“I’m just a kid like you,” she said gently, kneeling beside him. “What’s your name?”
The boy hesitated, as if even his name carried weight.
“Ethan,” he whispered finally. “Ethan Walker… They’re going to find me.”
Emma didn’t know it yet, but Ethan Walker was the son of Daniel Walker, one of the most powerful technology CEOs in the country.
But in that moment, Ethan wasn’t a billionaire’s son.
He was just a broken boy lying in the rain.
Emma slid her thin arm under his shoulder.
He was bigger than her, but he felt strangely light—like someone had drained all the strength out of him.
“I know a place,” she said. “It’s ugly… but it’s dry.”
Ethan stared at her face, searching for lies.
All he saw was a soaked little girl with stubborn eyes and trembling hands.
He nodded weakly.
Moving was agony.
They didn’t walk so much as crawl forward together: a drag, a step, a painful gasp. Emma gritted her teeth, refusing to complain even as her muscles burned.
“Almost there,” she whispered over and over.
Eventually they reached an abandoned office building that no one entered anymore because it smelled like mold and forgotten years.