Read Online The Three by Meghan O'Brien - Free Book Online

glance. “Yeah. Your man over there worked up my appetite, kicking my ass.”
    The corner of Kael’s mouth twitched in amusement. “I don’t know. You got a couple of good hits in there. I think my belly is going to ache all day.”
    “As long as you don’t blame breakfast,” Elin said playfully.

    Anna chuckled, dropping down to sit beside the fire. “It looks great,” she said, as Elin spooned breakfast into the plastic bowls they carried with them. Rabbit again, and fresh vegetables they’d snagged from a field. “You know, maybe if Kael gets good enough with that bow, we could have deer for dinner sometime.”
    Kael lifted his head. “That would be awesome.” He shot her a smile full of grateful wonder. “You’re right. I bet I could totally do that.”
    Elin frowned. “But deer are so cute.”
    “And tasty,” Anna said, sharing a knowledgeable nod with Kael.
    Elin scowled. “Well, I’m not cleaning it.”
    “That’s fine. I’ve got to be good for something around here. Kael can shoot it, I can clean it, and you can enjoy the fruits of our labors.”
    “Because we love you,” Kael said.
    Anna gave Elin a serious nod. “It’s true.”
    Elin handed Kael his bowl, and Anna hers, then picked up her fork with a resigned sigh. “All right. Go kill your deer. You boys,” she said, and turned to Anna, “and warriors…I’ll never understand you.”
    By instinct, Anna turned to share a conspiratorial grin with Kael. As their eyes met, she saw recognition in his, the knowledge of what she was thinking, and he opened his gaze to her, truly, for the first time since she had known him. She read such depth of emotion, such sorrow and quiet empathy, that her heart momentarily stopped in her chest. They both broke their gaze then, turning to listen to Elin as she launched into a story about the book she was reading.
    She was living it again. That day.
    She saw the blue sky, smelled the acrid smoke as their belongings burned. She heard the screams of the women who were being attacked and captured by the large group of men who had raided their community.
    She felt the thrum of combat in the ground beneath her feet. The fighters of her tribe were locked in a fierce struggle with men carrying weapons. There were more than twenty of the raiders.
    She was one of only nine trying to protect her people. She carried a wooden baseball bat. It was the only weapon she had ever used in training. She gripped it with her right hand, so hard that her knuckles turned white with tension. Next to her, Pete Jamison grunted as a bearded man thrust a long blade into his gut.
    Scared blue eyes found hers as the light went out of them.
    She was overtaken, not killed. One blow to the back of her head that drove her to her knees, then a backhanded punch across the face that sent her to the ground. She didn’t even recall being moved away from the fighting.
    The sky was so blue. It was the first thing she saw when she regained consciousness. Blue sky, tree branches and leaves above her. Then a sneering face looking down at her with an ugly grin, and then another one. She closed her eyes, cold fear clutching at her belly. She knew what was going to happen.
    She thought she could endure it, stoic and silent. She was wrong.
    Anna jerked awake with a panicked gasp, cold sweat beaded on her hairline. She half-sat in her sleeping bag, caught somewhere between waking and dreaming. Nightmare images merged with reality for a long moment, pulling her eyes to the surrounding trees in a desperate scan for enemies. The breath she’d been holding escaped from her mouth in a pathetic whimper, a foreign noise that shocked her into awareness.
    Elin knelt beside her. “You’re awake?” she whispered.
    It took Anna a beat to nod. “I hope so.”
    “Do you want some water?”
    “Please,” she croaked, embarrassed.
    Elin crawled away, then returned with a canteen of water. She gave it to Anna and scooted over to sit with her on her sleeping