Total pages in book: 87
Estimated words: 81279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 325(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81279 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 406(@200wpm)___ 325(@250wpm)___ 271(@300wpm)
Soothing myself with an exhale, I type the number into my burner and click call as I make my way down the long corridor, but I almost stumble on my own feet when I hear the faint echo of an old-timey telephone ringing somewhere ahead.
“Ro... wan?” I utter, but the ringtone comes to an abrupt end as the noise ahead dies down.
I leap forward with my heart on fire. “Rowan!”
I shouldn’t have left him alone.
I shouldn’t have fucking left him alone!
Chapter 25
Rowan
It’s my nightmare all over again. I’m sixteen and my hands are tied behind my back as I kneel and watch Otto Grass slit my mother’s throat.
Only this time, the restrains are steel, not rope, and, and if I don’t manage to do anything about my situation, Saint might join my family in the afterlife. Because he’ll come looking for me, and this is a trap.
When Otto and his buddy snatched me from the mall, I was as easy to overpower as a baby. I got one punch in, and a kick, but that was that. Moments later, I was tied, gagged, and being dragged toward a dirty van.
Did they watch us kill Brown at a distance, yet did nothing, as if he were expendable? How else could they have accosted me so easily?
A shudder goes through my overheating body as Otto paces around the room, casting a shadow on a wallpaper with a geometric pattern. It’s eerily clean here, and I even spot some of those wooden words that were popular decor a few years back. One says Love, the other—Family, and as my initial panic is replaced by a numb sense of anticipation, I wonder where the person who takes care of this house is, because it’s certainly neither of the thugs who imprisoned me here.
Otto is flanked by two dangerous-looking guys. One is bald and has a moth tattooed over the left side of his face, while the other is a brute with a massive orange-red beard. They must be accustomed to kidnappings, because they don’t seem fazed by the fact that I’m cuffed to a chair.
Mothman is sitting on a salmon pink sofa, focused solely on his phone. He’s already commented to Otto that women who reject him on Tinder because of his face tattoo are “shallow”. I imagine the ink is the least of his problems when it comes to dating. Beardy just took off his leather jacket and is now spraying something on his elbow.
Otto frowns at him. “What is that shit?”
Beardy shrugs. “Heat spray. What? I’ve got joint pain.”
Otto waves him off, annoyed. His face is flushed all the way to his ears. Or it’s just rosacea. Hard to say. What’s more important is that I know of at least two guns in this room. Otto has one, and before taking care of his elbow, Beardy cleaned the other weapon and stashed it into a holster under his top. Mine got taken off me and left with the two guys downstairs. If Saint’s coming here alone, he’ll be at a disadvantage and may get hurt—a truth that keeps rumbling in my head like pre-shocks before an earthquake.
And yet, I hope he does come for me. Maybe I’m a coward who simply wants to be saved, but if he steps in here, guns blazing, it will mean I’m worth something to him. I know he enjoys my company, and the sex we have, but none of that would be worth the risk of dying if there wasn’t something more to our relationship. Something I don’t dare name, worried I might like the truth too much.
I hope he comes for me.
My Saint.
I stiffen as heavy footsteps echo on the stairs, but when the door swings open, I see that it’s one of Otto’s buddies, a brunet with the plainest and most forgettable face I’ve ever seen.
I’ll need to wait a bit longer.
“Tamara called and said there’s goulash in the freezer. You guys hungry? Me and Pete want some anyway.”
Otto dismisses the guy with a wave. “Last time I had her goulash, I spent the evening shitting myself to death. I’m good.”
Once the man disappears, Otto’s cool blue eyes settle on me, and I hate every second of it. Just being in his presence makes all the hair on my body bristle.
“So. Little asshole, all grown up, thinks he can take me on?” he asks, shaking his head. “I don’t know how a weakling like you got to my old buddies, but what I’m sure of is that you’re not working alone.”
He looks different. Just as horrible as he used to but different, as if he’s aged twenty years, not four. Patches of dry skin cover his face. He has premature wrinkles, and the stubble that’s almost becoming a beard at this point makes him look unkempt.