“Julian knows where I went. He probably went for help, but I don’t know if they can get here until the storm lets up. It’ll be okay, Buttercup. Let’s get some rest.”
“I guess the track meet tomorrow is probably out of the question, huh?” She watched Sawyer slide down to the floor, his back against the rock wall.
He raised his hands, motioning her over. “Come here.”
Suddenly she was again hyper-aware that they were completely alone. And for the moment, safe. If she hadn’t been so exhausted…
But she was. Exhausted and hurt and afraid. They couldn’t go back the way they’d come. She wasn’t sure there was even a way out. She collapsed next to him. He pulled her onto his lap, tucking her head under his chin. She curled around him, craving his warmth. Craving his touch.
“I think the storm will have canceled the track meet, anyway. We’ll probably head back to Utah as soon as it’s safe to travel.”
“Damn.” This was their last meet before regional. She wasn’t ready for track season to be over. Once it ended, they had finals and then the semester was over. Sawyer would go back to Texas. Laura would go back to Alaska and Kelly to Tennessee. Only she and Beckett would stay in Utah for the summer. The thought made her very sad.
“Did my little Buttercup just swear?” He chuckled, his hand running absently up and down her back in slow, lazy circles.
“I don’t—I don’t want everyone to leave.”
He sucked in a breath, and she was barely breathing herself. “You don’t want me to leave?” he asked quietly.
“No.” There. She’d said it. It wasn’t like he didn’t know she was in love with him. Everyone knew. Even, she suspected, Beckett.
“I—I don’t want to leave you, either.”
She bit her lip. “Because I’m hot?”
He chuckled. “You are hot. The hottest girl I’ve ever met.” He tugged gently on her soaked hair. “But that’s not why. Get some rest, Buttercup. We’ve got to find a way out of here.”
Her heart, which was attempting to pound right up her throat and into her mouth, slowly relaxed, settling back into its home in her rib cage. They weren’t going to have that conversation. He wasn’t going to let it happen. Part of her, a very small part, was relieved. But the rest of her was massively disappointed.
Until he started to sing. Slowly, keeping his voice low, he sang to her, stroking her hair, down her back, up her arm. “I’d sell my soul to save you, shred my heart to have you. Look at me, wanting you. The one thing in this life I can’t have.” He had a beautiful voice, deep and gravelly. She could have listened to him sing for the rest of her life. Instead, she fell asleep, his song the last thing she heard, winding its way through her brain and around her heart.
CHAPTER EIGHT
SAWYER HAD NO IDEA WHAT TIME IT WAS or how long he’d been laying there, immobile because Savannah was curled around his legs. Watching her sleep, watching the dim lights shimmer off her hair. Her eyelashes fluttered against her bruised cheek, and every so often she would whimper and slide even closer. His body was exhausted, his mind was exhausted, but he would not sleep. She’d been right; in a few short weeks, he’d be heading back to Texas. Yeah, he’d be back in a few months for fall semester, but things could change. He could lose her forever.
She’s not yours to lose.
The wind’s howl seemed to have died a little, although it was hard to hear anything so deep underground. This place seemed to have simultaneously saved them and trapped them.
He shifted, groaning. Instantly, she was awake; her eyes flew open and she sat up. “Are you okay? Did I sleep too long? Holy creak, you’ve been stuck sitting on this hard floor this whole time! I’m so sorry!” All that, in one breath.
He smiled at her flushed cheeks and wild hair. His chest where she’d laid her head already felt cold, and it chilled his heart, having her away from him. “Savannah, I have to tell you something,” he said before his brain fully comprehended what he was about to do.
“What? Were we attacked by ancient ghosts? Are we dead?” She scrubbed her eyes with her good hand. The other one, with its black and blue bruises from shoulder to elbow, she kept cradled against her ribs. “Did zombies attack and I protected you in my sleep?”
Sawyer chuckled, taking her good hand. “Not that I know of. Listen… earlier… when I said you were hot…” Holy crap how do I say this? “That’s not why I kissed you.”
She paled and drew back, pulling her hand away to wrap it around herself.
Before he could lose his courage or she tried to run away, he hurried on. “I kissed you because I’ve wanted to kiss you from that very first day in English Lit. And every moment since.”
Her jaw dropped and she blinked at him. He swallowed. “I… love you… really like you. A lot. Maybe even an obsession?”
She shook her head, like trying to shake the muddled thoughts into order. “Then why — all this time—?”
“Because before I met you, I hated you.”
She frowned, subconsciously holding the gash across her forehead.
This is going well.
“I’d heard of you from Beck. How you broke his heart. How you’d left him behind for older, hotter college guys. When we moved in together, I was either listening to him cry at night or picking his drunk ass up from bars. Even when he’d bring other girls home, it was all about you.”
She started to scoot away, but he grabbed her, pulled her back into his lap. “Beck’s my best friend, Savannah. When I realized that you were the girl he couldn’t get over, I was—” devastated “—disappointed. And I know you’ve been trying to ignore this–this thing between us for his sake, too.”
“I didn’t want him to hurt,” she whispered.
