Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 130761 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 654(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130761 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 654(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Then I thought of her face. Thought of the fact that she could no longer have children, because of what the Elders had done to her. And I hated it all. I wished that AK had not saved me. I wished that Meister’s potion still mixed with my blood, because it made me forget. Above all, I wanted to forget.
I thought of Grace in her bed and Lilah reading to her, brushing a kiss on her head. My heart yearned for a moment such as that. But that hope had died, long ago, and my soul had faded too. The sins I bore in secret made it feel as though my life had no point anymore.
That I no longer had a purpose, now I was here, starting over again, but separated from the missing piece of my heart.
I ran my hand along the marks on my arm, the flesh itching and yearning for what I could not give my thirsty vein. Then my hand hit something beside the chair. I grabbed hold of the object and brought it into the light cast by the lantern attached to the ceiling.
Jack Daniels.
I removed the cap, and a familiar scent filled my nose. Meister would drink this in New Zion. A sudden image of him, drinking after he had joined with me in a dark room, hit me. I flinched when the memory made me feel sick. When I remembered the blood. The pain between my legs. His seed on my skin and the heavenly needle being injected into my arm . . .
He would use this to relax.
I raised the bottle and drank from the neck. The bitter liquid burned my throat. I coughed as it took the breath from my lungs. But then the liquid traveled through my body and lightened some of the pain I bore.
So I took another sip, and another, and one more, until I felt the pain subside and the image of Lilah’s ruined face leave my mind. Whenever memories tried to infiltrate my mind—Meister’s handlings, Judah’s betrayal—I drank some more. And when the worst of my memories tried to stab me, bruise me, destroy me, I drowned them with the drink, begging them to flee.
Eventually, the world became blissfully numb and my mind became immune to all evil. Yet one image did not leave. AK’s face and kind eyes stayed with me as I watched the bats fly in the midnight sky.
And I was okay with that. Because in this whole mess, he was a shining beacon of hope. The only face that made me feel safe. Because there was a darkness in him too, a fellow traveler on the same uneasy road.
So I let his angel eyes watch over me as I slumped in the chair.
I let them keep me safe.
Safe . . .
Chapter Eleven
AK
Five days later . . .
I drank the beer, letting the cold liquid run down my throat. The night had gotten warmer, so I sat at the back of my cabin, a cooler filled with beer by my side. The sky was black and there wasn’t a damn cloud in the sky.
Vike left for the clubhouse about an hour ago, enlisted Ash to be his DD for the night. I wasn’t thinking about sluts tonight. Fuck, I hadn’t been thinking about them all week. Wasn’t interested in some slut raking at my chest and sucking on my junk.
What was the fucking point?
I looked through my kitchen window to see the clock on the wall. Five minutes to midnight. My eyes prickled with tiredness, but I knew I wouldn’t get more than a couple of hours if I tried to sleep. Because they’d be at the end of my bed in a second. And I really couldn’t stand seeing those fucking faces glaring at me.
They’d given me a couple of days rest, of course. I knew they would. The minute I helped Phebe, helped her purge the fucking heroin from her veins, I knew they’d go for a while. But I also knew that when they came back it would be worse. So much fucking worse. Memories that I thought I’d pushed away for good came back to pelt me between the eyes like a perfect shot. As they stood at the bottom of the bed, they showed me details I’d forgotten. Details I couldn’t fucking think about without losing my damn breath.
But the guilt was worse. Ripping into my stomach like talons.
So I’d stay awake.
Because I really couldn’t cope with those memories right now.
I finished the beer I was drinking and was opening another when I heard footsteps on the grass.
“What’s wrong?” I asked as Flame, avoiding my eyes, came over to where I sat.
“Nothing.” He sat down in the chair next to me.
“Nothing’s wrong? You sure?”
He nodded, his dead, black eyes staring out at the trees. I watched his jaw clench, the knives in his hands turning over in his palms. Since we’d got back from Klan Kunt’s ghost town, the fresh cuts on his arms had healed and his knives were blunt again. He still traced the flesh, but he made no new fresh cuts.