Page 33 of Fighting Shadows

“Noah!” a voice shouts throughout the cabin, sounding furious.

“Oh goody, he’s awake,” Dominic says gleefully as he twirls his knife gleefully between his fingers.

The sound of his chains rattling brings a smile to my face. I know he has no way out, and I know we can finally finish this.

For her.

“I’m assuming you’re Noah,” I say, holding my hand out to help him up from where he’s still lying on the ground.

“That’s me. It would be best if you got her out of here; I suspect she has sepsis and has done so for a while now. I’ve given her antibiotics to try to stave off the infection, but I didn’t have what I would need to help fully,” the guy – Noah, tells us, his eyes fixated on our girl.

“Thanks. We’ll grab Charlie. Zander and Dominic take Autumn to the car where Brenn is waiting. You go with them; you have blood all over your shirt and need to get what I’m assuming isyour head checked,” I say, hoping like hell the new guy listens to me and we can get everything on the move.

“I’m going to take my car. I don’t want to leave it,” he says. I don’t argue with him and nod my head, ordering Sebastian to go with him and drive so he doesn’t cause an accident by passing out.

Sebastian grumbles about not wanting to babysit, but I shoot him a glare, and he shuts up, realizing this isn’t the time.

The chains rattle from inside the house again, and all of our heads turn in the direction it came from.

“Someone sounds mad. Let’s go,” Tobias says.

Before anyone can step foot inside the cabin, an older man, who I’m assuming is Charlie, appears from the hallway and sprints to the backdoor.

Pulling my gun from the holster, I point it at him, aiming for his shoulder, and squeeze the trigger.

Charlie swerves to the right, narrowly avoiding the bullet as he swings open the back door and rushes out. The bullet that was meant for him embeds itself in the doorframe, wood splintering from the impact.

“Tobias!” I shout, not needing to say anything more as he follows me. Charlie comes into view as he dashes into the tree line, his eyes crazed.

“She’s mine! You can’t take her!” he screams at us, stopping just outside the trees.

Refusing to answer him, I lift my arm, aiming my gun once again, and fire, this time hitting him exactly where I want to.

Charlie stumbles, blood blooming from his shoulder, soaking his t-shirt. Wide, fearful eyes stare at me as he cradles his now useless arm to his body, and then he turns and takes off running into the woods.

We waste no time taking off after him; our feet pound against the leaf-littered forest floor, mud splashing over our boots.

“This way!” Tobias shouts, turning left.

Following the sound of Charlie’s labored breathing, we run deeper between the trees, the branches tearing at our skin.

Tobias holds up two fingers against his palm, a silent order to split up and crowd him up ahead.

He’s fast and crafty, but he’ll tire eventually.

I trust the others to get Autumn to the hospital while we hunt her monster for her. When she wakes up in the hospital yet again, we can tell her that she’s finally free and that she can move on without the shadows of her past chasing her.

I can’t hear him. The only sound in these woods is my breathing, the rustling of leaves as the wind picks up, and Tobias’s boots hitting the ground as he gets closer to my position.

“Any sign?” Tobias asks me, his eyes scanning the trees as we do.

“Nothing. I don’t understand where he could have gone. We were on his tail the entire time,” I sigh, frustration prickling at me.

We stalked him through these woods for twenty minutes, always on his tail as we ran through the trees, and now he’s just vanished.

“Fuck!” I shout, slamming my fist into a tree.

“It’s like he fucking vanished! I tracked his footprints the entire time, and then they just stopped,” Tobias groans, defeat shining in his eyes when he finally looks back to me, “We failed her.”

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