Free Ignited by Desni Dantone Page B

ahead of us. They’re coming, now, as we’re standing here, wasting time. Once we put some distance between us and them, I’ll explain what I can.”
    A few hours of walking? I made a face, which he ignored.
    “Come on.” He nodded his head at the woods looming ahead of us.
    “We’re walking through the woods? What’s wrong with the road?”
    He looked at me like he really hoped I wasn’t that stupid. I wasn’t. I was in shock, and not thinking straight. Obviously, they would be looking for us on the road. 
    I cleared my throat and rallied up some attitude. “We’re going in there with nothing but a map and your star reading skills to guide us?” He walked off without an answer, and I called after him, “You never did say how it is that you know how to do that.”
    He glanced over his shoulder. “All masochistic assholes can.” 
    I faltered briefly, and a reluctant smile spread across my face, but he wasn’t around to see it. He was way ahead of me, already trudging into the woods. I scurried after him, secretly impressed.
    So, it seemed he had a soft side and a sense of humor. Throw in his killer good looks, and I was afraid to say I had a da ngerous combination on my hands.
     
     

 

CHAPTER 8
     
    The only thing worse than walking blindly through the woods at night was walking blindly through the woods at night, while trying to keep up with Nathan. The man was a machine. And me? Well, not so much. I hated the woods under normal circumstances. My throbbing ankle, the mind-numbing cold, and the fact that we were being hunted by guys trying to kill us only made it worse. I would be a wreck if not for Nathan. I would also be very lost.
    From what I knew about him, the man had no limits. He could appear out of thin air and save my life like it was the sole purpose of his existence, take out a whole bunch of bad guys single-handedly, drive like a stunt driver, and tell direction by the stars. He made the impossible look easy. After all I have seen, and all that I knew, I couldn’t figure, for the life of me, what we were doing walking through the woods. It seemed like such a regression from what I knew he was capable of.
    “Yo, Nathan, is it just me or does it seem like we’re walking up a lot?”
    Shouldn’t we be walking down the mountain, toward the road, toward civilization?
    “That’s because we are walking up.”
    Of course. “And why is that?”
    “We’re going out of the way for a little bit. Until things settle down.”
    “We’re hiding out in the mountains?”
    “Yes.” He was much more confident about the idea than I was, but who was I to question him? We walked west, or that was what he said when I asked. He wasn’t in a particularly talkative mood, so I didn’t press for details. West and up. That was the most information I’d gotten all night.
    We walked for hours, with me struggling to keep up with him. Finally, he stopped, dropped the sac on the ground, and waited for me to catch up. 
    “You’re limping,” he observed.
    “I twisted my ankle.” I shrugged like it was no big deal, even though it was killing me.
    “Why didn’t you tell me?”
    “I didn’t realize it would have mattered,” I returned heatedly. 
    Nathan shot me a stormy look that rivaled the one I was giving him. He sat on the ground against a tree and motioned for me to do the same. I sat across from him and he pulled my foot into his lap, exposing it to the chilly night air. By contrast, his fingers felt like fire on my skin as he poked and prodded my ankle. I jumped when he touched a sore spot.
    He glanced up at me. “That hurt?”
    I rolled my eyes. “A little.”
    He pushed another spot. “How about here?”
    “Not as bad.”
    He tested the stability, or so he said. In my opinion, all he did was make it feel worse. When he was finished, he declared it a sprain, and didn’t seem to think anything was broken. 
    “We’ll rest here for a few minutes,” he said, leaning his head against the