Total pages in book: 72
Estimated words: 74227 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 371(@200wpm)___ 297(@250wpm)___ 247(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 74227 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 371(@200wpm)___ 297(@250wpm)___ 247(@300wpm)
I shook my head. “I don’t know. Seems kind of crazy to me, too.”
“Harold wasn’t chosen. I was,” came a voice from the side window.
I screamed.
Baylor didn’t.
Chapter 17
Why don’t I think before I speak? Because I like to be surprised by what comes out of my mouth along with everyone else.
-Baylor’s secret thoughts
Baylor
I would’ve punched Rafe in the face if I had my hands free. Seeing as they were filled with a freaking out woman, I refrained. Barely.
“Goddammit,” I grumbled as I pushed the door open.
Rafe narrowly stepped out of the way in time to avoid being hit and sent me a grumbled oath for my troubles.
“Fuck,” Lark said as I put her on her feet. “That wasn’t very nice, Rafe.”
Rafe shrugged in the darkness.
“Let’s go inside,” I mumbled to them both.
Before I went very far, though, I stopped and turned back to my truck, grabbing my keys.
“Won’t be hiding these in the truck anymore,” I tossed at Lark.
Lark shrugged, which then had me thinking.
“Lark isn’t your real name, is it?”
She shook her head and pushed through the door of my house.
“Why is everything of yours unlocked?” Rafe asked.
I shrugged. “The neighborhood is good. Plus, everyone knows this is my house. Oh, and him.”
Rafe didn’t see Pongo until he was nearly standing in front of him.
Pongo sat in the darkness of the room, keeping vigil for me until I got back.
“Jesus Christ.” Rafe came to a sudden halt. “You can’t even tell that he’s there.”
He went to reach forward to place his hand on Pongo’s head, but Pongo’s ears went flat, clearly letting him know in no uncertain terms that he didn’t wish to be touched.
“Since when do you have a dog?” Rafe asked, sounding amused.
“Since I stole him,” Lark said, turning the kitchen light on.
“Stole who?” Rafe asked, eyes narrowing.
She tilted her chin in Pongo’s direction.
“Why?” he continued.
Lark crossed her arms over her chest.
“Because I wanted to, that’s why.”
“Where’d you steal him from?” Rafe pushed.
“You know exactly where she got him from,” I muttered. “Stop playing like you’re dumb.”
Rafe shrugged. “Well, I was watching her that night. Sue me.”
Lark’s eyes went wide. “That was you?”
He nodded.
“Why?” she pushed.
“Because you need a keeper,” he said. “Jesus, you’re worse than my sister.”
“You have a sister?” Both Lark and I said at the same time.
Rafe nodded. “I do.”
“If you’re the point of contact with Free, then who the hell is Harold?”
“Harold is a means to an end,” he said. “I’m sorry I couldn’t stop him from reporting you to the police for those unpaid parking fines. I was there, trying to do something else, and missed the call he placed to the mayor.”
I stared at the man that I so obviously knew nothing about.
“What the fuck?”
“There’s a lot about me you don’t know,” Rafe said.
“Tell me about it,” I muttered. “Why are you really here?”
Rafe walked to my fridge and opened it, extracting a bottled water.
How he knew I had bottled water in there was anyone’s guess. I normally had nothing but a half gallon of white milk.
My mother had come over at some point today and stocked my fridge—again—and I didn’t even know they were in there.
“I’m here because I’m helping set up a network where other birds like Lark can be sent,” he said. “And her name was Rita, not Lark. But my guess is that she will never go by Rita again. You might as well continue to know her as Lark.”
Lark paled even further and leaned her butt against the kitchen table as she started to shake.
I walked to her and pulled her into my arms, sending Rafe a glare.
“She’s wondering if I’m the real deal,” he said. “I just had to make her realize I was.”
“Why haven’t you introduced yourself to me?” she questioned.
“Because you didn’t need to know me.” He paused. “Now you do.”
Mr. Mysterious right there.
“Rafe.” I pulled my hand up to pinch the bridge of my nose. “For the love of God. Stop acting like this and just fucking tell me what’s going on.”
“I already did,” he said. “I was hired by an organization—the same one that set her up here—to make sure that this place is a safe one. That the point of contact is on the up and up. Which he so obviously is not. But I got distracted by the fact that Harold had his fingers in so many pies and forgot to tell them that they needed to hold off on sending any more of their little birds. Seems Lark was sent before the Freebirds received that message. Which I’ve already informed them of, by the way. I told them I would watch over her while she was here, otherwise she would’ve been moved three weeks ago.”
“You knew I was having trouble?”
He nodded. “I paid off your car loan, by the way. Ridiculous that they didn’t do that before, but it’s been fixed. They’re normally fan-fucking-tastic. Something happened that made them drop the ball there, though. And I have a hell of a feeling that it was Harold—Harold who was never supposed to be a contact if my sources are correct. But since I’d been watching him, I decided to wait on telling them anymore until I had the full picture.”