Page 59 of Rot In Knotty Pieces

Pix turns a look on Roseland. “Will you please try to remember who you are talking to? Sage, King, and I have this. You and Blaze get to be babysat by Kest.”

I smirk at the omega. He winks and grabs a rope and then starts running.

“Wait a minute, what are they doing?” I protest as he runs the wrong way.

“They are going to drag the rafts back up through the stupid canyon.”

I stand up, thoroughly frustrated. “Can I just ask why we aren’t going to the town that is just yonder?” My sarcasm hits hard.

“Yonder town?” Sage says, blinking. He rubs the back of his head and looks at Pix. “What town?”

Pix stares at me. He is strangely tense, his face blank. “It’s in the wrong direction.”

“This seems like the really wrong direction and also dangerous and tiring,” I snap. “Get in the boat before I cut the rope and let you all run to catch up.”

Roseland chuckles. “Ah, Kestrel, you are one of a kind.”

I shake my head, muttering about the brain cells of alphas until they are in the raft, then I grab a paddle and stab it into the water.

“Let’s go,” I growl at them.

King sits beside me and glances at me a few times before I finally give in with an irritated huff.

“Say it.”

“I missed you. When you were gone.”

I stare at him, and something hard softens inside me. “Ha, that’s a bit funny. I thought you only liked Merle,” I say defensively.

“You’re all you, and I’m learning the different parts of you. Kestrel is tough and smart. Yet, you have this soft spot a mile wide.”

“I absolutely do not, and don’t go telling people that.”

He laughs off my attempt to distract him with humour and continues.

“You protected the other alters from the pain.”

I look away. “We don’t need to all carry it.”

“You could have shared it.”

“Raven and Raptor were there when we got hurt. They don’t need to carry our poor decisions.”

“Your self-loathing is something I did not expect.”

I look up, startled. “I don’t hate myself-”

“You do. You hate yourself so much, but it’s okay.”

“It is?”

“Yes, because I’ll be here to tell you every day that I love you, and one day, you will wake up, and you won’t hate yourself quite so much.”

I stare at him, wondering who the hell he is and where he buried King.

He loves me? Nobody loves me.

“You don’t know me well enough to love me,” I argue and shift on the raft. Can I jump off? Will they let me swim?