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Ezra drops beside me. “Pepper. Pepper, look at me.”

“I’m looking.” Or trying to. There appear to be two of him. One is solid and frightened. The other flickers through the first like a damaged projection.

His hands hover above my face. “Where are you hurt?”

“Everywhere.”

His laugh breaks in the middle.

Behind him, a figure emerges through the fog. Black leather vest. Gun raised again.

“Ezra.”

He turns.

The Saint takes one step closer. “Move away from her.”

Ezra rises between us. His body flickers so badly I can see the trees through his ribs.

The Saint stops. Fear crosses his face before greed replaces it. “Doc wants both of you breathing.”

“Comforting,” Ezra says.

The gun shifts toward Ezra’s chest.

I reach for the field knife beneath my jacket. My right wrist works, but my ankle absolutely doesn’t.

The Saint moves closer. Fog rolls behind him, and a larger shape bursts through it.

Theo hits the man from the side. They crash into the cypress roots. The gun fires again. The shot disappears into the white.

Theo drives the Saint’s wrist into the ground until the weapon falls loose. He throws it into the channel, catches the back of the man’s vest, and slams him against the tree. “Stay down.”

The Saint swings blindly. Theo ducks and hits him once. The man drops.

Theo turns toward me. His face softens. “Pepper.”

He takes one step. Then stops. A limestone marker rises from the ground between us, the same first boundary marked on Josephine’s route instructions.

Theo is on the holding side. Ezra and I have fallen beyond it.

The fog curls around the stone as if the land has drawn the line itself.

Theo stares at the blood running down my face. Every part of him pulls toward me. His alpha scent tears through the fog, leather, bourbon, and terror so thick my omega tries to crawl to him.

He can’t cross.

I press one hand to the cut above my temple. Blood coats my fingers. Head wounds bleed a lot. That’s a scientific fact. Probably.

“I’m okay,” I call.

Theo makes a sound that says he doesn’t believe me.

Ezra kneels again. “You hit your head.”

“I noticed.”

“You’re bleeding everywhere.”