Total pages in book: 96
Estimated words: 91809 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91809 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 459(@200wpm)___ 367(@250wpm)___ 306(@300wpm)
I backed away, letting her disturbingly sweet voice fade.
“Split up.”
I nodded. This mansion was just too big for us to go through every room together. Cato and I traveled to the very end of the house. I went left, he went right. We worked our way down our sides of the hall, and we did it fast.
There was no reason to spend much time. Most of the rooms had nothing in them at all.
It occurred to me that this was Everton’s hideout, then it was Everleigh’s. There was no one to put a show on for. No one to invite over to sleep, eat, or play in all these rooms. It was just them. Alone. The only one either of them had was each other.
In another universe, I’d feel so sorry for Everleigh, in the universe where she wasn’t the reincarnated spawn of Satan.
Cato and I worked our way through the rooms and met back up right where we started. We shook our heads.
Nothing.
My phone buzzed, drawing my attention away from Everleigh. The light was still on in the kitchen, but she stopped talking. I hadn’t checked to see where she was yet.
Pressing my back flat to the wall, I opened the message.
Wilder: Our cabin was a two story. Lucien clocked a bunch of photos of an old couple in his. Ours are out. Do I want to ask if you have your foot on Everleigh’s throat right now?
Me: You know me too well, baby. We found Everleigh’s place. We’re inside right now looking for her laptop. She doesn’t know we’re here, but she will when we burn this shit to the ground.
I wasn’t about to lie to the guy.
Wilder: We’re on our way. Be careful. Love you.
Me: Love you too.
Stuffing my phone in my pocket, I looked around the wall, then snapped back fast—clapping my hand over my mouth. Flapping a hand at Cato, I warned him to get back.
Everleigh crossed in front of us, moving to the living room. It was only because she was looking down at her phone again that she didn’t see us.
We darted across to the opposite wall, keeping out of sight. Everleigh was on the other side of the room, and our way to the other half of the building where her bedroom had to be, welcomed us from the entrance to the kitchen.
I was twenty feet away, but it might’ve been twenty miles.
The television flicked on, and the rerun of a remake filled the too-quiet mansion with noise. Everleigh settled in with her food and her show, and it didn’t sound like she was going to bed anytime soon.
“What do we do?” I hissed. “Just stand around and wait? She’s out of her room right now. The last thing we want to do is snatch the laptop when she’s in there.”
“Distraction.”
“But we can’t—”
Cato turned and walked off.
“Cato—!” I cut off the whisper shout, biting my lip hard. Stealing, setting fires, giving me orgasms—I’d never been able to get in the way of what he loves to do. That wasn’t changing that night.
I just have to trust him. Cato knows how important this is. He wants to bring down the woman who abducted him and threatened his girlfriend as much as I do.
I sat back to wait, breath held tight in my chest. What would Cato do? Lure her outside with a fire? Knock and then attack when she opens the door? Did he pack bombs like—?
The lights flicked out, plunging the mansion in darkness. I smirked to myself. Or he’d just do that.
“Ugh,” Everleigh sounded in the dark. “Not again.”
I didn’t waste a second. I moved quickly through the dark, heading for the kitchen. I was begging to trip and fall flat on my face, but I had to get across before Everleigh turned on her flashlight.
The thought no sooner crossed my mind than a light beam pierced the gloom. I dropped flat, pressing my lips together tight when I banged my knee. Ignoring the pain, I crab-walked across the stone—beating it to the other side of the island.
I couldn’t stop there, out in the open. If I could just make it to the kitchen, she wouldn’t see me from the living room.
“Fuck’s sake, this place is falling apart.”
I heard movement in the dark, then the front door opening and closing. I could’ve cried.
Everleigh was going out to check the breaker. That was the gift I needed to get my ass off the floor. I turned on my flashlight, weaved through the kitchen, and walked up to the first door on the right side.
My foot came down on something soft. A bunch of sparkly tulle.
I swept my light over the space, revealing a mass of strewn clothes, a messy bed, textbooks, pictures of a handsome man and young Everleigh, and a laptop.
Jackpot.
Laid out casually on the bed, amid two pairs of tights and a random black dress, was a rose-gold laptop covered in stickers.