Total pages in book: 80
Estimated words: 77118 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 77118 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 386(@200wpm)___ 308(@250wpm)___ 257(@300wpm)
“Do you still have contact with your family?”
“Yeah. I get calls and letters a few times a week still.”
“You have no idea who would have left me the comic books?”
“No. And I don’t know who would beat your boyfriends either,” Czar said, eyes going a little sad. “I won’t lie. It fucking cuts to think about you with someone else, but I’m not fucking naive, Nyx. I knew you were going to eventually move on. I’ve always wanted you happy. I wouldn’t have stood in the way of that.”
He meant that.
I had very few reasons to trust him.
But, somehow, I did.
“Hey,” Czar said, going to reach for my hands, but getting barked at by the CO, making him fold them into fists near mine. “Listen. I don’t know what the fuck is going on right now. But I don’t like the way shit is sounding. I’m in touch personally, but out of the loop on the… comic book sales business,” he told me.
“Who is running it now?”
“I have no idea,” he admitted.
And, I guess, that was fair.
Czar wasn’t the head of the whole organization. He’d just been running things locally. But the core of the organization was in LA. Which wasn’t exactly close. So it made sense if he didn’t have a finger on the pulse of what was going on there.
“Bab—Nyx,” he corrected, starting to realize he couldn’t call me that anymore, that we weren’t going to be together again. “Listen, I don’t know what the fuck is going on. But I do know that shit is serious. And you need to get somewhere safe. Do you have somewhere?”
“I… yeah,” I said.
“Listen, stubborn ass,” he said, dipping his head and giving me an old, familiar cocky smile. “You might not like it, but you can’t handle this alone. You need help. Lean on the fucking Murphys if you need to. They would know how to hide you at least. Go snag your aunt and hide somewhere. Because that kinda money in comic books is… serious. And I can try, but there’s not a fuckuva lot I can do from here.”
He would try, too.
Czar had always been a decent guy. The kind who stopped to jump a stranger’s car on the side of the road. Always tipped well. Randomly paid for someone’s groceries if it looked like they were freaking out about the total going up as the clerk kept scanning items.
I’d been able since he went away to paint him the villain because I believed he’d been behind the attacks and the threats and the heroin.
But if that wasn’t him, then, really, what did I have to be pissed at him about?
Holding a torch?
It was kind of sweet, even if it was never going to go anywhere.
Lying to me all those years ago?
I mean, I did believe that he thought that by doing so, he was protecting me.
“I appreciate anything you can figure out,” I told him. “I like my life in Shady Valley. I would really prefer not to have to leave. I have friends here. A job I like. A nephew I want to see grow up.”
“Nephew?” Czar asked, knowing I was an only child.
“Delaney Murphy. She had a son with one of the Henchmen.”
“Oh, yeah, heard about the bikers moving in. I am going to make some calls. See what I can find out. Will you give me your number?” he asked as the guard announced that visiting hours were coming to an end.
I rattled off my number, listened to him repeat it back to me a few times, then we slowly started to stand.
“Bab—Nyx,” Czar said, giving me a bittersweet smile.
“Yeah?”
“You okay?” he asked, his gaze moving over my face.
“Honestly… no,” I admitted. And, God, it felt good to say it. I’d been insisting I was fine for so long when it was so far from the truth.
At that, Czar’s shoulders slumped.
“I’m gonna fucking figure this out,” he vowed. “Someone will pay for this,” he added in a whisper.
“What do I do about the missing…” I started, but the CO was getting impatient, coming up behind Czar and barking at him to get moving.
“I’ll call you,” Czar said, giving me a reassuring nod before he was being pushed away.
Alone, I sank back onto my chair for a moment, taking a deep breath.
“Hey, honey, you okay?” a woman’s voice said, making me look over to find the mom of the kid with the comic book shirt.
She was young and pretty. Maybe only in her early twenties. She was short, with long inky-black hair that she had pulled back into a ponytail, dark eyes, and with that pretty golden skin that suggested she was possibly of Mexican descent.
She wasn’t familiar, so I figured they were from out of town, just coming in to visit her husband or brother or something. I honestly hadn’t even looked at who’d been at her table. I’d been so laser-focused on Czar.