Birds chirping in the distance filled the room as his muscular arms tugged me against his firm chest. Thomas held me the same way as we fell asleep the night before. My head rested on one of his arms, and his other arm was draped around my back. We hadn't moved an inch.Since my clothes were ruined, Thomas offered to let me wear his shirt for the night. It smelled just like him, and I don't know how, but even his sweat smelled good. I loved being encompassed by his scent. It made me feel safer than ever.So yeah, I was only wearing his shirt and my underwear. Sleeping alone together for the first time, Thomas opted to sleep in only his boxers, which was something he never did before, but I wasn't complaining. He was sexy as hell.Last night ended rather quickly as everyone experienced a massive nose dive in energy. We all needed sleep since we hadn't had a decent night's sleep in days. We hurried to choose our rooms and remove all the linens.We were exhausted, b

Lifting Mindy into my arms, I moved toward the stairs. Celia was right. There could be killers standing outside.If we'd learned anything in the past couple of months, it was that the world was filled with awful people who would do anything to get what they wanted.As I carried Mindy up the stairs, they pounded on the door again."Dada." Mindy struggled in my arms, reaching for Thomas.Shushing Mindy, I half-heartedly bounced her as I glanced back to find Thomas's wide eyes on us.Thomas covered his lips with one finger, instructing everyone to stay quiet.When I finally made it all the way upstairs, I whispered, "I'm up."Grant rushed past me to get down the stairs as Celia ran into her room with the puppy.Opening the door to my room, I discovered Suzie sitting on my bed, sobbing. Grant had come from a different room so I could only assume she never apologized, and I didn't have time to worry about it."Su, take Mindy. Someone's here."

Thomas was only gone for a minute before he came back into the dark room. "Der's sleeping. He must've passed out right after you left. I'll talk to him in the morning."I nodded a little too fast as I held back another sob. I had no right to cry since I'd caused this. I needed to try and make things right with Thomas.Wiping my cheeks, I stood. "I'm sorry. For everything."The emptiness in his expression broke my heart. Thomas walked to the window and moved the curtains aside, scouring the darkness. "Okay."Okay? What did that mean?"Is that all you have to say?" I needed to know if he wanted me to leave or stay. Yeah, I screwed everything up, but I didn't know if I was allowed to sleep here or if I needed to find a new room."Yep." Thomas didn't even make an effort to look at me.A new tear ran down my cheek. "I want to be with you, Thomas. I love you. What do you want me to do? I'll do anything."Thomas suddenly stalked toward me as his eyeb

Suzie POV    "I already said I'm sorry. You know I was having a hard time with everything." I whispered as Grant scanned the front yard."I know, but we're all having a hard time, Su." His voice was barely a whisper."I know." I waited for him to look at me, but he didn't.Grant carefully examined the tree line for biters through his scope. "Can we just not talk for a while? I'm tired and I need to check around back.""Yeah, okay." I sat back in the patio chair as Grant disappeared around the side of the wraparound porch.Since Derek's return several days ago, everything in my life had been flipped on its side, and it all started when I'd been an enormous jerk to Grant.We were allowed to have bad days, right? Well, that day had been mine and I was effing ashamed of how I acted. I was just sick of being scared all the time. When Grant and Thomas didn't come back, I'd nearly gone into hysterics,

Suzie POV    "There are so many. What are we gonna do?" I cradled my puppy tight to my chest, doing my best to shove the fear out of my thoughts. I'd never seen so many biters, which made it nearly impossible to keep my eyes forward.Grant glanced in the rearview mirror for the millionth time. "We'll take all the back roads and make sure they follow us far away from home. After we ditch them, we'll lay low until morning, and then we'll head back, okay?"He sounded confident in his plan, which made me feel a tiny bit better about our scary predicament. Grant's blue eyes connected with mine for the shortest moment before he lifted the middle console and motioned for me to move closer.Careful not to divert his focus from driving, I scooted over, pressing my shoulder to his firm bicep.Grant's attractive, toned body was one that all the girls loved. Over the past couple months, he'd grown taller while his m