Total pages in book: 205
Estimated words: 204377 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1022(@200wpm)___ 818(@250wpm)___ 681(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 204377 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1022(@200wpm)___ 818(@250wpm)___ 681(@300wpm)
Plowing forward, the vehicle loses traction, slipping and catching on plant debris. But it keeps going, faster than I can run, and that’s all that matters. Speed and distance. I’ll conserve as much of my energy as possible. Then I’ll run when I have to run.
I don’t locate the trail until I reach the first hill. It winds around sparse spindly shrubs, and up, up, up, and over a distant slope.
Patches of snow give me bursts of speed, but the long stretches of dirt make the sled unhappy. Is the terrain damaging the engine? It’s definitely fucking up the skis. Feels like they’re coming loose.
Shit. I hug the path, my thighs painfully clenched to remain seated, my ass bouncing with each brutal bump.
Exhaustion invades, every muscle fatigued and screaming. Still I keep going, hanging on for dear life.
Until the sky tilts sideways.
I hit the brakes, but the sled doesn’t slow. There’s no ground beneath me. Only a steep drop-off. And air.
Pulse sprinting, I try to disentangle from the heavy machine as the momentum sends me spiraling out of control.
I land with a crash, the snowmobile colliding with an embankment. My neck cracks to the side. My skull smashes against the ground, and my body lies pinned beneath plastic and steel.
Gasoline and exhaust burn my nose as the engine falls quiet. I push against the weight crushing me into the earth. It doesn’t budge.
All I feel is pain.
Stabbing, blinding, inescapable pain. It spreads through my back and attacks my pelvis in a torrent of red-hot lava.
A scream tears from my throat, and I jerk, bucking and kicking, unable to move the snowmobile from my lower half.
Trapped.
Oh God, the cramping. The agony in my tummy and spine. It weakens me. Annihilates me. Every breath brings a fresh wave of torment. Nausea.
And despair.
I know.
I know before I slide my fingers down my body, stretching, slipping beneath the hem of the coat, reaching for the warm, wet place between my legs.
Sobs hitch my chest as I lift my hand.
Blood.
It coats my palm. Soaks through my jeans. Runs along the crack of my ass. Drenches my thighs, my tailbone, and the bed of dirt and rocks beneath me.
No, no, no, I can’t do this. I can’t accept it. I won’t.
But it’s there, staring back at me as my arm drops to the ground and my bloody fingers curl into a fist.
My baby.
Monty’s baby.
My only reason to fight. To survive this.
I will myself to black out to escape the inconsolable anguish, but my body refuses. It forces me to endure every wretched minute as my uterus contracts, squeezing, bleeding, expelling the life it held.
I did this.
In my reckless, fearful haste to flee, I killed my child.
Tears course down my temples, soaking my hair. I cry loudly, violently, letting grief consume me. I have nothing left. No strength. No desire. No reason.
I give up.
The pain is relentless, and I become it. I become the throb in my womb and the hole in my heart, confined in a bag of defeated bones lying at death’s door.
I no longer try to move the snowmobile. I can’t see past my tears or muster the strength to cry for help.
Time moves without urgency, and I fade with its passing, waiting for my soul to leave my body.
Awareness flickers in and out. Sounds ebb and flow. Until a single, constant vibration remains, growing louder, coming closer.
The unmistakable rumble of an engine arrives. It’s not curiosity or self-preservation that pulls my attention toward the intrusion. All of that has drained out of me.
What I want is to be left alone. To die without interruption. I glare at the noise.
The motor shuts off beside me, and my focus narrows on the knobby tires of a dirt bike.
That would’ve been handy when I made my escape, but I didn’t see it. Didn’t take the time to look.
I failed in every way possible.
The rider climbs off, his black boots crunching rocks as he walks a circle around me.
How long have I been here? It should be nighttime. Possibly a new day. Yet the sun still clings to the sky, high above the horizon.
Because it doesn’t set here this time of year.
Footsteps come back around, bringing the rider in view. I stare up into eyes the color of grim-reaper black.
Garbed in dark clothes, Kodiak cuts a menacing figure silhouetted in the glow of the midnight sun. Feet braced apart, a crossbow clutched in one hand, his handsome, broody expression giving nothing away.
“Let me die,” I whisper.
“How about I do us both a favor?” He lifts the crossbow and trains it on my chest, his voice a gravelly growl. “I’ll hurry the process along.”
I swallow, wanting that. But I’m not brave enough to demand it.
“No, you won’t.” Someone approaches behind him.
Wolfson emerges from the hillside, aiming a rifle at Kodiak.