Lead Me Home (Fight for Me #3)(17)

Those lips pursed in that wild, impassioned way.

The girl who saw too much.

Too clearly. “I’m not coming back here after work. I only agreed to one night. You know I can’t stay here, Ollie.”

I didn’t ask why. Both of us knew the answer to that. It still didn’t mean I was relenting.

Hot air puffed from my nostrils, the same anger from last night slithering beneath the surface of my skin. “It’s not safe out there, Nikki.”

Didn’t matter that she was all the way across the room. I could still feel the weight of her eyes searching me.

I itched beneath it. Tried to shield myself from that feeling that slammed and pulsed and moved.

“What are you going to do, Ollie? Keep me here so you can keep me safe from all the horrible things that happen in this world? Why now? What changed?”

“Are you joking? Some asshole broke into your house. That changed.”

“It wasn’t a big deal.”

“Wasn’t it?”

That storm rumbled in the depth of me. A warning. The quake of an omen that ran the length of my spine.

Maybe it was because of the anniversary of Sydney disappearing was inching closer.

But the dreams had become almost unbearable.

Intense.

Vivid.

Every morning, it left me with this gut-deep intuition that something was coming.

Something wicked.

“Just . . . have this bad feeling, okay?” I admitted, nothing but a fool.

I needed to keep my mouth shut.

Put a padlock on what I was feeling.

She took a step forward like she could reach me from across the space. “It’s been fourteen years, Ollie.”

I stepped back.

Away.

Headed for my room because I couldn’t look at her for a second longer without completely losing it. I shouted over my shoulder as I banged into my room, “Be ready in fifteen. This isn’t up for discussion.”





8





Ollie





Ten Years Old





“This is a bad idea,” Ollie whispered.

If their daddy found out about this, he’d have Ollie’s hide.

Sydney grinned. “Are you scared, Ollie Jollie?”

“Course, I’m not scared. This is just stupid.”

A frown pinched his sister’s brow. “What do you mean, stupid? This is a pact. And a pact means forever. There isn’t anything stupid about that.”

Nikki shifted beside him where the three of them sat at the back of their yard, their knees touching where they sat in the moonlight beneath the pour of the moon.

He looked that way.

She smiled. Softly. With a tip of her head.

Something tightened in is chest. Tightened in his stomach. She looked like a fairy with those big purple eyes.

Unreal.

So perfect she had to be fake.

“It’s a pact, Ollie. Forever,” Nikki said, like she was trying to get him to understand.

Forever.

He swallowed hard and picked up the knife Sydney had sneaked out of the kitchen. He turned his hand over to reveal his palm, pushing the tip into his skin.

He sliced a shallow cut into his flesh.

He bit his tongue, trying to pretend it didn’t sting.

“Does it hurt?” Sydney asked, scrambling to get closer to watch the droplets of red bead in his palm, interest and awe in her expression.

“Not much.” He glanced between the two of them. “You sure you want to do this?”

“Yes!” Sydney giggled, biting her bottom lip, always too excited for her own good. She was always racing off, getting them in trouble because she refused to listen.

Never being bad but never following the rules, either.

And Ollie had promised his mom and dad that he would make sure she did.

He was pretty sure this was breaking that promise in a bad way.

Sydney took the knife and held out her hand, counting under her breath, “One, two, three.” She squeezed her eyes shut when she made the slice. Then she giggled wildly. “I did it!”

She held up her hand as proof.

“Your turn,” she said, handing the knife off to Nikki.

Nikki’s teeth grabbed on her bottom lip. Ollie could feel her getting nervous next to him.

He always could.

Knew she was gonna be scared before she even knew it herself.

“You don’t have to do this,” he encouraged her, barely tapping her knobby knee with the pads of his fingers.

“I want to,” she whispered back, but her words shook. She looked at him, a plea on her face. “Do it for me?”

“I won’t know if it hurts.”

“Yes, you will. You’d never hurt me.”

He hesitated before he took the knife. She was right. He’d never hurt her.

Sydney took Nikki’s opposite hand while Ollie took the other, holding the tip of the knife to her palm.

Nikki sucked in a shaky breath, and Sydney squeezed her hand. “Fly, fly dragonfly.”

Nikki’s lips moved silently when she repeated Sydney’s words. “Fly, fly dragonfly.”

Ollie slipped the knife across her palm.

Nikki flinched then smiled, holding up her hand in her own kind of awe as she watched the tiny line of red bubble up.