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“You can’t do this.”
“It’s the only way around the bridge, princess.”
“No, I mean this. Do you really expect to keep me with you forever?”
He turns his gaze onto her, and I see something really interesting there. “Absolutely.”
“I’ll run.”
“Handcuffs make nice bracelets.”
“I’ll get out of them again.”
“They also work well as anklets.”
“Griffin,” I say.
“I’ll fight back.”
“Please do.”
We’re approaching countless abandoned cars. They’re not all blocking the road. There still looks to be a path winding between them, but he doesn’t see what I see.
“Griffin,” I say again, louder this time.
“You’re not leaving me unless I’m physically unable to follow.”
“I can make that work.” Emily pulls out one of her knives, and he grins at her before wrapping his hand around her wrist. He’s not watching the road at all. I unbuckle my seat belt and throw myself in between them, applying pressure on his wrist to make him let go of her.
“Watch the fucking road, man,” I growl.
“What are y—” His words cut off when the tire blows. “Shit.” The car rolls to a stop and then he gets out, slamming the door shut behind him. “Stay.”
I sit back in my seat and run my hand through my hair, forgetting that I’d put it up into a bun so I wind up making a mess of it.
“William.” Her voice is so gentle and soft that I almost think I imagined it, but still I look at her, anyway. She’s looking right at me. Well, at my arm. “I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to.”
Confused, I raise my arm and see the gash along my forearm. Blood trickles out, but it’s not life-threatening. An accidental cut, no big deal.
Max howls.
“Did you sharpen all of these?” Emily asks.
“Of course. I wanted to make sure you could properly defend yourself, though I didn’t expect it to be against Willie-boy here.”
I thump the back of my hand against his chest. “It’s William.”
“Potato grapefruit.”
“That doesn’t make any sense,” I argue, but it’s pointless.
“I’ll get the first aid kit.” Emily reaches over the center console to hit the button for the trunk and then unlocks the doors. I push open my door.
Bleeding or not, she won’t go out there on her own. Griffin is busy with the busted tire, and we’ve become stranded at the edge of a highway graveyard. I step out and stand by her side, pressing my arm against my side because it’s bleeding more quickly now. It’s still fine.
“Tire’s busted and we don’t have a spare.” Griffin stands up and kicks the flat tire. He shoves his hands into his hair and walks in a frustrated circle. “We used to have a spare, but then we needed to use it, and then when we found another good tire, we didn’t have time to take the spare with us before rotters were upon us. It’s a repeat of that, except this time we don’t have the damn spare.”
“And there are no rotters,” Max points out.
