Page 1 of Dreadful

ONE

BELLAMY

“Do you trust me?”

The warehouse air sticks to my skin—salt, gasoline, rusted metal, something damp rotting somewhere deep in the walls. Water drips steadily from the rafters high above us, each soft plink stretching the silence thinner.

Rafe stands a few feet in front of me with his wrists zip-tied together, his posture loose like none of this is getting under his skin. Like he didn't just tell me he loved me in the middle of an abandoned warehouse.

Like I didn't set him up—like he didn't let me.

Fuck.

He could’ve stopped this. That’s the part I can’t stop thinking about.

Rafe Calloway could’ve snapped those zip ties before Lola even finished tightening them. Could’ve taken the gun from me the second I pulled it from the back of my jeans and walked out of this warehouse before any of us got stupid enough to stay.

Instead, he let me point a gun at him while my hands shook. He let Lola restrain him. And he told me he fucking loved me. Which is the best and worst part of this entire mess.

Because I don't deserve it.

The weight of that settles heavier in my chest with every second we wait.

Rafe’s gaze drags slowly over my face, steady enough to make my stomach tighten. Then he lifts one brow slightly, the faintest smile touching his mouth. “Baby.”

Four letters. That’s all it takes for my pulse to stumble.

I close the distance between us before my brain catches up, my shoes scraping softly across the concrete floor. Heat rolls off him immediately, familiar and grounding in a way that feels dangerous right now. For half a second, I almost forget where we are.

I almost lean in—almost press my mouth against his. But the warehouse groans around us, metal creaking somewhere overhead, and reality crashes back in hard enough to make my lungs tighten.

I force myself to stop inches away. “Trust me,” I murmur, softer this time. My breath trembles anyway.

Something unreadable shifts behind Rafe’s eyes then. (xxx make sure he doesn't say anything here)

Behind us, motorcycle engines grow louder. The sound rolls through the air in waves, engines rumbling low enough to vibrate the ground.

I love you.

The words reverberate through me with every beat of my heart, rattling around my ribcage hard enough to make it difficult to breathe. My pulse is too loud in my ears, feels too fast in my veins. Sweat beads along the back of my neck despite the cool breeze bleeding through the busted out windows.

“Get on your knees.” Rafe doesn’t look away from me. “Please, Rafe.”

The side of his mouth curls into a smirk as he slowly lowers himself to the ground. “You don't need to beg me to get me on my knees, baby.”

Every instinct in my body is screaming at me to move, to rethink this, to come up with a different plan before the Widowmakers come through those doors and this turns into something none of us can come back from. Lola and I spent nearly the entire night trying—and failing—to figure out a different way.

I fucking failed.

I love you.

Tears prick my eyes as his confession embeds itself deeper every second, settling beneath my skin and somewhere even worse—down into the muscle and bone, where I know it’s going to scar.

And I don’t know if I can leave him like this.

I’m just not entirely sure how I’m supposed to get everyone out of this warehouse alive.

I step halfway in front of him, angling my body so my shoulder cuts across his chest. Behind me, the grip of Rafe's gun digs into the small of my back where I tucked it, a cold reminder against my spine every time I breathe. High above us, somewhere in the dark lattice of catwalks, metal ticks quietly under shifting weight. I resist the urge to send my sister a warning glare.