Exhaling, I grip my control and steady my hands. “I need to find Hayes and explain. Tell him why I did it. Hope he’ll be agreeable enough to actuallywantto help me.” I scoff. “It’s not like he has any reason to help.” What if he told Maeve I was lying? My sister hated dishonesty. He could use me to get back in her good graces and never have to guard me again.
“He’ll go along with it.”
I pick at my nails. “You sound so sure.”
He shrugs. “Because I am.” Standing, he pushes me to the side, grabbing a discarded shirt.
“Come with me,” he says, gesturing for me to stand. “I’ll take you to him. That way you can talk this out and I can get my bedroom back.”
Slipping the shirt over his head, he grabs the keys from his desk, sliding the gleaming gun into his waist. He adds to black knives to his arsenal.
“Preparing for war?”
Killian smirks. “Something like that.”
We ride into the Berkshires in silence. The deep woods are so thick the full moon’s rays can’t reach us. Tall oaks and wide maples are full of burnt red and orange leaves, with morecovering the forest floor. My breath fogs up the window, the chill in the air reminding me of how close winter is.
We stop and I open the door. The night is quiet, only the purring of Maeve’s Mercedes G-Class and the distant hoot of an owl surrounding us.
Licking my lips, I look back at the reaper. “Does Maeve know you took her car?”
He gives me a bored expression. That answers my question.
Pointing through the darkness, I follow his finger to the distant blaze of a red flickering flame, concealed well in the foliage.
“He’s over there.”
“You’re just going to let me go alone?”
Leaning back, he settles into the car, running a hand through his locks. “Afraid?”
Terrified. “And if Hayes isn’t too happy to see me?”
He shrugs, closing his eyes. “Careful. He has a mean left hook.”
Slamming the door, I stomp through the heavy root laden ground, sneakers tripping on bunched up vines as I go.Fucking asshole.
Carefully picking through the trees, I crash into the clearing, twigs snapping underfoot. The small flame is actually a large roaring bonfire, with dozens of thick stumps fueling the blaze. Inhaling, I cough, expecting cedar and pine, only to smell burning flesh and hair.
“Oh God,” I say, gagging as I cover my mouth.It’s bodies.They’re burning bodies out here. That stench is unmistakable, one that warns humans away from danger.
“What are you doing here?”
Jumping, I spin to see Hayes, carrying a body over his shoulder. A verydeadbody.
Gulping, I wave my hands around as my heart pounds in my chest. “We have to talk.”
12
COLLINS
“Do we now, viper?” He drops the guy into a heap of listless limbs and vacant eyes.
My father always taught me to have an end game. Where to put everything, how to hide it. Logically, it made sense that my clan—who kills and tortures people—would have a dump site.
There should be a part of me that cares—but that’s gone, along with my innocence, stolen by my father’s lessons.
“Want to tell me what the hell you were thinking?” he growls, coming closer, stalking me with the prowess of a tiger. “You told your sister—your very angry, spiteful sister who runs a fuckingmoboutfit—that we were engaged and you didn’t even run it by me first?”
