Total pages in book: 195
Estimated words: 185573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 928(@200wpm)___ 742(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 185573 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 928(@200wpm)___ 742(@250wpm)___ 619(@300wpm)
“They can’t charge you with Adam’s murder again,” he says. “But they can still charge you with hers.”
Instead of returning to the compound in the Moapa Valley, I decide drinking my weight in whiskey sounds like a better plan. So I check into a room on the Strip and gamble my way through a few of my usual haunts before ending up at the MGM Grand.
This is the venue I was scheduled to play with Last Rite before my life imploded on impact. It’s a hollow reminder of everyone I’ve failed, and that list is a long one. Inevitably, that high-speed train of thought takes me straight to hell, derailing on the night Adam died, and his girlfriend turned up missing.
I stumble across the sidewalk and lean against the building for support, the flashing lights and noise becoming too much all at once. I need to go face-plant in my hotel room and sleep it off. But I only make it a few steps before some guy’s trying to shove a card into my hand.
“Titty club, brother? VIP experience. I’ll get you a good price.”
I flick the card back at him and weave my way through the crowd. It’s busy tonight, and I just want to get the fuck out of here. But something stops me, and it takes me a minute to understand what it is. Above all the traffic and the chatter is a familiar voice. A voice that haunts my dreams every night.
I take a step forward, convinced I must be imagining it. Maybe Ace and Lucian were right. I’ve really lost my goddamn mind. But as the seconds play out, and the lyrics to a song that I taught her float through the air, I know it’s not a memory.
I shove my way through the throng of people separating me from the voice. Everything is moving too fast and too slow at the same time, and when I finally see the girl standing there with her guitar, it’s all fucking wrong.
Instead of black hair, hers is blue. And the dirty clothes hanging from her malnourished body are a far cry from designer labels. Everything about her is off, right down to the empty expression on her face. Even on her worst day, she couldn’t be Bianca. But that voice is too close for comfort, and the longer I listen, the more it fucks with my head. Am I hearing it correctly, or do I just want it to sound like her?
I catalog every detail of her face, but I’m too far away, too paralyzed to move. This wouldn’t be the first time my illusions have been shattered. How many glimpses of her have I caught in perfect strangers? How many fleeting glances, familiar gestures, sounds, and scents have plagued my waking moments? Too many to count. And in the end, it’s always the same. The ghost of her memory disappears the moment they shift because they aren’t her. They’re never her.
But I want this one to be.
Uncertainty keeps me tethered to the spot as I wait for it to happen. She’ll do something—move, or smile, or laugh—and I’ll know it isn’t her. Except she does none of those things because this woman is a fucking tragedy. It’s written all over her face. She doesn’t even see the crowd around her. She’s lost in her thoughts and the music, her gaze unfocused on the sea of pedestrians. Until it isn’t. Until she looks up, and her eyes clash with mine.
Time stops, and a spark of electricity explodes between us, shocking me back to life. A dark promise screams inside my brain, luring me closer, telling me this could be the one. But the girl doesn’t feel it. She doesn’t seem to feel anything as she frowns and looks away.
Blood rushes through my ears as my eyes capture details in rapid fire. Her style preserves a hint of familiarity in the way her fingers move, but there’s something different too. Bianca was well practiced, but her technical ability wasn’t as honed as this girl’s is. Her approach is more organic and relaxed, while Bianca was always chained by her expectations.
I try to imagine her with blue hair instead of black, but I can’t. She’s too thin. Too dead in the eyes. Bianca radiated warmth, and this girl is a tundra.
Time passes. Minutes. Maybe hours. I don’t know. I only know that when she stops playing, I’m drifting toward her. As she’s packing up her guitar case, I call out to her.
“Bianca.”
Nothing. She doesn’t even acknowledge me as she slings the case over her shoulder and walks away.
“Bianca.”
My fingers wrap around her arm, and she startles, blinking up at me with horrified eyes. Horrified brown eyes. My heart slams against my chest as I lose myself in the depths of a color I could never forget. There’s only one shade like that in the entire world, and it exists in her. I know I’m not imagining that.