Page 118 of Hide And Seek

A shape flickered through the trees ahead, just for a second. Movement. Someone cutting across. Then Chris was right in front of me. Close enough that if he lunged, he’d have me.

I veered hard to the other side, forcing Chris to adjust his path. “Come on, Alissa,” he called out, voice rough now. “Don’t make this harder than it has to be.”

Something in me snapped then, and I spun around. It wasn’t a clean decision. It wasn’t even a decision at all, really. Just instinct and panic. A flicker of memory from my lesson with Rhys.

I hurled the ax toward Chris.

For a split second, everything seemed to slow. The blade spun once, clumsy and uneven, then hit. Chris made a strangled sound as it slammed into his chest, the force of it knocking him backward a few steps before his legs gave out completely.

He went down hard, crashing into the forest floor. I didn’t wait. I sprinted straight back toward him. I needed to get the ax.

My hands closed around the handle, and I yanked, but it didn’t budge. It was buried deep. Way too deep. The angle was wrong, lodged between bone, and when I pulled again it shifted just enough to make Chris choke on a broken gasp.

His eyes snapped open, and his hand shot up and clamped around my wrist. “Got you, bitch,” he rasped, his grip tightening despite the blood soaking through his shirt. His face had gone grey, but his eyes were still sharp and focused. “You really think you’re getting away from us?”

I wrenched back, trying to pull myself free, but his fingers dug in harder, dragging me off balance. “I’m going to kill you,” he muttered.

A sound crashed through the trees behind me. It was Jensen.

“Fuck, man, what did she do to you?” he barked.

I yanked again, harder this time, twisting my wrist and clawing at Chris’s grip with my free hand. His strength faltered for half a second, and that was enough. I tore myself free.

I didn’t try to retrieve the ax again. I just ran.

I crashed deeper into the trees, no longer caring about direction. Only distance. Soon, I barely even felt the branches raking at me anymore. Everything had narrowed to one thing.

Keep going.

Left, right, forward, weaving between trees without any real thought behind it. The camp could’ve been behind me. To the side. Miles away for all I knew. It didn’t matter, as long as I kept moving.

“Alissaaa…”

The sound echoed through the trees, low and drawn out, and I flinched, nearly tripping.

Jensen.

“I’m not letting you get away from me,” he called, voice carrying in an eerie, sing-song cadence that made my stomach twist. He sounded far too calm for someone who’d just found his friend bleeding out on the forest floor.

“I can see you,” he added.

A lie. It had to be. But it still worked. Panic surged again, hot and blinding, and I veered to the left without thinking, ducking under a low branch and scrambling over a fallen log that scraped my shin hard enough to make me gasp.

A scream tore through the woods then. High, sudden, cut off almost immediately.

Either Grace or Sutton must’ve tripped and fallen. But obviously, I wasn’t going to turn back and offer a helping hand.

Instead, I ran even harder.

My legs felt heavier with every step, and my breathing turned ragged and uneven, each inhale dragging in less air than the last. The trees all looked the same now. Dark trunks, shifting shadows, patches of pale moonlight that barely helped me to see.

Another sound drifted through the forest then, faint and warped by distance. I froze for half a second, head snapping toward it. It was a low, strangled noise. Almost like a cry, but somehow… wrong.

Animal, I told myself. It had to be. A fox, maybe.

I forced myself to move again, shaking it off even as unease settled deep in my gut.

“Alissaaa…”