Chapter 8 · Don't Teach Me to Run

I'm not hiding in this cabin like some scared kid.

Cain's standing between me and the door, arms crossed, that same flat look he's been wearing since Vera left. Like I'm a problem he has to solve. Like I'm cargo.

"You go out there, you're dead in forty-eight hours," he says.

I shove past him. He catches my wrist. Not hard. Just enough.

"Let go."

"Layla."

"I said let go."

He does. But he doesn't move. I can feel the bond mark burning under the bandage on my other wrist, that sick hot itch that flares every time we're too close or too pissed at each other. I don't know which this is. Maybe both.

"You think I don't get it?" I snap. "You think I don't know what's coming? Vera gave us one night. One. And your plan is what, teach me to curl up small and hope they don't smell me?"

"My plan is keep you alive."

"By hiding."

"Yes."

"I've been hiding my whole life, Cain."

His jaw tightens. Good. I want him angry. Angry's better than that dead-eyed hunter stare.

"This isn't the same," he says.

"You're right. It's worse.