Page 205 of Ride the Sky

“By your arm.” Her gaze follows mine. “He left the key to the cuffs.”

She smirks and snatches up the keyring. “Fucking amateur.” She picks through the key ring and swallows. “Wy, there must be twenty keys here.”

“I’ll try ’em all,” I tell her. “Hurry.”

She passes the ring through the cage to me. I clench my hand around the key ring. Breathing hard, I work the first key into the lock. Swear when it doesn’t work. “You’re free, and that’s all that matters.”

“No,” she says, snaking her tattooed arm through the wire to cup my face. She shakes her head fiercely. “That’s not all that matters. I’m not leaving you.”

“Fallon—”

The basement door opens.

Fallon’s eyes widen.

Fuck.

He’s back.

Wyatt and I stare at each other through the wire. “Go,” he shoves at me, his tone urgent. “Get the fuck out of there.”

I shake my head, swimming through dizziness. “I’m not leaving you.”

“Fallon, damn you.” Desperation rises in his eyes. “You have to leave.”

“I will never leave you,” I tell him. “Not again. Not ever.”

The muscles in his jaw tick as he glares at me. I glare back, refusing to give in.

Thump. Thump. Thump.

Footsteps on the stairs.

Wyatt’s spine straightens. His eyes burn with tears. “I don’t want you hurt.”

I interlace our fingers. I look down at the tattoo on my finger, a symbol, a reminder that we’re in this together. That he has always been in it with me, even though I couldn’t see it at the time.

I’ll never stop fighting for us.

Never.

I’ll die before I let anything happen to him.

Quietly, I adjust my cuffs so they look like they’re latched. “Listen, I’m going to do something, okay? So just…play along.”

“Remember what I said,” Wyatt orders, sticking the ring of keys into his pocket for later. “I go first.” His eyes blaze. “Fucking remember that. I go first, Fallon.”

I smile, baring my teeth and leaning in to kiss him through the wire. “Guess what, asshole? Not a damn chance.”

“If you die, Fallon”—his voice shakes; his eyes shutter—“I’ll never forgive you.”

I grin. “You think I’m a menace in real life, just wait ’til I’m dead.”

“Fuck you,” he rasps.

“I love you,” I say, and Wyatt makes a strangled kind of noise in his throat.

Tripp appears at the bottom of the stairs. His face darkens when he sees Wyatt and I locked in an embrace.

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