20. Bexley

20

BEXLEY

“I found hiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiim!”

Fire never knows what do to with mud, so the second Merida and I ran up on that ring of fire out in the middle of fucking nowhere, I hopped off her back. I slammed down into a muddy puddle and rolled around in it like a fucking dog, listening as those kids in the trees shrieked and cried out for help. I coated myself from head to toe, even going so far as to run that shit through my hair. Then, without another word spoken, I pointed to the treetops where the kids were screaming, and Merida’s wolf nodded its head.

She scaled it to get to the kids at the top.

I leapt through the flames caked in mud and laid eyes on Dom.

He was handcuffed to a tree, shirtless and in nothing but his suit pants. His bare feet looked scratched and scraped. Two of his toes were bleeding. One looked broken. His body was drenched in sweat that ran down his body in beads. He needed hydration. He needed a healer. He needed rest. And even over the roar of the fire, I still heard the children above our heads crying out for help.

I raced to Dom as my heart slammed heavily against my chest.

“You did so good,” I said breathlessly. “You did so well protecting those kids. Come here.”

My hands ran over his sweat-drenched chest. I clocked his neck and his head. I looked for any signs of a concussion before I ran my hands down his clothed legs to make sure he wasn’t bleeding.

“Bexley, you—you can’t be… here,” he choked out.

“Just give me a second,” I said breathlessly as I gasped for air. The fire pulled all of the oxygen out of the air. I heard Merida scrambling out of the tree, and it didn’t take much of a look for me to see that her back was piled with those kids. I watched as she leapt from trunk to trunk, finding a way over the growing wall of fire as she disappeared back through the smoke with the pups.

“All right,” I said as I focused back on Dom, “now, we just need to get you out of here.”

“It’s a trap,” he choked out.

I grinned. “Trust me, I’m aware.”

“For you.”

That snapped my gaze to his. “What?”

Dom swallowed thickly. “It’s a trap that’s been set for you. She’s coming for you, Bexley. You have to get out of here.”

“Sh, sh, sh, sh, sh,” I said as I patted his chest and walked to the back of the tree. “Once we can get you out of here, you can get us both back to the pack. How’s that sound?”

He coughed and sputtered. “Y-Y-you—you don’t understand. Bexley, she?—”

“Sh,” I hissed as I dipped down toward the handcuffs. I watched wisps of smoke rise up from Dom’s skin as the flames felt as if they licked my back.

Jesus, the cuffs were actually burning into his skin.

I have to get a barrier between the handcuffs and his wrists.

From the ground, I picked up any leaf that wasn’t yet crunchy and dead. I slipped it in between the bleeding skin of his wrists and the heavy metal of the handcuffs. They didn’t look like traditional handcuffs, either. They were impeccable. They had an infinite shine on them. Hell, they could’ve been mirrors, for crying out loud.

“What are these made of?” I asked as I continued slipping leaves beneath the cuffs.

“Silver,” Dom wheezed.

I committed their weakness to memory as I blocked out all of the sounds around me. The screaming coming from the compound. Wolves, howling in the distance. Voss, bellowing over the crackling flames of the forest. All I hoped was that Merida got those pups back to Voss and Ronyn safely.

“There,” I said, surveying my handiwork. “How’s that feeling?”

Dom finally drew in a deep breath. “Bexley, get the hell out of here.”

I crouched down and studied the handcuffs. “Just give me a second. I can get you out of this.”

“No, you can’t. Just?—”

“Just shut up, Dom!” I exclaimed.

I shook my head and racked my brain for anything that might work. I ran my fingers through my hair, but I didn’t have a bobby pin to use. I slid my hands along the forest floor, but none of the sticks that I picked up were small enough or sturdy enough to help me pick the lock on the cuffs.

“If something happens to you, I’ll never forgive myself,” Dom pleaded.

“Good thing I’m a trained agent,” I said breathlessly.

“You have to get out of here. Your pack needs you.”

“So does yours,” I said as I kept searching the ground for anything to use to get him out.

“Bexley, you need?—”

I walked around to the front of the tree and pinned him with a look. “Shut up, or I’m gonna punch your lights out so you do shut up.”

He grinned weakly. “Promise?”

I scoffed, but I couldn’t help the small grin that crossed my face. But, he was right. I had no way to pick the lock on his handcuffs. The tree was much too big for me to take down by myself. I didn’t have a way to call out to Voss, otherwise he probably could’ve uprooted the damned thing with his pinkie toe. I rushed back around to the handcuffs. They were much too tight for me to dislocate Dom’s fingers and slip his hand through. I had no hair tie, no lockpicking kit. I had none of the things on me that I required to get him out of the situation.

I rushed back around to look at Dom’s sweat-stricken face and I heard Voss bellowing in the distance.

“Beeeeeexleeeeeey!”

“Go,” Dom choked out.

The heat of the fires beating down around us threw me into panic mode. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pressing myself closely against him, and gazed into his beautiful blue stare. I committed every part of him to memory. I studied the geometric designs upon his chest and down his arms. I ran my hands through his sweat-stained hair, memorizing the way it felt against my skin. I smiled softly as the flames mounted, slowly eating away at the forest around us. And as the screaming of the packs in the distance faded away, I saw a tear streak Dom’s cheek.

“I gotcha,” I whispered as I brushed it away with my knuckles.

Dom’s voice was choked with emotion. “You can’t die here with me, sweet girl. Please.”

I simply shook my head softly, though.

“I don’t want you to die here with me, Bexley. I’d never forgive myself.”

I pressed the softest kiss to his lips before I tucked a strand of dripping wet hair behind his ear. “Well, I’m not leaving you here to die by yourself. I already did that once with someone I loved. I’m not doing it again.”

His eyes bulged. “Love?”

I stroked my knuckles along his cheek. “Does that really shock you, Dom?”

He shook his head quickly. “Get out of here, sweet girl. That’s an order.”

“I’m not leaving here without you. End of story.”

Another tear streaked his cheek. But as he parted his chapped lips to say something, a familiar voice that made me see nothing but red emanated from behind me.

“Maybe I can be of service with that particular venture,” Delilah said.