was exactly what she wanted. Noah sucked in a sharp breath as if she’d stabbed him, and he caught her other hand, trapping her against him.
“Just one kiss,” she whispered, knowing she’d be embarrassed later for begging. “I’ve been numb for days. I need to feel something, anything.” Please don’t leave me alone.
“Hell,” he breathed, his nostrils flaring as his attention dropped to her lips. “This isn’t the way to do it, mi amor.”
Her mind was foggy, but she couldn’t come up with a good reason not to, so she once again brushed her lips against his. Noah released a rough exhale, and she breathed in. His grasp loosened, and she took advantage to shimmy closer, her knees falling on either side of his, and pulled her hands free.
She slid her fingers over his shoulders and sunk them into the luxurious strands of his hair, reveling in how it seemed to soak up all the light around it. Hazel opened her mouth over his, tasting the smoothness of his lips. He didn’t respond quite the way she wanted, so she closed her eyes and tried harder. Maybe she was doing it wrong? She’d only ever kissed Matt—and Aaron, but that encounter didn’t count.
Noah opened his mouth to say something, and she licked at him and brushed her fingers along the silky membranes of his wings, curious.
Suddenly, he wasn’t passively holding her. One hand cupped the back of her skull and the other clenched over her hip, yanking her tighter against him. Hazel gasped and the world upended so she was pressed into the dirt with Noah leaning over her, looking like a fairytale pagan prince.
She blinked at him, catching his own startled look before fisting her hands in his hair and kissing him open-mouthed, her tongue darting against his. The tension in his body traveled through her as he raked his hands down her curves. Her belly rolled, but she ignored the nerves and tried everything she could to imprint herself on his skin.