Page 62 of Rest In Knotty Pieces

He holds out his hand for my knife. I hand it to him, which says a lot because no one has touched this knife since I bought it. He drags the knife so gently across his throat. It’s a beautiful and sexy move.

Blood fountains into the water, pouring his life force into the frothing currents. In minutes, he’s dead.

I drag him back towards the cave I found earlier and slide him in, head first. It’s a good fifteen to twenty foot deep hole in the world that is only wide enough for a single person.

After that, Pix and I quietly dismantle my traps and make our way back to camp. We arrive at dawn.

She’s sitting by the fire, her back stiff and straight.

I pull off a ring and drop it in her hand, showing her how it twists to reveal a needle. There is something deeply relaxing about arming my omega.

She humphs and relaxes. I scoop her up, watching as Pix disappears into the tent.

Merle lays her ear on my chest, and second by second, her muscles relax until she’s letting out the most adorable purring snores.

When King wakes up, I use our pigeon sign language to tell him what happened and to be careful.

He disappears, and I know he’s going to the other’s, and our speed is about to increase. It’s time to vanish.

Merle

Itwirl the ring that Rolly gave me around my finger so I can hide my thoughts, because I have a lot of them right now. A lot of really strange thoughts.

I missed something really important. Something I should have seen but was blinded to.

These alphas and their omegas are all trained. I don’t know what they are trained in, but few of them make noise as they travel through the forest. They all know about survival. I saw Meg and Desi twirling knives yesterday, then throwing them at trees. They both got the spot they were aiming for dead on.

Vale shot a rabbit.

He shot it while it was running.

With a bow and arrow that he made. Out here. With sticks and a string he carries with him.

I rub my mouth, trying to work out if I’ve fallen into the wrong people’s hands. My whole body has been trembling, a result of the adrenaline that keeps getting dumped into my bloodstream. I am oscillating between bone-deep weariness and buzzing with so much fear it has me vibrating.

As I watch from under my lashes, King punches Cyn so hard and suddenly that it would have laid most people out, but Cyn manages to dodge it. Pix runs at a tree and climbs it with no rope, just the strength in his body.

Blaze and his sword.

Sage and his smile.

“Merle?”

I look up, startled to find Bonnie crouched in front of me. I blink a few times, resisting the urge to throw myself back and get as far away from her lying self as I can. Everyone lied to me. All of them.

I’m angry, but mostly scared.

There are gaps in my memory, but there’s a lot I remember, and I’m not going to go back into their hands without a fight. If these people think they’ll just hand me over…well, they can think again.

“I know this is all new, but I promise you are safe out here. No bears, no cats, no snakes. Nothing is going to happen out here. It’s my home.”

I can see that she really loves it here and believes that, but…

The memory of something teases, and I stand up and walk away from her, looking west. There’s something waiting for me. Something I’m supposed to do. I’m meant to be somewhere.

“Merle?”

I jolt, startled, losing my train of my thoughts.