Page 64 of Midnight Hunt
Fire! Fire! Get up!she frantically shouted.
I pried my eyes open, disorientated when I didn’t recognize the room. It was dark, and my night vision was struggling to pick out details for some reason. I inhaled another lungful of smoke and immediately started coughing.
Griff stirred against me with a sleepy groan, then abruptly bolted upright on the bed.
“Vi.” He reached for me, dragging me off the bed with him as I continued to cough.
“What . . . happened?” I gasped out, finally realizing that smoke was filling the room.
“The hunters found us,” Griff replied grimly. “They’re trying to smoke us out.”
Or burn us alive, Sable whimpered, clearly terrified.
I could hear the crackling flames below us on the first floor, which reminded me of the time our family estate had burned down with us still inside. Terror gripped me as well, and it became even harder to breathe.
“Look at me, Violet,” Griff said, grabbing my face with both hands as he sensed my panic. I looked up at him with wide eyes, my heart thundering uncontrollably. “We’re going to be okay. Say it.”
I opened my mouth, but nothing came out.
“Sayit,” he ordered, his voice filled with so much authority that some of my panic eased.
“We’re going . . . We’re going to be okay.”
“Good girl.” He pressed his mouth to mine in a brief, albeit searing kiss. “They might outnumber us, but we can overpower them. It’s time we fight back.”
Fresh panic squeezed my chest. “They could separate us.”
“They won’t. I’ll kill them if they try.” He said it with so much conviction that I couldn’t help but believe him. I soaked up his confidence like oxygen, willing my racing heart to slow so I could better focus.
“We should shift,” I suggested, trying and failing to hear anything over the raging fire below. “We’ll be faster and stronger that way.”
Griff nodded in agreement. “Into our wolves’ true forms.”
“Okay. But we sticktogether.”
“I won’t leave your side, I promise,” he said, then pulled me in for one final kiss and breathed against my lips, “I love you.”
“And I love you,” I automatically replied, then froze, realizing what I’d just done.
He pulled back to look at me, and his expression nearly broke my heart.
Joy. Pure, unadulteratedjoylit up his entire face.
I hadn’t meant to say the words. They’d just slipped out. But there was no undoing them now. If we both survived whatever fresh hell the hunters had in store for us, I’d have to face the consequences of what I’d just done. But for now, I kept silent. Griff was absolutely thrilled, and I wasn’t about to take that away from him—not when it could help him get through the danger about to swallow us whole.
Taking a step back, I allowed the shift to overtake me. He followed suit, and less than a minute later, Sable and Whiskey were standing where we’d been, their heads practically touching the ceiling.
“The balcony?” Whiskey rumbled to my familiar, the fierce glow of his red eyes cutting through the smoke.
“They’ll be expecting that,” she replied, her voice an octave lower than mine. “Follow me.”
“I’ll follow you anywhere, beloved,” he said, and for once, I didn’t comment when she approached him to nuzzle and lick his mouth. It could be the last time they did so on this plane if one or both of us didn’t make it out of this alive. They deserved a moment to say goodbye, in case the worst happened.
The sweet moment came and went all too soon, though, and Sable turned toward the closed bedroom door. Toward thefire. I could feel her fear, but that didn’t stop my brave familiar from facing it anyway. Pausing only for a second, she launched herself at the door and smashed it down with a single blow.
Whiskey was hot on her heels as she burst into the hallway. A wall of fire greeted them, and she cringed away from the intense heat.
“This way!” she shouted, hugging the right side of the wall. As they neared the end of the hallway, both of them took a running leap and bypassed the stairs completely. Two resounding thuds announced their arrival on the first floor; then they were off like a shot, loping full tilt toward the front door.
