Total pages in book: 71
Estimated words: 69330 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 347(@200wpm)___ 277(@250wpm)___ 231(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 69330 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 347(@200wpm)___ 277(@250wpm)___ 231(@300wpm)
“It’s not easy for me to talk about it.”
An inexplicable desire to know and soothe his pain made her say, “Give me your hand.”
Craning his neck, he studied her with a furrowed brow. “Sky.”
“I won’t access anything else, only what you give me permission for.”
“Why?” He brushed a thumb over her cheek. “Is it important?”
“It is to me. I want to know you. Every part.”
Reluctantly, he offered his hand.
“It’s all right.” She took his palm in hers and traced the lifeline with a finger. “If you share the bad memories, they can’t hurt you anymore.”
“Is this a philosophy you live by?”
She didn’t answer. Her secrets were too grave and dirty to share.
Gently, she rubbed his callouses, and closed her eyes.
The place his past took her to was in the desert. The landscape was barren and the sand a bloody red in the warm reflection of the setting sun. An eagle cried out from the steel-blue cliff tops on the horizon. It was a lonely call of desolation and hopelessness. The setting filled her with an eerie sensation of pending tragedy.
Next to a small oasis stood a single dwelling—an impressive house with mud walls and a tile roof. Bono exited from the kitchen, holding the hand of a young woman. She was dressed in a see-through, yellow dress that reached her sandaled feet. There were traces of tears on her cheeks, and fear was etched on her face as she glanced over her shoulder toward the house.
At the walled garden exit, Bono paused to survey the surroundings. Armed guards patrolled the perimeter of the property. He motioned to be quiet with a finger on his lips. His face was beautiful, unlike any she’d seen. His dark skin was flawless, smooth like coffee and cream. A strong, straight nose and a square jaw accentuated his masculine beauty. Full sensual lips and long dark lashes softened the harsh lines of his male features.
Of all his physical traits, his eyes were the most stunning. They were the color of dark chocolate with specks of caramel. This is where Sky paused the longest. She couldn’t help it. He was magnificent to look at, too beautiful to behold. His handsome exterior was contorted with an expression of concern. Death hung like a cloak around the couple. Life awaited on the outskirts of the desert, far away from the mansion they were escaping.
He inched forward when the guard had passed, gesturing for the girl to follow. He counted soundlessly, his lips forming the words, and on the fifth beat, they ran for the Jeep parked in the shade of a palm tree. Sky tasted the victory on his breath as they reached the vehicle, and the dread that oozed from his pores as he lifted the woman inside and hotwired the engine. For a horrifying moment, nothing happened, and then the vehicle stuttered to life. The girl, Lydia, uttered a silent cry of relief, her face tilted to the heavens in a prayer of thanks. And then a small army of soldiers emerged from behind the sand boulders, their automatic rifles aimed at the vehicle.
Bono lifted his hands, pledging his life in return for Lydia’s.
A man dressed in a white robe with a pistol approached. He addressed them in English. “You think you can steal my slave and run away from me?”
“She had nothing to do with it,” Bono said. “I forced her to come. Punish me, not her.”
Lydia shook next to him, fresh tears running down her cheeks.
“I trusted you,” the man said, “and you betrayed that trust to steal from me.”
“She’s not a piece of property that can be stolen.”
“Yet I paid a lot of money for her.”
“At a slave market. That’s inhumane.”
“Why did you steal her?”
“You torture her.”
“Ah, so you believe you’re a savior. In believing such a foolish thing, you’ve turned yourself into the executioner.”
The man turned the pistol on Lydia and pulled the trigger.
“No!”
Bono’s scream echoed through the valley as the girl slouched next to him in the seat, a red circle pooling through the flimsy fabric on her chest.
The soldiers dragged Bono from the Jeep and made him kneel on the ground.
The man with the pistol came to stand over him, a dagger in his hand. “She wasn’t worth much, and I was growing tired of her. I was going to kill her anyway. By law, I should cut off your hand, but I believe your original sin wasn’t the theft you committed. Your original sin was to lust after the woman of another man. I saw the way you looked at her. God himself said to cut off the part of the body that leads us into temptation. So,” he wiped the blade on the fabric of his robe, “I won’t take your hand. I will take your eye, as that is the part that made you sin.”