When Anna woke, it was still early, the light in the room murky. Garrick was wrapped around her, his legs tucked under her knees, broad chest pressed to her back. His hands were gentle paws resting heavy at her waist, his exhalation tickling the nape of her neck. She lay motionless, soaking in the moment.

This is what safety feels like.

It cocooned her, blotting out everything else. A chink of grey light spread out across the floor in front of them. The world had still gone to hell, but this morning she was different. Garrick wanted her. All of her.

With him, I can let go.

Thoughts fluttered through her brain, flighty and unsure of themselves as they danced in the light.

Garrick.

His presence soaked into her shoulders and spine even as his name reverberated and echoed in her mind. She’d done things with him she’d never done before, surprising herself at what she wanted. For the first time, she had been with a man and hadn’t held back. Was it because the world was blown to hell, or was it him? She trailed her hand along the thigh that pressed into hers. Soft hairs curled under her palm.

She’d always kept a piece of herself safe from other men. With Garrick, for some reason, it was different. Something within him resonated for her. He mumbled and stirred. She took one last deep breath of this perfect moment and then rolled over. His eyes were wide open.

“Hey.”

She met his gaze, unashamed after the rawness of the night before.

He slid a finger under her chin, running his thumb along her lower lip. Stormy eyes locked with hers, seeing to the very bottom of her soul. She was powerless to resist anything they asked of her. He swept loose hair from her forehead.

She reached for him, her lips crushing his, her tongue playing along the edge of his mouth, teasing him. Fiercely, he kissed her back.

Finally, they separated, his kiss leaving her breathless.

“All I want to do is lie here with you and drink you all in.” His finger traced down her neck, across her collarbone, and between the swell of her breasts. With a sigh, his eyes flicked up to hers. “But we need to get going. We can’t afford to waste daylight.”

She withdrew from him with a nod, responding to his practical tone. “Yes.” With an effort, she pushed the jumble of thoughts and emotions rattling in her brain back into the dusky recesses where they couldn’t distract her. If there was one thing she was good at, it was being practical and dealing with the task at hand.

* * *

After a dry breakfast of survival biscuits from her pack, she quickly repacked her few belongings, aware of the tenderness of her thighs as she bent and stretched. She massaged the sensitive muscles, happy for the reminder that last night had not been a dream.

She insisted on dressing his wound before they left, even though the gouges were not deep, unabashedly enjoying a last few moments standing close to him and breathing in his scent of leather and oil.

As they headed for the entrance, they passed the shower rooms, and Anna lagged behind, giving them one last wistful look. She had no idea when she’d next have the opportunity to have a hot shower. Or be naked with Garrick in one.

When they reached the main door, Garrick went to scout outside for Chittrix activity while Anna rechecked their weapons. The pulse rifle was still almost fully charged thanks to Julia’s tweaking with the power source. Anna ran her hands across the weapon, murmuring a small prayer for Julia and Blake to be safe. A noise behind the door interrupted her and Garrick appeared, his face calm.

“We’re good to go,” he said, extending an arm to help her over the rubble the Chittrix had created as it battered its way through the doorway. He guided her down the other side, his palm in the small of her back.

Outside, the day was bright. Clouds scudded across the sky overhead, but the blue open expanse was free of Chittrix. Anna inhaled, her eyes shut, savouring the freshness without the presence of any alien invaders to sour the moment. Her lungs filled with clean, damp air still heavy with the scent of rain. When she opened her eyes again, Garrick was removing folded paper from his back pocket.

It was a map.

He pressed it flat on his thigh, tracing the route they needed to take with his finger. She watched him in silence, working out their route.

“Oh, so you do have a map?”

He cocked an eyebrow.

Anna raised one right back at him.

She pointed at the crumpled paper. “What are the red and yellow shaded areas?”

“Areas with high Chittrix and Scutter activity. Those are the bits we need to avoid.”

She peered over his shoulder. “That’s a lot of red and yellow.”

Garrick grunted an affirmative.

“We should get out of London today. We’ll roughly follow the A30, heading for the M3. We need to go in the direction of Basingstoke.” His voice was confident. His grey eyes intense in the morning sun. “It’s still a lot of walking.”

Anna stared back, her eyes challenging him. Without a word, she hoisted her backpack and started to walk. Checking over her shoulder, he was stuffing the map into his trouser pocket.

“Let’s go,” she shouted, waving him on.

Garrick shook his head and jogged up to her, cuffing her gently across the back of the head as he settled in beside her, matching her pace.

* * *

According to her watch they had only been on the move for two hours, but it felt never ending to Anna. The sun had disappeared, and the unrelenting grey-white of the sky began to blend into the desolate, destroyed buildings. Drifts of litter swirled against her feet as she stumbled and trudged her way through the debris of the abandoned capital. They cut down one-track roads between dirty, sullen reservoirs as they continued to head west. Overgrown grass banks rose up, encompassing them as they navigated between the flat expanses of water.

She observed the strange plant life beginning to establish itself in the pavements and cracks in the road. Congested, crumpled vines laden with purple blooms silently strangled lamp posts and shattered brick work. In the shadows, squat, fern-like things trembled when they passed, sensing live prey.

Garrick walked in front of her. Long, easy loping strides that covered the ground effortlessly and at a pace that had her trotting at times to keep up. He kept glancing over his shoulder, making sure she was still there. His eyes blazed right to the core of her whenever he did, making her stomach flip with anticipation.

