Page 65 of A Cruel Kindness

The sounds were coming from a row of larger tents, large enough to obscure several waiting figures.

I approached slowly, making sure my steps landed on smooth, soft ground that wouldn’t make a sound. I could feel Bellamy at my back, and the Bond confirmed what I was feeling in my soul. She’s got you.

I approached slowly, keeping my gun positioned for the fastest reaction time. I snuck past one tent, prepared to shoot around the side and get the jump on whoever was hiding there.

When I did, I startled a wolf feasting on discarded food. It yelped at me, launching towards me with a snarl before running off into the woods.

The next thing I knew, someone was laughing behind me. I blinked and took back in my surroundings, and realized I had my non-shooting arm tucked behind my back, holding Bellamy tightly to me.

I realized it was Ford laughing, low under his breath. In a rare show of intimacy, Esme smacked his arm.

“Soren, darling, I’d prefer if you let me go,” Bellamy said, the words muffled against my back.

“Call me darling again and I might,” I shot back, the banter feeling far too easy.

“Darling, I can’t breathe.”

That was a double whammy, calling me an endearment that made my stomach too tight and invoking the Bond by saying she couldn’t breathe.

When I turned, she had a knowing smile on her face. “Smart ass,” I grumbled, though I was smiling as I said it.

“That wolf was kinda cute,” she said, looking over my shoulder to the line of trees it disappeared into.

“Cute until they think you’re your next meal.”

“Very true,” she said, her eyes lowered as she went to holster her gun. She missed on the first try, her hands shaking a little too hard, but managed it on the second.

Before I knew what I was doing, I lifted her hand between my own and pressed down, trapping them in warm pressure.

When I let her hand go, the shaking was gone. Bellamy blinked up at me under confused brows, but her eyes were the issue. There was clear gratitude there, and I couldn’t look at that for too long unless we wanted a problem.

At the dip of my chin, everyone hopped off their horses, gathering what they needed.

Ford had his rifle slung over his back. Freya had an empty bag that she intended to fill with trinkets.

Esme didn’t have anything special, but she never did. Her memory was uncanny in its strength. She could rifle through discarded documents and walk away with a near-perfect recollection.

“Ford and Esme, hit the main building. Go for offices first.” They both nodded, heading off together in silence.

Peter and Ella didn’t even need instruction, moving towards the right to take the perimeter.

Freya, meanwhile, was buzzing with barely contained excitement. I sighed, “Go on. Please try to bring back just the essentials.” It was a useless warning, but I heeded it anyway.

Freya disappeared in a flurry of red hair, happy to scavenge.

That left me and Bellamy alone. “We’ll take the left side.”

Bellamy nodded, falling easily into step next to me. We were truly alone for what felt like the first time.

God, I shouldn’t love that thought as much as I did.

“Walk me through this,” Bellamy said as I walked to the first tent and peered inside.

“Muli has camps set up all around the Bridge, some close some a little farther, but we are surrounded on all sides. Our main priority is protecting the camp. We aren’t here to invade, just defend. Most of the real harm comes from us pushing out to one camp trying to get them to retreat. Sometimes they do, sometimes they don’t. This is the second camp they’ve abandoned without pressure from us in as many months.”

The last time I’d done this, mere days before we Crossed back and Carson defected, we’d been doing something eerily similar, walking through an abandoned strongholds in the mountains.

If you had told me then that I’d be walking next to my Soul Mate, watching as her angular brown eyes widened as they rapidly tried to take in every new detail, I’d have probably tried to push them off the cliff at the back of the stronghold.