Prologue
The first thing Mica noticed was the smell.
Gasoline. Burning rubber. Blood.
Her eyes fluttered open to a world turned upside down. The car lay on its side, half-submerged in the creek, icy water seeping through the shattered windows and soaking her clothes. Rain hammered against the mangled metal outside.
Pain crashed over her like a wave. A sharp cry tore from her throat as she tried to move, the seatbelt cutting into her chest like a blade, holding her suspended in the wreckage.
Everything hurt.
Everything was dark.
"Mica?"
Reese's voice was hoarse, ragged. Alive.
She turned her head, vision swimming, and saw him hanging from his own seatbelt, blood streaking down his forehead. For one fragile second, relief flooded her.
"Reese," she whispered.
His eyes met hers, then widened with panic.
"Sabrina!"
He began thrashing against the belt. "Sabrina!"
The raw terror in his voice sent ice down Mica's spine.
She forced herself to look toward the driver's seat.
Jensen wasn't moving.
His neck was bent at an impossible angle, his eyes open but unseeing.
No.
A strangled sob escaped her as she pressed a trembling hand over her mouth. Dead. He was dead.
"Mica!" Reese shouted, still fighting his seatbelt. "Where's Sabrina?!"
She didn't know.
The night had been wrong from the start, tense silences, sharp words, the kind of heavy atmosphere that made everyone sit rigid in their seats. Then the rain, the spinning tires, the screams, and the sickening impact.
Her fingers fumbled desperately with her seatbelt until it finally released. She dropped hard onto the crumpled door, pain exploding through her leg. She ignored it.
They had to get out.
Together, she and Reese clawed their way through the broken window, glass slicing her palms. The cold night air slapped her awake as they stumbled onto the muddy bank.
The car was destroyed. Twisted metal and shattered glass everywhere.
A low groan came from the back. Cory. They dragged him out, unconscious and bleeding. Maybelline was beside him, pale and barely breathing, but alive.
Alive.
Mica's heart hammered with fragile hope.
Then Reese's voice cut through the rain again, broken and desperate.
"Where's Sabrina?"
The silence that followed was deafening.
They searched the darkness, calling her name until their voices cracked. Flashlight beams from a distant phone cut through the trees.
Reese stopped suddenly.
Mica nearly collided with his back.
He wasn't breathing.
She followed his gaze.
And the world shattered.
Sabrina lay at the base of a tree, her blonde hair fanned out like a halo in the mud. A jagged branch protruded from her chest. Her eyes were open, wide, vacant, staring at nothing.
For one endless heartbeat, no one moved.
Then Reese broke.
A guttural howl tore from his throat as he dropped to his knees beside her, pulling her lifeless body into his arms. His sobs were violent, animal, shaking his entire frame.
"No... no, baby, please... wake up. Sabrina, wake up!"
He rocked her, begging, pleading, his hands stained with her blood.
Mica's legs gave out. The ground rushed up to meet her as her vision blurred and tilted. She could still hear him, his broken cries, the way he whispered Sabrina's name like a prayer.
This was the night that would ruin them all.
The darkness swallowed her whole, Reese's anguished voice echoing in her ears as everything faded to black.
.....
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