Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 114936 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 575(@200wpm)___ 460(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114936 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 575(@200wpm)___ 460(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
“It wasn’t her fault, Keaton!” Kyrin’s next to speak, but I don’t want to hear what he has to say. “She was played too.”
I stand at the edge of the cliff, watching the waves crash against the pale stone. It reminds me of the anger I felt the day I was told what I needed to do. What I must do. The first task of me taking seat as CEO was to protect Midnight Mayhem and Kiznitch. At all costs. Even at my own.
“You made it?” Her voice is the whisper of a memory that I haven’t seen in a long time but have known was always there. It was perfectly planned, it always would be. Trick the trickster, beat The Brothers, be who I needed to be. Even if it meant removing my memories to do it.
I turn slowly, tucking my stray hair behind my ear. “Delila,” I say, squinting against the sunlight. “So strange to see you out in the outside world like this finally.”
Dove steps out from behind her, with Kohen on the other side. I swallow past the betrayal from the two of them. The betrayal I’ve had to hold on to for years upon years without realizing.
Dove has blue and pink paint smudged over the sides of her face, and Kohen has dark to match hers. For years, I’ve known she’s watched Midnight Mayhem from the crowd. I’ve never understood why, and she’s never told me either.
“Yes, well, I guess it is.” She clamps the metal handcuffs around my wrists, jerking me forward. “Come on, our Little Bee. It’s time.” She yanks me forward and I follow behind her like a lost lamb to be slaughtered. Delila hid her death from everyone, and she doesn’t know that I know why. She and Kaius had been working together from the second she ‘died’, maybe even before. I know King and The Brothers will be angry at me right now because they won’t understand.
There was no me being kidnapped by them. Me being raised with Dominic. The memories Delila created with Dominic weren’t true. Part of me is angry that it worked, that I agreed to give her the opportunity to do this to me. I gave her my sanity on a silver platter and she took it like a hungry wolf. The other part of me is angry that they truly believed they hadn’t known me all of their life. Like I wasn’t embedded into each of their souls as deep as they were in mine, but then I remember why. Why I had agreed to do it.
The sun ducks behind a fat dark cloud and a chill spreads over my spine. Delila directs us toward a waiting white SUV, and Dove and Kohen take the one behind her. A man opens the back seat and I slide in without arguing, keeping my head resting on the window. Doors close and we’re driving away from the cliff top.
“Do they know where you are?” Delila asks, and I just shake my head. “Very good. They’ll keep chasing Dominic’s tail so we won’t have any hiccups.”
“Why do you want Midnight Mayhem so bad?” I turn toward her. She’s aged a lot since I last saw her, and her hair is much longer too. Delila was always so prim and put together. In opulent suits and Jimmy Choos, she walked the line of boss lady with grace, yet somewhere down that path, she lost her way. “You had Midnight Mayhem, Delila. Why?”
“Oh, Cartier. You still have so much to learn when it comes to The Fathers. We’re going to take over. Get rid of all the acts and rebuild new ones.” The road is bumpy beneath my butt. “We got what we wanted.” The smile on her face is far from anything happy. “Got rid of Patience so we can take their pipeline.”
“Money? Sex trafficking? Slavery? That’s the kind of shit you want to turn Midnight Mayhem into?”
Her shoulder lifts slightly in a shrug. “Not for money more than power, but the money is a bonus. This is what we needed to take us to the next level. We want to be where notorious cliques like The Elite Kings are.”
“They don’t dabble in sex trafficking…” I sneer, but I try not to make it obvious.
“Well no, but this is what is going to take us there. I just have to meet Kaius before we all fly to the US.” I have no doubt in my mind that she has every intention of killing everyone in Mayhem. Everyone but Maya, because as much of a monster as Delila is, she loved Maya’s father. She loves Maya. I’ll believe that forever.
They continue to drive us through the busy city and around people crossing the road. We pass small shops and kids playing on the street until we reach the end of a back road. There’s a set of doors that open out onto concrete steps and a bin right beside it. It looks like the back of a club.