Total pages in book: 144
Estimated words: 130761 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 654(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 130761 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 654(@200wpm)___ 523(@250wpm)___ 436(@300wpm)
And I closed my eyes as the potion took me to the forest I longed for most, the one where my Rebekah and Grace waited. The one where Sapphira walked out of some overgrowth, covered in blood. I cried out at her too-thin body and lifeless eyes.
“Sapphira.” I tried to get to her. But I was tied to a tree, my hands behind my back. Sapphira saw me, and tears fell down her face. “Save me,” she begged as she began to fade away.
As the potion engulfed my veins, I watched her fade from the forest, then begin to disappear from my head, shape by shape, image by image. I tried to remember her face. I tried to hold on to the fact that she was here. But the potion mixed with this new mystery serum grew stronger than ever before, robbing me of Sapphira’s cries, her tears, her face.
I rocked against the tree, back and forth, trying to recall what I had begged my mind to remember. But the forest was barren and dark, and my head was too full of fog. I was alone in this forest. Alone and afraid.
I wanted to remember.
I needed to remember.
But as my arm tingled and I became motionless against the tree, everything was just . . . gone.
Chapter Three
AK
“I’ve created a background on y’all,” Tanner said as we read the files he’d given us. “I placed your information on the Klan’s intranet and shared files. There’re millions of people on there, so you’ll be lost among the names. I made you mid-level members—you should be let in, but not cause too much intrigue.”
I read my file again. Tanner had us as originally part of the Louisiana brotherhood. Cowboy’s Cajun accent would help with that. We were nomadic Klansmen, apparently. I hadn’t even known there was such a thing. Meant we drifted from state to state, helping the Klan “cause” wherever we were needed. Mobile soldiers.
“And this Beau Ayers, our supposed reference?” I asked. “Take it he’s a relative of yours?”
Tanner tensed. “My brother,” he eventually said, casually, as if the relationship meant nothing to him. But the way veins corded slightly in his neck told me otherwise.
“Let me guess, y’all ain’t too close now you’ve left the great white cause?” Cowboy drawled, as Hush watched the ex-Nazi with suspicious eyes. He ain’t ever trusted him fully. Couldn’t really blame the guy.
“Don’t speak no more,” Tanner said stiffly. “He was next in line to me. So now he’s the heir. He has top authority in the Klan circles along with my father and uncle. But he keeps to himself, ain’t too talkative. Signs off on orders through emails and shit. Perfect person to have given you the green light to head down here to Texas.”
Tanner leaned on the table, all business, emotion gone. “You show them your names on entrance. They’ll check them in the system, verify the memberships. You say you just got into town and need to unwind. And you want pussy. I’d go as far as to say you want pussy in all the fucked-up ways.”
I ground my hands together as I tried to imagine what kind of shit was going down in this so-called town. Tanner’s eyes shifted to each of us in turn. “Y’all got fake names. Remember them. Don’t use your road names—if all this goes down right and you get the bitch the fuck out, we want no traces.” Tanner’s assessing eyes flicked to Flame beside me. He was staring at the name on the file on front of him: Earl Brown.
I could read what was going through Tanner’s mind; it was going through mine too. We weren’t sure the brother was cut out for all this undercover shit.
“Carson Abney,” Tanner said to me. “Same background. Ex-Marine scout sniper, Special Ops. Same tours as you did. Means they can’t get your real records, so it works as our cover. Vike is Wade Bray, and Cowboy, Bryar Groves.”
Tanner looked at Hush. Hush stared back, one cocky eyebrow raised. “What? No white-trash redneck pseudonym for me, mon frère?”
Tanner’s jaw clenched. “You walk in there and these fuckers will lynch you on the spot.”
“Fun,” Hush said dryly.
“You stay close, at a nearby motel.” I nodded at my mixed-race brother. “We’ll need a distraction at some point. You’ll be it.”
“Black bait?” He smiled, his blue eyes lighting up with excitement. “You mean I’ll get to toy with the big, bad Aryans?” He shifted in his seat. “Shit, my massive black dick just got real hard. Bet Meister and his henchmen would just love to suck on that.”
Cowboy laughed, then laughed even harder when Vike leaned around me to look at Hush and asked, “That true, blue eyes? You hung?”
“Like a motherfucking horse,” Hush quipped.
Vike shook his head and looked at Cowboy. “Shit, brother. I’m surprised you can even sit down if you get pounded by that battering ram on the daily.”