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Every point of contact made me want out of my skin. He was too warm. Too solid. Real in a way my nightmares never were.

I could feel his breath move my hair.

My body remembered being afraid of him even if my mind remembered almost nothing.

His mouth moved close to my ear. His voice was quiet, strangely spare, like he wasn’t used to wasting it.

“There you are.” The tone was soft, almost fond. “Got you.”

Something inside me recoiled before I even understood the words. The sound of him felt horribly intimate, like my body knew his voice from somewhere my mind refused to go.

I started shaking harder.

“Declan!”

He pulled me backward.

I dug my heels in. My injured ankle buckled. Pain shot up my leg.

Wade barely seemed to notice.

“Declan!”

Nothing. Blood had spread farther down his jeans. His face was turned toward me. Eyes closed. For the first time in my life, I called for him and he didn’t come.

My radio cracked again.

Mom’s voice this time. “That shot was inside.”

Dad answered immediately. “Chief’s not responding. Hazel’s room.”

Mom’s voice changed. “I’m going.”

“Go,” Dad told her. “I’ve got rear.”

Wade opened my bedroom door. He kept me in front of him. We entered the hall together.

I heard Mom before I saw her. Fast footsteps.

She rounded the far end carrying her gun, saw Wade behind me and stopped so abruptly her shoes slid.

Her weapon came up.

Wade shifted me.

Mom lowered it. Her face changed when she saw mine. Then she looked past us.

Into my room. At Declan.

“Mom—”

“Go,” Wade said softly against my ear.

She didn’t.

Dad’s voice came over comms. “Sunshine?”

Her eyes never left Wade. She spoke into her radio, “Wade has her.”