The Annihilator (Dark Verse #5)(39)

There was a street and one building, nothing more, and one car loitering. She recognized it as one of the complex security’s. They were patrolling, probably searching for her.
Pulling back into the shadows of the trees, turning to run again, she bumped into something hard.
Already dizzy from the weakness and dehydration and blood loss, she began to fall, her arms instinctively tightening around her bundled boy, just as two large hands clamped on her waist, steadying her.
“Easy, girl.”
At the sound of the voice, she tilted her neck up to see a tall man, probably in his late twenties, with mismatched eyes looking down at her. She'd never seen eyes like that on anyone.
“Help me,” she croaked through her dry throat, her weight leaning on him. “Help me, please.”
A visible shiver wracked his frame before he looked at her, properly looked at her.
“What do you need?” he asked, the seriousness of his tone making her feel a little more sure about her decision. She studied him as best as she could, an instinct within her telling her to trust him.
Lifting the bundle in her arms, she spoke. “Take him. Take him away from here, somewhere safe where he will grow up with love and care. Please. They’re coming for me, and he needs to be away when they find me. Please, please, please...”
The man’s mismatched eyes drifted to the baby swaddled in the thin blanket. “Is he yours?”
She nodded, her eyes tearing up again, the pain of giving him up a burden she would carry gladly for his chance at a better life.
The man stared at her then, deeper, so deep she felt he was searching her soul.
“You would trust me with your child?”
The question made her pause, but the instinct inside her, the one that had run with her baby in the first place, remained steady, unwavering.
Hugging her child one last time, she pressed a kiss to his forehead, her chin quivering, and handed him over to the man.
“I will trust you with him. But promise me—” she cried out as the pain in her insides increased, cutting off her words. She took a deep breath and continued. “Promise me you’ll keep him safe. If you can’t keep him, send him to someone who will love him. Promise me.”
Thunder rent the sky, rumbling loudly in the clouds, echoing her pain.
He held her son in the crook of his arms, his head tilted to the side as he stared at her with something close to fascination.
“I promise. He will be safe.”
Her knees buckled in relief and he wrapped an arm around her waist, holding her steady with one hand while holding her baby with another. The support of his strong arm broke her then. She began to sob hysterically into the chest of this strange man, holding onto the lapels of his jacket, crying for everything she was losing and the unexpected support she had found.
“What’s your name, flamma?” he asked her softly, and she looked up at him, surprised at the word he'd used, not knowing what he meant.
“Lyla.”
“Endless night.”
Is that what it meant? Endless night? Fuck if it didn't fit her life.
A shout from the woods made her straighten urgently.
“Please leave," she urged the stranger. "Take him. Now!”
Her eyes flitted to the round face peeking from the blankets, agony searing her as she leaned down to kiss his cheeks again, not knowing if she would ever see him again, not knowing what his fate would be but trusting the only choice she had.
“Be safe, little Xander," she murmured against his soft cheeks. "Be strong. Be loved, my beautiful baby.”
The man stayed still for a long second, watching her as she said her goodbye, before turning on his heel and walking into the darkness with the only thing she loved in the world.

PART THREE
Flames


"How can you become new if you haven't first become ashes?"—Friedrich Nietszche


Chapter eighteenLyla | Present Day


She jerked awake at the dream, her heart racing as thunder rumbled in the sky outside. She hated thunderstorms. As a child, they had scared her, and as an adult, they reminded her of the night she had lost her most precious gift—her son.
She had been close to eighteen when one of the men in the club had impregnated her, and though the child had been the result of a rape, it had been hers. She had spent months connecting to him, loving him, talking to him, and accepting that he would never know her. The night she had gone into labor, there had been a storm, and after hours of unimaginable pain, he had come screaming into the world.
The doctor had cleaned him up and swaddled him for her to feed, but she hadn’t. She had only seen the storm, known that most of the people on the grounds would be under shelter, and she had run.
Run straight into the arms of the man who would change both their lives.
After that night, she had never expected to see him again. But less than a week later, he had showed up at her work.
And again.
And again.
Until he became a fixture in her life, an anchor in the hurricane, a rock against the waves. Until he started leaving a trail of bodies of everyone who tried to hurt her. Until he claimed all the broken pieces of hers as his own.
She wondered why she had dreamed of their first meeting tonight. It could have been the storm, or the fact that he’d talked about Xander for the fist time, or the fact that he’d held her like he had that night. Whatever it was, need, pure, unadulterated need, overpowered her.
Unable to stand it any longer, she moved on silent feel to the door, going out and to the guest room, her heart pounding, but telling her it was right, the same instinct that had made her trust him all those years ago telling her to do it again.