Saving Verakko (Clecanian #3) - Victoria Aveline Page 0,2

enough for me.” The woman held out her hand. “I’m Alejandra. You can call me Alex.”

“Lily,” she replied and gripped the outstretched hand. She turned back to the woods and stared into the darkness, limbs itching to move even as her mind urged her to turn back. This is gonna be fucking awful.

***

“Motherfu—” Lily stifled a curse as yet another thorn stabbed through the flimsy soles of her flats. They were bright red, snug, and had cute leather ankle straps that chafed. She glared down at them and decided against tearing off the straps. Although painful, they at least kept her shoes from flopping off. The worst possible shoes for a daring escape. Well, maybe not the worst, Lily thought, picturing her favorite pair of strappy, royal-blue stiletto sandals from her closet.

Their trek so far had reminded Lily why she now hated the great outdoors. City sidewalks never tore up her feet. Manicured window boxes didn’t scratch at her face or pull at her hair like these twigs. If she were back in Portland, all she’d have to do to get where she wanted was call an Uber. She wiped the sweat off her forehead with her sleeve. A nice, air-conditioned Uber.

They’d been walking for what felt like hours through the increasingly dark forest, and Lily had begun to doubt herself more and more. Everything was so different. Where she’d expected thick undergrowth, there was only damp moss. It didn’t make sense. The air was heavy and saturated, as it would be if she were cutting through a thick jungle, but their path was clear save for the trees. A crisp, astringent scent hung in the air, undercut with a sweet, minty aroma so unlike the deep, earthy scents of most forests on Earth.

What kind of canopies overlapped like this? Lily glared up at the large, round leaves of the trees blocking most of the light. She’d been in forests all over Earth, but she’d never encountered a place like this. All the survival skills in the world would be useless if she couldn’t see what she was doing. Is it time to call it quits?

“Maybe we should stop for the night?” Alex panted behind her.

Lily placed her hand on her hips and turned back, breathing deeply. “I’m worried we’re still too close. If more aliens arrive and the other women tell them where we went, they might come after us.”

Alex leaned against a tree and clutched her side. “We’ve been walking nonstop for hours!”

“Yes, but we’ve been moving at a snail’s pace. You saw how fast that guy ran.” Lily let out a huff and took in their surroundings once again. Rustling from the treetops to her right drew her gaze, but she couldn’t make out much in the dim light. Unease lifted the hair on the back of her neck. They’d need to find shelter soon. “You’re right, though. We can’t keep trying to hike like this. Let’s just go a little farther. We need to gather dry branches and kindling anyway.”

“Okay. Okay. Just give me a minute to catch my breath.” Alex sank to the ground and tilted her head back against a tree. “Where are you from?”

That was always a difficult question for Lily to answer. Her upbringing had been…interesting, to say the least. She wasn’t from anywhere, not really. “Right now, I live in Portland,” she said without elaborating.

“Cool. I’m from SoCal.”

Lily was relieved to see Alex’s breathing slowly become more even. The rough days ahead would be a hundred times harder if she wasn’t in shape. Lily took the pause to sit and catch her own breath. She squinted to her right at an odd vine that appeared frayed at the end.

“Do you think they did a West-Coast grab or something?”

“Could be,” Lily answered, half paying attention. She forced herself not to reach out and inspect the vine until she could examine it in daylight. Might not be a vine at all. She cringed.

“What do you think they want with us?”

“No idea.” To be honest, Lily hadn’t spent too much time thinking about her abduction. Her parents had always trained her to focus on one problem at a time when in a survival situation. Expending mental energy worrying about the past, when she should be keeping her mind focused on their safety, was dangerous. For now, it didn’t matter how or why she’d been taken. What mattered was how they could make it until tomorrow.

In the dim light, Lily witnessed Alex roll her eyes