Total pages in book: 40
Estimated words: 35602 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 178(@200wpm)___ 142(@250wpm)___ 119(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 35602 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 178(@200wpm)___ 142(@250wpm)___ 119(@300wpm)
I will not forgive her, but now she doesn’t have to worry about that anymore because I already killed her. The only fate she has left to fulfill is that the one her God gave her. Now that she’s dead, she only answers to her maker.
I wipe my bloody palms on my jeans and walk out of the room. My guards are close behind, following me as I exit the building and get into one of our cars parked below the building filled with horrible things I’ve just witnessed.
I can stop myself from thinking about Tallulah. I’ve got this idea in my head now. One where she’s been kidnapped and forced to do all the things I just saw happen here, today.
It’s concerning that I’m more worried about punishing the men who could hurt my ward than I am about bringing her to justice.
I suddenly remember I still haven’t emptied her room.
As the car pulls away from the curb and drives me to my home, I fill my head with ideas of what I’m going to do to her stuff. Burn all her pretty clothes. Burn all her books. Ruin everything she’s ever held dear to her heart.
It’ll fucking hurt to get rid of her stuff, but there’s nothing to be done about it. For now, she’s missing from my life and I’m already enjoying the sick sense of satisfaction I know I’ll feel when she comes back, only to find all her shit destroyed.
Maybe I’ll play an even meaner trick on her, hide the dogs, convince her something bad happened to them. Although I’m not sure I could stop them from barking if they so much as smelled her nearby. I can tell Zeus and Hades miss their mistress. They often whine and whimper in front of her room, clawing at the door and trying to get in. Nothing’s the same anymore.
I make a resolute plan for what I’m going to do when I arrive back home. But even in the back of my mind, I already know I will not go through with it. There is no way I can part with her things. Before today, it was too hard for me to walk into her room and see it all splayed out there as if she’d never left.
But now my thoughts are filled with memories of the closets and drawers I filled with clothes I thought would look beautiful on her. The deep drawers, rose-wallpapered furniture that I picked out, along with its silky, lacy contents. All the things I never got to do with her.
Soon enough, she’ll be back here. I have to look for her harder. I’m never going to stop hunting her and I know someday, whether it’s tomorrow or twenty years from now, I’m going to bring her back here.
And I’m going to show her exactly why they call me the boss.
Chapter 6
TALLULAH
Since I've left Xavier's home I've grown closer with Yvette.
The woman I first thought had no name is actually sweet, kind and bubbly. But so far all of our conversations have been done in secret. We'll meet after everyone else has gone to sleep and spend the night together. We talk about everything, our lives, the men who have shaped us into the people we are today.
She has told me so many secrets.
At night where there is no noise, with the moonlight shining down on us, we share our deepest worries we've never told anyone else before. Yvette has told me about her husband and her two sons, whom he has kept away from her for a long time. I can tell how much she she's hurt by that. That it's his actions which have truly made her into a different person. She hasn't gone into the abuse she suffered at the hands of her husband, but I know it has to be bad, given she won't even touch the subject.
She told me before she ran from her husband, he threatened to take the kids from her and to track her down wherever she went, and kill her. She's hiding for her own safety. She told me her husband would never hurt the kids, but I don't know what to believe.
There must be some abuse there, something terrible that's happened to her at the hands of this man. Yet he's the one she's loved the most in the world.
Tonight we're meeting beneath the moonlight again. The full moon is shining right on us as we sit down. The grass is dry and clumpy, most of it turning a golden shade of brown because of the heat here.
We share a look of secrecy and she smiles at me.
"Are you ready?" she asks.
"I don't even know what's going to happen," I answer with a small smile. "You told me to come out here and that we were going to do something special."