Total pages in book: 168
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 160578 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 803(@200wpm)___ 642(@250wpm)___ 535(@300wpm)
He levels his eyes on mine, his hands warm on my cheeks. “You do whatever you’ve got to do, baby. No one, nothing, none of that shit matters. If it’s chaos that feeds you,” his pupils dilate. “Then eat.”
“—Kyrin!” Mom snaps at him, but he doesn’t shift.
Straightening back, he smirks a little. “Your mother seems to have forgotten how it is.”
“She needs us now, Kyrin!”
The faint sound of my door opening behind me forces through the tears strolling down my cheeks.
“She’s not needed us in a long time, Lilith. Wake up. This—you—are making her worse.” Father’s eyes snap to Dad. “And you shouldn’t have allowed her to interfere the way she has.”
“Well, if it isn’t exactly what I thought.”
Nate?
Spinning around to find him, arms catch my waist. The pounding of my heart races through my ears, tears streaming down my face when my eyes finally land on Nate.
Ignoring the heated argument behind me, his brows pull together as worry lines carve into his face. “You’re all right, Lulu. Remember who you are.”
His shoulders straighten. The softness in his eyes evaporates when they slide above my shoulder, landing on the person behind me. I never knew there was tension between both families.
Shadows dance over his face like a nightmarish tale, and he takes yet another step forward, in time for Bishop’s hand to stop him.
“Easy…”
Nate’s mouth slams closed, and his eyes drop down to me. His finger slips beneath my chin as he lifts my eyes up to him, inspecting me as if I were one of his projects.
In a way, I am. “You good?”
Tension in my muscles releases, turning my legs to jelly.
In a house, there was a door. On that door, there was a handle—no. No, no…that’s not it. In a house, there was a couch, and on that couch—Shit. The knots in my stomach tighten the more I stand here. The air turns thick, my palms slick with sweat.
Oh no…
A single finger hooks onto mine. My legs give out, but instead of hitting the floor, I’m pulled into something hard. Spiced honey, earth, and gasoline.
I bury myself deeper into the hoodie of who caught me. Arms as big as my body lock around me, holding me in place and turning the voices in the background to mumbles.
I don’t care anymore. About any of it. About trying to figure out why everyone in Midnight Mayhem seemed to hate me, or that no one helped me the way they wanted to help my mother. Whether I was crazy like her, unhinged like Father, or a joker like Dad.
I don’t care. I don’t want to exist anywhere outside of the people I’ve spent most of my time being with. Mom always said I didn’t have to have one without the other, but she was wrong. They’re two worlds charged by the same energy force, so one will always lack.
“Priest—” I hear someone say in the background, but arms swoop beneath my legs, and I’m being carried away. I don’t have time to turn around. I don’t have the fuel to see who is still there, fatigue refusing to let me go. How could I turn so weak the second I’m around Midnight Mayhem? As if what they thought of me truly became who I thought I was.
“Don’t take this shit to heart, Madness.” His lips brush against my head. “I hate to see you cry.”
He places me carefully into the back seat of a car, his familiar scent coating the leather. The back door closes, and my eyes fly to the rearview mirror.
Moose’s smile spreads warmth through my chest. “Getting in trouble, kiddo?”
I laugh, sniffing before the other car door opens and Priest slips in beside me. “Unfortunately, not the fun kind this time.”
With his hoodie hiding everything but the tip of his chin, the light of his phone does nothing to show his face. I want to ask him why he was here and why the Fathers brought him, but I know him well enough to know it’s wasted breath.
“Don’t,” he snaps without looking, typing out a text. “I won’t answer you anyway.”
“You knew and you kept it to yourself?” I’ve spent all my life balancing between my age and what I’ve been trained to do, but at this moment, that small girl who exists inside a carefully crafted weapon needs to be just that. A girl. But the waters I tread are a reminder I gave up that privilege a long time ago, some would even say the moment I was born.
His fingers stop moving.
If I was smart, I’d be afraid.
He turns his head slowly until the light from his phone switches off, and I’m left with nothing but the shading of his marbled jaw and polished skin as it reflects through the setting sun of tinted windows.
“You know more than most already.” His lips move around each word with precision. “Why would I show you my hand when I don’t know what’s in yours, Madness? Hmmm?” He shifts his body toward me, and now that I have his undivided attention, I’m not sure that I want it. I’ve seen what happens to girls who do.