“I’m sorry, Quinn,” Mara said, and I stiffened at what sounded like genuine regret. “But I didn’t have another choice. I tried. I really did, but things were just getting worse.” Her voice cracked. “You aren’t good for him. You have to know that.”
It felt as if a knife had lodged between my ribs. I blinked at Mara, trying to comprehend what she was talking about. Nothing made sense.
“Why did you—where are we? Why am I tied up?”
Mara’s sympathy ebbed like the tide, leaving behind a craggy indifference with an undercurrent of rage. “I have to protect him, Quinn. He deserves to have someone look out for him.”
I gritted my teeth as another pulse of pain rippled through me. My entire body ached sharply; my wrist and arms and shoulders screamed. I tried to recall what she’d said in the library, what we’d been talking about while I drank that hot chocolate.
The hot chocolate.
“You drugged me,” I said, the truth dawning.
Mara lifted her shoulder. “I had to get you away somehow. My grandma had some sleeping medication that worked really well.” She raised her brows, like she was impressed with herself.
I wanted to be sick.
I wanted to cry.
But I didn’t do either of those things. I fixed her with a stare. “You need to let me go.”
Mara’s expression darkened. She folded her arms over her chest. She wore a winter coat and gloves, and I longed for how warm she looked. I had nothing but my ripped jeans and sweatshirt. It did nothing to keep out the cold. I shivered, almost convulsing.
“I cannot,” she snapped. “You don’t get it.”
“What—” I swallowed a gasp as I shifted against the beam. “What don’t I understand, Mara?”
Mara’s eyes narrowed. Then, she reached for something behind her, and my entire world shifted as unbridled terror shot through me. My body went numb.
Mara placed a gun on her lap. A heavy, metal pistol that looked like something out of a movie. But I had seen enough weapons in my life. As a defense attorney, there was never any shortage of them in evidence.
It was very real. Very lethal.
She stroked the barrel with a fingertip like it was a beloved pet. “What has Graham told you about me?” she asked, her tone light, as if she wasn’t holding a gun and me hostage.
My muscles trembled, fresh adrenaline pumping through me. I needed to run. To get out of here. But my wrists were bound so tight behind the beam. Something sharp and hard dug into my skin, making warm blood seep down my hands.
“I—not much,” I confessed.
The tops of her cheeks flared pink.
Before she could say anything, I continued, “But Graham doesn’t talk about people like that. He keeps people’s secrets.”
Some of the angry flush faded as she blinked. “Yes,” she mused, her eyes darting away for a moment. “You’re right, he does. He is trustworthy.”
I nodded. “Yes,” I breathed. “He is.”
When she looked back at me, her expression was strangely blank. “I haven’t always lived at the library with mygrandmother,” she said, her voice softer. “I was married once. I thought…” She let out an empty, haunted laugh. “I thought I was happy. That I was so lucky.”
Her expression soured, her lip curling over her teeth. “But he wasn’t my hero. He took me away from my home, from my friends and my…family. He started hurting me, and when I was finally ready to leave and escape…”
She trailed off, her eyes going glassy. She stayed like that, silent and gazing off into nowhere for so long I wondered whether she was going to ever continue.
But she did.
“My father and my sister came one day. He was supposed to be at work and they were going to help me pack and bring me back home. But he—he had known. I don’t know how. Maybe he was monitoring my communication somehow, but he knew.” She shivered, even in that thick, red coat. “He was waiting. When my dad and sister got there, he came back to the house.”
She looked back down at the gun in her lap. Her fingertips trembled as she touched the grip. “He killed my father first. Shot him in the chest three times.”