When he finally stopped, she wasn’t paying attention. Her mind had begun to wander as she matched his pace, her eyes straying from the path of rubble and weeds. Mindlessly, she had allowed herself to become distracted, watching the effortless motion of Garrick’s back as he walked, and she crashed right into him. His feet might as well have been cemented to the ground. She bounced off him, stilling instantly as he turned to face her, tight lines of anxiety running from his eyes to his mouth.

“What?” The words froze in her throat.

He glanced from side to side, scanning the street. Anna followed, moving so her back was against his.

“There’s nothing—”

As if summoned by her words, a shot rang out.

“That’s close.” The words fell from her mouth in surprise. Too close.

Shit. She’d been absorbed in her own world, daydreaming about Garrick and the night before, not paying attention.

Garrick grabbed her free hand without warning and broke into a run. He cut right, dropping down a side alley. The ground under their feet began to slope. Given the proximity of the reservoirs, they were most likely heading towards the Thames.

There were voices now, shouts and cursing behind her. One rang out louder than the others, his nasal voice rising over the general melee. “Here. This way!” Spencer.

She didn’t dare look back. Garrick’s hand clutched hers as he pulled her fast down the narrow gap. They exploded out onto hardcore which cut sharply off the street they were on and descended to the dirty river.

More yelling behind them, louder now. Glass breaking. Garrick glanced past her, his eyes sharp, assessing everything. As much as the roar of voices behind were freaking her out, his eyes remained confident, fully in charge of the situation.

They skidded to a halt on the dockside. To their left, a pedestrian bridge spanned the river, a broken mass of tension wires and twisted metal. The far side of the water was at least thirty feet away. Between them and the opposite bank, the Thames churned, black and dirty, slick with grey scum.

“Down,” he commanded.

He pulled her over to the grass verge that fell twenty feet to the oily water below. The voices were getting closer. Anna risked a glance back over her shoulder as Garrick tumbled down onto the grass. As he pulled her with him, men burst out from one of the adjoining alleyways.

Her heart skipped a beat.

Spencer led the group and his gaze collided with hers, a sneer splitting his face. Then he disappeared from view as she dropped lower down the grass verge.

“Same scavengers,” she gasped as she concentrated on not falling head over tail down the steep slope. She leant heavily on Garrick’s forearm as she descended; his arm solid as a rock under her.

As she grasped at the leafless branches of a small, stunted bush for balance, the ground next to her exploded. Mud and leaves rained on her head and slipped down the back of her shirt.

Shit. They’re shooting at us.

Garrick’s hand tightened on hers, and he yanked her faster, so fast she began to lose her footing. Earth and plants detonated around her. Anna screamed, but her cry was lost in the shriek and thud of bullets dismembering the soil. Rocks and stones appeared out of nowhere under her feet, wrenching her ankles and throwing her off balance.

Her feet twisted out from under her and she fell hard, her shoulder connecting with the wet grass in an excruciating, stabbing sensation as she rolled. Garrick’s hand was wrenched from her grasp, her fingers clutching at the thin air where he had been only moments before.

Anna barrelled downwards, her momentum unstoppable. Her arms flailed as she tried to stop herself, but she clutched only at wet mud, pulling free irregular clods of earth and stones and doing nothing to stop her crashing descent to the grey water below. Her teeth snapped together, triggering a sharp bloom of pain followed by the coppery taste of her own blood.

Garrick shouted. “Anna!”

He was nowhere to be seen. The world was a dizzying blur of brown and green as she hurtled out of control. Her legs skated against the grass, searching for purchase. Dirt rammed under her fingernails and up the cuffs of her sleeves.

She finally landed, every bone in her body jarring, on a small, flat ledge of rough concrete, suspended above a sheer drop of ten feet. Her fingers scraped for purchase, and she skidded to a halt just on the precipice, the graze on her cheek torn open again. She pulled herself up into a crouch as Garrick skidded and fell towards her.

He didn’t hesitate, his arms reaching out wide. He slammed into her, grabbing her tight, hurling them both clean off the edge and into thin air.

Anna hung suspended for a shimmering moment while the water swirled below, and the vibration from the bullets thrummed through her mind. Then they dropped, Garrick’s body crushing her to him.

They hit the water. It closed over Anna’s head like a black, icy wall, intense cold driving the air from her lungs in a shocked stream of silver bubbles. Garrick’s arms locked around her waist. Even before she had stopped descending, he was tugging her, his body thrusting upwards to the light and the air, dragging her with him, never letting go.

Anna broke the surface coughing and spluttering. She heaved in huge gasps of dirty, wet air, spitting water. The river churned in her ears, the strong current speeding her along like human flotsam.

But Garrick was with her. His legs kicked and steered them with the flow, even as she struggled to make her own limbs work. He hooked her safe to his body with unyielding arms.

She kept her head tilted upwards to breathe more easily. The effort made her neck ache, and was compounded by the bone-crushing coldness of the gritty water. Branches caught and scratched at her legs from below the surface, but whenever they slowed or threatened to stop her, Garrick’s strength worked to move them free.

Out the corner of her eye, Anna saw the scavengers shrinking, receding as they stood screaming on the edge of the concrete precipice. Even though the speed of the river had taken her well out of reach, some were still firing, their bullets peppering the water.

Then the swell and rush of the river rounded some industrial buildings, and the scavengers disappeared from sight.