Total pages in book: 92
Estimated words: 88673 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 443(@200wpm)___ 355(@250wpm)___ 296(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 88673 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 443(@200wpm)___ 355(@250wpm)___ 296(@300wpm)
The horse stops short, practically flipping me forward over his neck. The only reason I don’t crash is because I grab hold of his neck at the last moment. It’s just enough to slow my momentum, so even though I do end up on the ground, it’s not as bad as it could’ve been.
I roll, and then everyone is yelling. I’m calling out, “Riggs!”
And Riggs is screaming, “Clover!”
And so are Amon and Collin. They stand up, looking at me like I’m some kind of ghost. I run past them and throw my arms around Riggs, burying my head into his chest as everything that happened to me over the last week suddenly becomes too much.
Riggs is yelling, “Untie me! Un-fucking tie me!”
And then Amon does just that and finally, Riggs’ arms hug me tight and I let out a breath that I swear I’ve been holding in for days.
There’s no discussion. No talking at all. No mention of Collin and Amon trying to kill Riggs.
That’s a conversation that needs to be had, but not now.
Now, all I wanna do is feel grateful.
We walk back down the hill, Ike’s horse following us. Even though this path is not really a trail and he seems too big to make such a steep descent, he still follows and manages just fine. Like he’s been climbing up and down mountains his whole life. Which, of course, he probably has.
When we get to the back of Collin’s house, Lowyn and Rosie are pacing in the driveway. I did manage to get a signal while I was tearing down the mountain, so I called her and told her to meet me here.
Lowyn and Rosie both rush at us when we approach. They hug each other. There’s other people too, Disciple people, all standing around at the end of the driveway. They must’ve heard the shots.
Collin looks at Riggs like he’s got something to say here, but he doesn’t say it.
“You can sleep here tonight, Clover. The key is under the back doormat. Just…” Lowyn points to her house, which is Collin’s house too. “Just get some rest and we can sort it all out later.” She looks at Collin. “Right?”
Collin is still staring at Riggs. But then he looks away. “Right.”
He pulls Lowyn towards him, and they head towards Lowyn’s car in the driveway. She looks over her shoulder at me one more time. “I’ll be back this afternoon. We’ll talk then.”
I just nod as Rosie and Amon follow them, and get in the car. The Disciple people disperse, deciding that whatever this Collin Creed drama is, it can wait.
A moment later, Lowyn’s backing out the driveway and then, like people weren’t shooting at each other just twenty minutes ago, and I wasn’t escaping from a crazy woman down in a secret underground military city—the night goes quiet and things are back to normal.
Riggs lets out a long breath. “What the fuck just happened?”
Which, for some unknown reason, make me laugh. That’s all I can do, just laugh. He looks at me like I’m crazy, but it takes me several seconds before I get myself back under control and point at him. “I saved you.”
He scoffs. “Woman, if it weren’t for you, I wouldn’t have needed saving.”
Which makes me laugh again. He scoops me up in his arms, carrying me like he’s about to walk me over a threshold, and then he says, “You like me.”
“You like me.”
He admits it. “I do like you. Come on. There’s got to be a bed in this house somewhere.”
And then he does walk me over a threshold and that’s that, I guess.
As happy an ending as one could’ve hoped for.
Considering.
I don’t know what time it is when I wake up, but by the low light outside, at the very least, it’s late afternoon.
As much as I would’ve liked to talk things through with Riggs after we came upstairs to the bedroom, he passed out mumbling something about Amon and IV’s, which I took to mean drugs.
Despite me releasing that breath outside, my body was tight with tension and my mind was racing so it took me a good long while to finally fall asleep.
Once I did, though, I guess it all caught up with me because I can’t remember a single time where I slept the day away.
Riggs has his arms around me tight when I finally come to enough to open my eyes. He’s awake, I can tell. Might’ve been awake for a while now, in fact. But he stayed in bed with me instead of getting up and going downstairs, where there are people, because I can hear them.
Collin and Lowyn are down there, making enough noise to let me know that they’ve been here a while and are probably trying to wake us up at this point.