She pushed that from her mind. It was too much. She had all she could handle not to fall to pieces.
“Do you think there are others coming to look for us?” Evan rasped. His thoughts had obviously traveled along a similar path.
“Maybe,” she said. Who were they? Did they have sweeping helicopters or all-terrain vehicles? Would they find them where they lay in this unknown desert under the stars, the burning building where they’d been held prisoner too far away to see?
It felt like they’d emerged onto the wasteland of some other planet. She knew that wasn’t true because the same stars she’d known all her life were overhead. There was Ursa Major, and her star sign, Gemini. The twins.
They lay there, still and silent for several more minutes, her lungs filling with air and the acrid smoke clearing from her sinuses. She felt his arm brush hers, and then his hand, his two fingers linking with her own and squeezing.
Oh God. Oh God.
They were holding hands the same way they had for so long, but now their shoulders were touching and they were free. She let out a gasping sob, turning to him and weeping against his side. He raised his arm and put it around her, and she thought she heard him crying softly, too, but she wasn’t sure.
Her sobs dwindled to soft cries, and then her tears dried. Wordlessly, they sat up and then stood. They had to keep moving. Soon, morning would come and they would lose the cover of darkness.
They walked this time, Noelle leading as Evan followed behind. She glanced at him now and again, his broken hand cradled against his chest. It wasn’t bleeding, though, which was good. But the damage, she knew, was contained within, the mayhem of which had allowed him to collapse his knuckle so that it could fit through the small opening of the bars of his cage.
His cage.
Horror rose within her at the vision of where they’d been such a short time ago.
It didn’t seem real. Her mind was spinning, hysteria seeping into the cracks of her thoughts.
Don’t think. Not now.
They weren’t safe, not yet. And so they traveled on.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
Evan’s hand throbbed mercilessly. He hurt everywhere, but his hand was where the pain radiated so harshly he felt like he might throw up.
Still they walked, Noelle shuffling over the cracked ground in front of him. He followed because he didn’t feel capable of leading and he didn’t want to let her down. But he wouldn’t leave her, not even to sit for a minute, and so if she kept moving, so did he.
Don’t stop. You’re the only reason I’m upright.
They were in the middle of fucking nowhere. How far had they been transported? And who the fuck took them to be locked in steel cages and forced to make horrendous choices? Rented? And why them?
We leave here whole.
We leave here together.
And they had, they had, against all odds. So far anyway.
A wild roar stirred in his chest, and he wanted to sink to his knees and scream at the sky. He wasn’t even sure what that sound would contain if he allowed it to emerge. Tempered triumph? Rage? Agony?
Yes. Yes to all of that.
And Evan sensed that emotions that enormous and all encompassing would not lie dormant for long.
But for now, the agony of his hand overtook the thrashing emotions inside, and strangely, he was grateful for that.
A slip of pale gray met his eyes, peeking into the dark sky.
Morning had come.
Fear leaped inside. Noelle glanced back at him, and he saw the concern in her face that he felt too. The darkness had seemed like protection, like cover from those who might be hunting for them, though they hadn’t heard any sounds, near or far, that might have suggested that, not even fire trucks to extinguish the inferno they’d left behind.
And so they walked on, the shadows of the desert becoming sage-green and brown plants, shiny, yellow-topped cacti covered in white spines, and red-hued dirt beneath their feet.
The sky moved from pearl to pale pink, and then all at once seemed to explode in streaks of purple and orange.
Noelle stopped in front of him, sucking in a breath as she met his eyes. He stopped, too, realizing that the sound of a vehicle could be heard moving in their direction. He’d zoned out, synchronizing his steps to the pulsating of his hand, and almost missed it. Adrenaline surged, and he pointed to a hedge of dry bushes to their right, and both of them limped as quickly as possible for the cover they provided.
The vehicle was driving slowly, and Evan realized there was a road ahead of them. He heard the tires rolling over the gravelly ground, but also the sounds of . . . laughter and . . . singing?
“It’s Spanish,” Noelle said under her breath, her eyes wide as they met his. Were they in . . . Mexico?