I nod my agreement so that Zeke knows it’s not up for discussion. He’s never liked doctors, and that was before he was tortured by one.
Before his brother became a cult leader, Isaac was a psychologist who was under investigation after he was suspected of encouraging his patients’ delusions and sometimes inciting them to commit suicide rather than treating them. There wasn’t enough evidence to send Isaac to prison, but he lost his license. Subsequently, the stain on his reputation drove him from polite society, which left him free to found the Seeds of the Undying and continue his mental warfare on the vulnerable unchecked.
The fucker called Zeke his greatest symphony.
I feel my fingers flex with the urge to wrap them around Isaac’s neck andsnap.
“It’s not just that. I feel…” Zeke absently rubs a hand over his chest where his heart beats underneath. “I don’t know. Something’s wrong,” he repeats.
“What? You have heartburn?”
Zeke doesn’t even notice my sarcasm as he continues to frown. “No. I mean that something is wrong withSeth.”
Thorin’s eyes fly open while I quickly sit up. “He’s hurting you?”
In the past, tricking Zeke into feeling pain was a common tactic for Seth whenever he desperately wanted out.
“No.” Zeke’s frown deepens. “That’s the thing…” He looks more than a little anxious when his green gaze meets mine. Before Aurelia, that look would have put Thorin and me on high alert because it meant that Seth was responsible, but now we’re calm as we watch Zeke rub his chest. He drops his hand a moment later as his green gaze bounces between us, something like panic rising within those murky depths. “I-I can’t…I can’t feel Seth at all.”
AURELIA
The sheriff’s strategy is pretty effective. By the fifth hour, I’m ready to crack.
He’s just returned from his third coffee break after interrogating me for half an hour, and like the other times, he quietly reads over my written statement while taking slow sips of his coffee and once he’s done, he sits back in his chair, folds his hands over his belly, and asks me to recount my story again from start to finish.
It’s obvious that he’s looking for holes or any small change in my story, but I’m media trained, so it never wavers.
“Okay, you’re right. You got me. I was abducted, Sheriff Kelly.” I wait until he straightens with a jerk, flips his notepad to a blank page, and plucks his pen from his shirt pocket, the ballpoint poised over the page in preparation to take my statement. “By aliens.”
“Ms. George…” The sheriff sighs before dropping his pen and pushing his notepad to the side. “Refusing to cooperate will not help you or those boys. I also feel obligated to remind you that I’m still deciding whether or not to chargeyouwith obstruction of justice. It’s in your best interest to take this seriously and answer my questions honestly.”
“I have answered you honestly. Several times. Your refusal to accept the truth is the only obstruction I see.”
“Perhaps I should keep you here over the weekend. Give you time to consider what you remember before we speak again.”
My blood runs hot as I study the sheriff silently. He waits patiently for me to decide my next course of action. “No,” I finally answer. “We’re done here. I’d like to call my lawyer now.”
The sheriff is visibly startled before he nods in disappointment and stands from the table to leave. “I’ll get you a phone.”
He leaves and comes back immediately, carrying a landline inside and setting it in front of me along with a steaming cup of coffee before leaving the room again.
The door closes with a quiet snick, and even when the sound of his departing footsteps fades, I don’t move. I stare at the black phone for ten solid minutes before I sigh and snatch up the receiver from the base.
As I dial, I draw forth the image of the tiny black numbers printed on the face of a crumpled business card. It was passed to me in secret nine years ago at one of the many industry parties my uncle dragged me to. I was newly eighteen and should have had control over my life, and apparently it had been obvious to all—or maybe just the shrewd and no-nonsense A&R rep at Savant—that I hadnosay, no autonomy, and certainly no control.
She’d slipped me her card and told me to use it when I grew a spine.
I remember thinkingwhat a bitchand liking her immediately.
Still, I’d nearly thrown out her card right then and there—partly out of misplaced loyalty to my uncle but mostly out of fear. Butsomethinghad stopped me, and whatever it was, I’m grateful for it now. Instead, I clung to her card over the years like a life raft while I drifted hopelessly in the endless sea of my uncle’s tyranny.
This is the first time I’ve ever dared try to kick my feet and swim for the shore, and as the line rings and rings and rings, Isqueeze my eyes closed and pray that I’m not too late. That she hasn’t lost interest. I’ve never dialed the number—not even once. I have no idea if it still even works or if the music exec, who’d been my uncle’s fiercest rival at the label, would even still deem me worthy.
Suddenly, the ringing stops, and I hold my breath as I wait to hear the recorded message for her voicemail.
A moment later, her voice comes through, but it’s clear by the sound of her clicking heels in the background and the sharp bite of her rushed greeting that it isn’t a recording. “Oni Sridhar and make it quick. Whoever this is, you get the first two minutes free and then I start billing for my time.”
I pause twirling the coiled cord of the landline phone around my finger and snort. “Seriously? Are you that money hungry or is Bound paying you so little?”
