Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 73680 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 73680 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 368(@200wpm)___ 295(@250wpm)___ 246(@300wpm)
“Nicky’s my friend!” I tear loose from Alpha’s embrace to point a finger at Dad. “I’m not going to leave this psycho to take her apart piece by piece!”
“Think,” says Ripper. “It’d just replace her with you, and we’re not going to fucking let you.”
“Not going to let me? Are you listening to yourself?” I yell at the phone, “Tell me where and when. As long as you release Nicky.”
“The fuck you are!”
Crow laughs at the chaos, but when he speaks, everyone quiets to not miss anything. “Here’s what you’re going to do. I’m going to send you a fucking address. You’re going to show up there, fucking alone and unarmed, with the God damned videotape, and if you fuck any of this up, you’ll be able to put your friend back together like a fucking jigsaw puzzle when I’m done with her. Got it? It’s so simple that even a Screaming Eagle should be able to figure this shit out.”
“Okay,” I say, in a breath I’ve been holding too long. I don’t want to go, because Ripper’s right. It would put me right in their hands, all to get back at Dad.
“Faith!” Dad and Alpha explode at me at once, fury radiating off them in palpable waves.
“You can’t trust a word that comes out of his fucking mouth,” adds Ripper. His frustration is thick.
“I know that, but what choice do I have?” I try very hard to ignore Crow’s laughter.
“I’ll leave you to discuss,” says Crow. “But her deadline’s literal, remember that.”
The phone goes dead. A moment later, it plings with a message coming in. The directions.
“You’re not going. Over my dead fucking corpse,” growls Dad, pulling up to his full height to loom over me. “And I’m not blind. You might think you have them wrapped around your finger, but Alpha. Ripper. Blade? They’re not letting you walk into that shit either.”
“Eagle-eye’s right,” says Alpha. “It’s only going to get you killed.”
“But you don’t care, do you?” Blade looks past Alpha to me, his expression grim.
“Don’t fucking encourage her.” Ripper glares between us.
Blade ignores him. Instead he speaks directly to me. “So what would you do?”
“I…” God, I really don’t want to, but I don’t have a choice. “I don’t know, but I can’t let them keep Nicky.”
He nods. “So then they’ll have you both. Let me go.”
“What? No! He wants me.”
“He wants Eagle-eye to suffer. You’re just the knife he wants to stick in his side.” He looks at my father. “They’ll never see me. Not until it’s too late.” The steely promise in his dark tone has me shiver. He’s ready to kill.
“But if they sense anything wrong, they’ll kill her.”
“They might do that anyway,” says Ripper. “Stop acting like they’re playing by a set of rules.”
Oh God. When it’s life or dead, rules don’t fucking matter.
“I don’t give a fuck about your friend,” Blade says flatly.
“Wha—what?” That snaps me out of it.
“I’m not an idealist like Alpha, or a fucking hero, like Ripper. I’m a killer, and I’ll take out every single goddamn Pit Viper if I have to do it, to keep you breathing. If the choice is between her and you, I’m going to choose you every fucking time, but that asshole’s not going to stop until he gets whatever fucked up revenge he thinks he deserves, so I’ll go. Prez?”
It’s so quiet you could hear a pin drop. Blade doesn’t give a shit, only looking at my father with a gaze so intense it makes me shiver. I must be starting to lose it, because that sort of sounded romantic, like an over the top anti-hero.
“It’s like that?” Dad asks Blade quietly. “I promised you that there were lines I’d never ask you to cross.”
“You’re not asking, I’m volunteering.”
Dad looks grim. “Faith, go to my quarters.”
“What? No. You can’t send me to my room like a little girl.”
Miriam, who’s stayed in the background until now, takes his arm. “If you try to control her, you’ll lose her. Take it from someone who knows.”
“At least she’d be alive to lose.” Dad tears his arm away. “We’re not trading anyone to Crow. We’re holding all the fucking cards here.”
“My friend isn’t a card!” I shout at him. “She’s a human being. Did you forget about that? This whole time, ever since you guys broke into my house, or maybe since that stupid video went viral, all I’ve done is react. Run away, hide, anything to keep from having to make an actual decision.” My eyes sting, tears threatening to force their way out, but I’m not ready for that. Not yet. “But it’s all catching up now and Nicky is going to die if I don’t do something. Is it dumb? Maybe. Is it dangerous? Definitely. But I’m not leaving one of my own behind, and I don’t think you would either. Alpha? Ripper? Blade? What would you do to save one of your brothers?”