Page 73 of Rogue & Her Hunters

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Alarms are blaring. Crimson lights flare like hellfire.

“I can hear the guards behind us,” Bird whispers, urgently. “Do you know the passcode?”

I can hear the guards too.

Our escape is being covered by the din from the cells. The Rogues’ rioting is delaying the guards, who are confused about what’s going on.

Are the other Rogues deliberately helping us?

I pull out the key and slip it into the lock in the steel side door.

Then I take a deep breath, before I punch in the code.

Let it work.

Bird’s shoulder touches mine. “This is it. Please…”

The door swings open.

CHAPTER TEN

Houndfall Forest

Istumble through the oaks and hickories of Houndfall Forest, gritting my teeth against the waves of exhaustion that are threatening to drag me under.

Yet I battle against them.

If I give in and curl underneath these pale, skeleton trees, then I’ll be buried underneath the next snowfall and become a skeleton myself.

If I don’t find shelter before the freezing night falls, then it won’t matter that I’ve been running for miles into this dense forest from the ABO Facility without the guards capturing me, I’ll die.

More importantly, the Omega who is wheezing and struggling to keep up even at my reduced pace will also die.

And that’s not acceptable.

I push myself to run harder, despite the screaming muscles in the back of my thighs.

The forest is silent.

The earthy scent is familiar to me. I have trained in forests like this with my instructors many times.

In my teenage years, I spent long weekends dropped in the mountain forests with nothing but a knife, left to scavenge and survive, despite the dangers of bears…or because of them.

I have hunted targets through forests in worse conditions than this.

Yet most of my time was spent trapped inside a basement, business rooms, or penthouses as a bodyguard.

And now, I am here as the prey.

I bare my teeth. My breath puffs out in mists in front of me.

Bird’s rasping gasps sound painful.

I squint up at the gray clouds through the bars of thick branches above.

It’s going to snow soon.

Too soon.

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