He reached up, ran his fingers across her cheekbone. “I’ve done everything in my power to stay away from you, but I can’t. Hell, I joined the track team so I’d have an excuse to be with you.”
She raised an eyebrow. “You’re pretty dang good for only joining it for social reasons.”
He grinned.
“It’s killed me having you so close and having to keep you at a distance, Savannah. I don’t know how much longer I can do it.”
“Me too. Me either. I’m—I don’t want that, either.” She scooted closer, watching him shyly.
“You’re so beautiful.” He slid his fingers through her hair, tugging it free of its ponytail so it tumbled around her, catching the light. “Even beat up, you’re beautiful.” His fingers trailed through her hair, and it was as soft and silky as he’d dreamed it would be. Her dark eyes widened as he leaned closer. “I’m going to kiss you, Savannah. You know that, right?”
She nodded, her tongue flicking lightly across her lips. “I was hoping you would.”
He tilted her chin with his knuckle and lowered his head. He’d been obsessing over this moment for months, and yet he was hit completely unaware for the power of her kiss. Her lips melted against his, stopping his heart, sending his blood rocketing through his veins. “Holy hell, woman,” he groaned against her mouth, rising up on his knees, pulling her with him and against him. She purred, sliding her arms around his neck, her fingers tangling in his hair — sore arm apparently forgotten.
She was so soft. So perfect. Her mouth molded against his. His hands ran up her back, tangled in her hair, and then back down to pull her hips tighter against him. His tongue, of its own free will, parted her lips, sliding across hers. She gasped and then bit him, light enough to not cause pain, but hard enough to send waves of need washing over him.
He never wanted to let her go, never wanted to stop. That kiss lasted for seconds, or for hours, he wasn’t sure. Time ceased to exist in her arms, doing the one thing he’d dreamed about since he met her. He sank back against the wall, and she sat on his lap, her legs straddling him, and he couldn’t seem to get her close enough. It was all he could do not to tear her clothes off and rain kisses down her throat. To do things he’d sworn he’d never do with her.
Sworn to Beckett.
“Wait, baby. Just… wait.” He pushed her back, gently, untangling her arms from around his neck. She blinked at him, and then her brow furrowed while he did everything possible to tear his eyes from her sweet, swollen lips. He ran his knuckles over them; his body and his heart begging him to not say what had to be said. “We can’t do this.”
She sat back, sliding onto the ground. “What do you mean? This… or us this?”
He ran a hand over his face, praying for strength. Praying he wouldn’t shatter her heart the way his was shattering now. “Us this.”
She swallowed. “Because of Beckett.”
“He’s been my best friend since I was a baby, Savannah. I can’t… it’s wrong. It would kill him.”
“What if… what if he doesn’t know?”
It was his turn to frown in confusion. “Doesn’t know what we’re doing now?”
“Doesn’t know about us. We could hide it from him. From everyone,” she was talking too quickly, her cheeks reddening.
“So we’d be sneaking around? That seems a hell of a lot worse, Buttercup.”
“But we would be together,” she whispered. It was as if he could see her heart breaking right in front of him. The entire night flashed through his eyes — Savannah standing, bloody and bruised, in the alcove, watching her climb the tree in the middle of a lightning storm. Seeing her tumble down the stairs into the water and watching her shove the door open with the shovel. She was smart, beautiful, fearless. At the same time, broken, frightened, and sad. And that was his fault.
“Savannah, I’d give anything, anything, to be with you. You have to understand that. But Beckett—”
She rose to her feet so swiftly she had to catch herself on the wall to keep from toppling over. “I understand.” She spun on her heel and ducked through the door, out of sight.
“Savannah! Wait!” He scrambled to his feet and went after her. She was halfway down the brick road by the time he got out, and running hard. “Savannah, don’t do this!”
She skidded to a stop, her breath echoing through the underground city. But she didn’t turn to face him. Her shoulders rose and fell and her tangled hair tumbled down her back. “I need some time alone, Sawyer. You can at least give me that.”
And what, exactly would he say to that? What could he say to that? He had no choice but to stand there and watch her disappear into the darkness. “Yeah, okay. I’ll let you have your space,” he muttered. Swearing under his breath, wondering if he was having a heart attack because his chest hurt like someone had thrown a javelin through it, he went back into the little building and collapsed on the floor. He stared at the ceiling through his fingers, wondering why, of all the girls in the universe, he had to fall in love with the one his best friend wanted more than anything.
The universe was cruel. That’s all there was to it. Cold and cruel.
When she didn’t come back after a half-hour, he heaved himself to his feet and went looking for her. Aaron’s phone lay silent in the dirt, still alive but still no damn signal. He shoved it in his pocket with his own useless phone and wandered down the street, cautious because she was angry, and he’d seen her go after Beckett. His little Savvy was fierce. The last thing he wanted was her anger.
She had to see where he was coming from. She’d been trying to protect Beckett for a year now. She knew where Sawyer was coming from because she was there, too. They couldn’t be together. It would kill Beckett.
It will kill me to let her go.
He ran a hand through his hair. There just wasn’t a solution. Not one that anyone ended up happily in. They’d go their separate ways, maybe he’d see her at Kelly and Caleb’s wedding one day, and she would be beautiful and happy. She’d turn every head in the room, and someone else would own her heart.
