Page 1 of Savage Elites

Chapter 1

My stomach lurched with each revolution of the car down the mountainside, and my heartbeat accelerated with each passing moment. Blood roared in my ears, drowning out the sound of the radio but letting in every gut-wrenching creak and crash and crush of the car’s metal bodywork.

I had to stop looking at the moonlit figure in black. I had to jump out. Jump out before the vehicle fell into the stream. Or into a boulder.

I wedged open the door, but the car tumbled into a tree trunk and forced it closed. “Fuck!”

My fingers shook over its handle, and when I pulled it, the door jammed. Cold despair washed through my insides. I was trapped. Trapped in this metal coffin.

With more force this time, I opened the door and lurched out to freedom, but my seatbelt held me back. The car paused, and a released breath whooshed out of my lungs. Just as I undid the belt buckle and was about to jump out, the car overbalanced and continued descending. But the door still swung open. There was still a chance.

I leaped out of the car and hit my shoulder and the side of my head on a rock. Pain radiated through my skull, my right shoulder, and the right side of my hip, and I squeezed my eyes shut. The creak and crash of the car continued as it tumbled further down the valley.

When I opened my eyes, the figure in black descended toward me at an alarming pace.

Cold panic exploded through my chest and surged through my veins.

If I didn’t run, they would catch up with me.

If I didn’t run, they would finish the job they started.

“S-shit.” I stumbled to my feet. Pain lightning-bolted across my left hip, and a scream tore from my lips. But I couldn’t dwell on that. I needed to run.

As I shuffled along the mountainside, my feet skidded on mud and on vegetation still wet from the rain. I splayed out my uninjured right arm and tried to maintain my balance. A crack of thunder filled my insides with cold terror, but I picked up my pace. I turned, and a flash of lightning illuminated the mountainside and the advancing dark figure.

The wind blew on my wet skin, adding to the chill, and my head throbbed in time with my galloping heart. As I turned around to look at my pursuer, my shoulder clipped the side of a tree trunk. The impact sent a new explosion of agony down my left side, knocked me off my feet and sent me spinning down the slope.

No matter how much I struggled, I couldn’t stop the fall. No matter how much I flailed, I couldn’t find anything to hold.

Then I stumbled over a ledge and fell.

A shocked breath filled my lungs with freezing air, and a silent scream emptied them. Flailing through the air, I tried righting myself, but panic seized my muscles and kept me immobile.

Just as I took my next breath, my head cracked against a hard surface, and everything went black.

* * *

Mom’s voice penetrated my stupor. She told me to hold on, that I was safe and found, but every nerve ending vibrated with pain. I just wanted it to end. Then unconsciousness pulled me back into its dark embrace.

* * *

The beeps of monitors seeped through the cocoon of oblivion and into my consciousness. Why was I dreaming of being in a hospital? This had to be a nightmare. I had to wake.

“Willow?” asked a female voice. “Willow Evergreen?”

I forced my eyes open. A blurry figure stood over me, but I couldn’t make out her face. I closed my eyes again, inhaled, exhaled, and opened them. She was a blonde-haired nurse a few years older than me, wearing a blue tunic with white piping.

“Willow?”

“What happened?” I rasped. “Why am I in a hospital?”

Her pale brows creased, and she stared down at me as though I’d asked the question in Latin. “I’ll…” She licked her lips. “I’ll inform the doctor that you’re awake.”

“Can’t you just tell me—”

“Won’t be a minute.” She spun on her heel and hurried to the end of the ward and out of the double doors.

“Excuse me?” I tried raising my upper body, but every muscle screamed with agony, making me slump back into the mattress.