Fragile Sanctuary (Sparrow Falls Book 1)

It wasn’t a sound that woke me, it was a feeling. A thumping inside my skull like my pulse lived there and only there.

I tried to open my eyes but couldn’t quite get them to obey. It was as if they were glued in place. Confusion swept through me. That shouldn’t be possible.

Trying harder, I finally got them to flutter. I was blinking so fast, the images filling my vision looked like they were bathed in strobe lights.

Nausea swept through me, whether from my weird vision or the fact that I had some sort of migraine; I wasn’t sure.

I tried to slow my breathing, inhaling through my nose and out through my mouth. I tried opening my eyes again, slower this time. As my surroundings came into clearer view, I stopped breathing altogether.

I was lying on charred flooring surrounded by the remnants of what looked like some sort of burned-out cabin. The only thing left of it were pieces of framing. Everything else had been burned away. Even pieces of the floor revealed a drop-off into nothing but the darkness of a basement below.

None of it was familiar. Not the structure itself or the forests beyond it. That simple fact had my heart rate speeding up as I struggled to sit.

The moment I pushed up, a wave of dizziness swept over me, bringing nausea flaring back to life. I lifted my fingers to my head and winced as I connected with a lump. Pulling my hand back, I saw flecks of dried blood there.

Crap. What the hell happened?

I searched my memory. Flashes of the day came back to me. Forcing Anson out the door to go to work. Getting ready for lunch with Fallon. Walking out to meet her⁠—

My spine jerked straight as I remembered. Deputy Rolston. All the blood. My stomach pitched as I swallowed back bile. But the memories kept coming. That voice, something about it so achingly familiar but not exact. Then the pain. The falling.

I clambered to my feet, the world swaying around me.

Shit, shit, shit.

I reached out, grabbing for something to hold, anything. My palm hit rough wood, and I gripped it hard. Splinters pierced my palm, but I didn’t give a damn. I needed to stay upright. There was no way I could sustain another hit to the head without passing out.

Slowly, the dizziness faded, and the world came back into focus around me. But I had to blink to make sure that what I was seeing was real. It shouldn’t have been. It was a photo of me that looked to be from high school or college given the haircut. I was working at the nursery but caught in a moment of laughter, my head tipped back and hair tumbling around me.

I swallowed hard and began scanning the space with new eyes. It wasn’t the only photo. There were countless images. My stomach hollowed out.

This wasn’t happening. Maybe if I believed that deeply enough, I could alter my reality and transport myself to early this morning so I could redo everything.

I picked my way through the rubble of the house to the next photo, careful to avoid the places where the floor had fallen away. This shot was more recent. I was working in the garden at the guest cottage, my hands deep in the dirt. I could tell from the grainy quality that all of them had been taken with some sort of zoom lens—one that enabled whoever it was to invade my privacy with the press of a button.

But it couldn’t have been Felix. Not if I was here now.

That thought had my gaze whipping around. No one was with me. Not a single soul. But I also didn’t know where the hell I was. The trees were too thick for me to get a good sense of direction, but being lost in the woods would be better than being at the mercy of some creepy psycho.

I hurried toward what looked like it had once been an entrance to the home, but as I reached the threshold, I came up short. The photo there was from many years ago.

It was me in shorts and a tank top at the river. I was among friends, and Emilia was with us. I remembered that day. She’d begged me to come, and Fallon and I had finally given in. She’d had the time of her life.

My eyes burned as I reached out to touch the image. To touch her.

“It’s always been you.” A voice cut through the quiet from behind me. I stiffened, my muscles turning to cement. “Even back then. You saw me when no one else did.”

I turned so slowly, like I was moving through quicksand. Because it couldn’t be. His dark, shaggy hair was swept across his eyes as he looked at me with what could only be called reverence. “Silas?” I croaked.