I could hear them behind me, laughing cruelly. I tried not to think of what they’d do if they caught me, but I was in panic mode. I had no idea where I was going. Such was my indiscretion that I didn’t realize the dead end until it was upon me.

A tall fence, unscalable. I felt like it was laughing at me, laughing like the evil, leonine, lustful boys on my heels.

“Don’t worry, girl,” said one of them right behind me. “We’re just here for a good time.”

“Just leave me alone!” I shrieked, backing up against the fence. Why, god, why did I let Bree talk me into wearing this bikini?

Now they were upon me, surrounding me. I could feel their breath against my face, smell the beer on it. I winced, tried to turn from them, but they were everywhere.

“Shhh,” said one, resting his finger on my lip. I jerked away. “Like we said, we’re just having a little fun.”

“Yeah,” echoed the blonde one. I felt his eyes crawling up my body, touching me with his lecherous gaze. “A little bit of fun.”

For a split second, time seemed to slow to a stop. It seemed as though all sound had been sucked out of the world, and we were in a vacuum.

And then, like a light coming on, all three of their faces contorted, melting from expressions of lust and amusement into abject terror.

One grabbed his hair and ripped it out in large, painful chunks. Another dragged his fingernails down his face. The third fell to the ground, ramming his forehead into the pavement.

“No!” he screamed. “Nooooooo!!”

I was at first too stunned to react, or to even think. Soon all three of them were on the ground, abusing themselves, shrieking incoherently. The effects of the alcohol were still on me, as well as the terror from my sprint from the horny wolf pack. My mind was in a haze until I looked up, and there he was.

Riley.

It might have been the alcohol, but I could swear his piercing green eyes were glowing, and I knew. He was doing this. He was doing this to these guys, just like he had done it to Travis at the pool party.

And he had saved me.

Overwhelmed, I began to collapse, and suddenly he was there next to me, catching me. Just like at Henrietta’s, it was as though he moved space and time, stepped right through it, or stopped it so that he could effortlessly cross that distance in a split second to catch my fall. Insignificant, stupid, drunk me, collapsing because of a situation that I alone had gotten myself into. I had no one to blame for them coming after me but myself. I knew that. Riley had to have known it.

But he caught me anyway.

“Riley,” I whispered.