And him? He would never own his heart again. No matter how long it took, she would always keep a piece of it. There would be an aching, fiery hole in his heart for the rest of his life.
A part of him daydreamed about staying in this silent, underground city — never going back to face the real world, or Beckett. Just stay here with Savannah, and he would have everything he ever needed. Maybe, when he found her, he would propose the idea and see if she’d go for it.
He’d reached the end of the road. In front of him rose a hill with sparse grass and Savannah’s footprints in the sand. He couldn’t see the top, but it looked like it went all the way to the ceiling of the cave. “Savannah?” he called.
She didn’t answer.
Swearing again, he started climbing the hill. He could see each place she’d slid or fallen because the proof was right there in the indent. He followed her prints to the very top, where it did not, in fact, touch the ceiling. In fact, there was path going down the other side, disappearing around a bend into the darkness. There was another path that wound around some scraggly trees and man-made stone structures to what looked suspiciously like a way out of this nightmare.
He jogged to the entrance first. The hurricane was dying down, but the wind still howled and nearly knocked Sawyer over, and the rain still drenched everything around him. Half the mountain had slid down in the storm, giant trees had been uprooted and tossed like toothpicks, but the cave was untouched, protected by an overhanging crop of solid rock above it. He couldn’t see her anywhere, and he couldn’t picture her — even mad — running off and leaving him. So he turned around and went to explore the other path.
It led down the hill and through a narrow crevice. It was darker here than up by the buildings, and more foreboding. Goosebumps rose up his arms and down his back — and it wasn’t from being wet and cold. This place was creepy. It made the falling down, abandoned house seem like an amusement park.
The path finally opened up into a wider, darker cave. He dug Aaron’s phone out of his pocket and held it up for light. “Savannah?” he called.
Again, no answer.
He gathered up his courage, telling himself that if a little thing like Savannah could waltz right in here, so could he. And that nothing in here could hurt him as bad as she did just by existing and not being his.
It took him exactly five steps before he realized where he was. Lined up on each side of the chamber, in rows of three, were bodies. Dead, decaying bodies for as far as he could see. Fear froze him for about thirty seconds before he started running.
Not toward the exit, like anyone with any semblance of coherency would have done, but down the corridor of dead bodies. “Savannah!” he yelled, picturing her being dragged to hell by the hands of the dead surrounding him. Or being torn apart or held down…
“Savannah!”
He reached the end of the crypt, nearly slamming into the wall. She wasn’t here. He turned in a circle, breathing fast, his phone light shaking in his hand. “Savannah?”
He jogged back toward the path, feeling like there were a hundred dead bodies climbing from their crypts and pulling themselves along the ground after him, and he refused to look over his shoulder. He hit the path, slid through the narrow crevice again, and shot up the hill. He raced through the little city, checking in every building, but she was gone. Somehow, Savannah had managed to get out without him seeing. She’d been so mad she’d left him there alone.
Hopeful that he was wrong, he waited for another half hour in the little building where just an hour ago, he’d thought he’d finally found paradise. Now it was hell on earth. She’d crushed his heart and there were hundreds of dead bodies not even five hundred feet away from him.
Not his best day ever. But he’d thought it was, before they’d fought. Now, she’d abandoned him. If he’d been hoping for any kind of happy resolution to this whole painful situation, she’d pretty much crushed that under the heel of her boot.
Sighing, he went back to check all the buildings one more time. There was no sign of her. At least the storm had died quite a bit. The rain still came down in sheets, but the wind had died. He jogged through the forest, exhausted, hun
gry, and hurting, clutching at his chest when he thought his heart might break otherwise.
She’d left him there alone. She hadn’t even said goodbye.
CHAPTER NINE
SAVANNAH HAD NO IDEA HOW LONG she’d been curled up with her aching head on her knees, waiting for someone to come open the door. She hurt. Everything hurt, so much that if she stopped to try to figure out which pain was what, she’d start screaming, and maybe never stop.
More than anything, though, her heart hurt. He’d come all the way to that house in a hurricane to save her, and then he’d left her. It wasn’t even her saying painful things. She’d been willing to sell her soul so they could be together. He’d been the one to push her away. And the little voice telling her that he was being noble and a good friend, well… she shoved that voice way down deep and kept it there.
She was so cold. So cold and she hurt and she couldn’t feel her fingers or her toes. At least she wasn’t shivering now, though. There was something… something nagged at the back of her mind, telling her that she needed to shiver, needed to stay warm, but she couldn’t remember why, and shivering took too much energy.
She’d run as fast as she could through the forest. She’d looked all around, watching for him, but he must have run, too. Eager to get away from her. She wasn’t even sure how she’d found the hotel. She hadn’t been looking. Suddenly, it had just shown up in front of her.
“Savvy?” Sawyer’s voice was hoarse, barely more than a guttural growl. She heard his feet slapping across the wet asphalt until he sank to his knees next to her. “Savvy, baby, look at me.”
“I’m not your baby,” she muttered, but it didn’t sound as fierce as she’d intended. “You left me.”
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