“So I noticed. Just give me a minute, please.” When silence followed my request, I exhaled and braced myself for more pain. Just do it quickly. We needed to be out of the woods and out of sight before dawn, and we were running late already.

I closed my eyes and sucked in a deep breath, hoping against all logic that the rest of the floor would hold me. Then, since I couldn’t support my weight on my right arm, I stretched over my head, flat on the floor, and rolled to my left.

Wood dug into my arm like daggers as it slid through the hole. I screamed again. I couldn’t help it.

“Faythe!”

I lay on my back, breathing hard though I’d barely exerted myself, afraid to move lest the floor collapse beneath me. Marc’s footsteps came closer, and wood snapped, dull and heavy. “Damn it!” he whispered fiercely, and my eyes popped open.

“Don’t!” He’d broken the first rung of the ladder. The deer stand couldn’t take much more damage without collapsing, and I desperately didn’t want to be on it when that happened.

“Sorry.” Marc’s boots backed several steps away, and I made myself roll over carefully, avoiding even the briefest glimpse of my newly injured arm. It burned and felt cold at the same time, and I could barely stand the brush of my jacket sleeve against it. “Are you okay?”

“My arm feels pretty bad, but I’m not gonna look at it until I get down.” Because I was pretty sure that if it looked as bad as it felt, my brain would tell me I couldn’t climb down.

“Be careful.”

“I will. Look, just…don’t talk for a few minutes, so I can concentrate, okay? And catch this.” Without waiting for his response, I shoved the gallon bag off the edge of the platform.

Marc’s steps crunched forward. “Got it.” Then he was blessedly silent.

I blinked and inhaled deeply, then pushed myself onto my knees and elbows, busying my eyes in the search for more weak spots in the wood, so I couldn’t accidently look at my new wound.

But it was bad. I could tell from the strength of the scent of my own blood, and the pool of it I was now crawling through. I’d be light-headed soon, and I wanted to be safely on the ground before that happened.

I eased slowly toward the ladder, and after a few tense minutes found myself sitting on the edge of the deer stand. Marc stood in front of the ladder, with Jace at his side on all four paws. I could see them clearly thanks to my cat’s eyes, and the slight lightening of the sky as dawn approached.

Damn it! We needed to be halfway back to the car already.

I pushed that thought away and took another deep breath through my mouth. Then I twisted to lie on my stomach and put one foot on the third rung from the top. The next step was a bitch, even once I was sure the rung would hold me, because I couldn’t grip the ladder well enough with my casted right hand, and moving my fingers made my left arm explode in agony.

A whimper of pain escaped before I could lock it down, and Jace echoed the sound from below.

I stepped down again, and again gripped the bar, this time biting my still-bleeding lip to keep from crying out. So far, so good.

The next rung snapped beneath my foot.

Marc gasped. I screamed as my feet fell out from under me, and almost passed out from the agony in my left arm. I hung from it, my life dependent on a grip weakened by my shredded flesh.

“Let go,” Marc said. “Let go and I’ll catch you.”

“No.” I was too high. My body twisted, and my feet scrambled for the nearest rung, but it had been broken before we arrived, and the next hung a full foot below my feet.

“Faythe. Let go.”

I glanced down at Marc, and if I’d seen fear in his eyes, I couldn’t have done it. But I saw only confidence. If he said he could catch me, he could catch me. It was as simple as that.

So I closed my eyes and let go.

My hair blew back from my face as I fell. My cast broke through two more rungs, each impact reverberating in my broken wrist. My right foot slammed into the side of the ladder, and the blow radiated up my leg. Then I landed hard in Marc’s arms.

He staggered beneath the impact, but didn’t fall.

I clung to him and didn’t even try to stop the tears. Screw being strong. I could be strong and hurt at the same time, right?

Because daaamn, I hurt.

Marc set me on the ground, and I caught his quick glance to the east. The sun would be up in an hour, and if anyone had gone for an early morning run, my screams had probably been heard.

He met Jace’s gaze and tossed his head toward Malone’s property. Jace nodded as his ears swiveled in that direction, on alert for any suspicious sounds.

“Let me see your arm.” Marc knelt next to me, and I was glad all over again that he’d already mastered the partial Shift. Without it, he couldn’t have gotten much of a look, because without our usual emergency trunk kit, we didn’t have a flashlight.

I held my arm out straight, sniffing back more sobs as he carefully pulled my jacket off. I got my first look the same time he did.

“Oh, fuck,” Marc whispered, and Jace turned to look. He whined in either sympathy or horror, but I was speechless. That couldn’t be my arm. That piece of raw meat hanging from my elbow bore no resemblance to the forearm I’d had minutes earlier. Broken wood couldn’t do that much damage. It wasn’t possible.

A jagged section of the broken deer stand floor had ripped the side of my left forearm open from wrist to elbow, where my coat sleeve had bunched up, protecting the rest of my flesh. The muscle was exposed, and the whole thing was slick with blood.