DEMI
By breakfast, the lie I had sent Hannah looked less like mercy and more like evidence. One bright thumbs-up and one tiny yellow bandage emoji had tried to cover an empty fridge, a stolen drop, and a forest that had gone silent while I hunted through it. Every time I blinked, I saw the open lid beneath the fallen pine, the useless cold packs, and the claw mark scored into plastic. Someone had found the blood before me. Someone—or something—had been near those caves, close enough to make the night feel watched long after I ran.
I could have called her before dawn and told her the rest: the fur under my fingers, the warm blood on my tongue, the disgust crawling up my throat every time I swallowed. I could have admitted that panic had started whispering Demetrius’s name, tempting me
